Its Vital that the Census Include as Many Homeless as Possible

The census generally doesn't include nearly as many homeless as there really are. This is a very important for America's homeless. The more homeless people counted in the census, the more government funding will go towards programs that help them getting housing and food. Hopefully, more homeless will go to shelters to be counted, because if the government spends more to help them, then they will have a better chance of getting back on their feet. This isn't always possible for them to do on their own.

Opportunities for Underprivileged to go to College

Amazing news for kids who'll enter college starting 2014. When repaying student loans, students only have to pay 10% of their income per month. And after 20 years, if they paid 10% of their income every month toward the loan, then the remaining debt is dropped. This is great for families who can't afford to send their kids to college, because now more kids will be able to pay it off themselves. So even if parents don't have a job, their kids can have a future.

Westboro Baptist Church Gets Money from Father of Dead Soldier

I'm going to keep this short because the Westboro Baptist Church(WBC) enrages me, and I don't want to get too worked up.
The WBC can be seen picketing soldier's funerals, holding signs that say things such as "God Hates Fags", "Thank God for Dead Soldiers", and things of that nature.

Among the teachings of the church, which was founded in 1955 by pastor Fred Phelps, is the belief that God is punishing the United States for "the sin of homosexuality" through events such as soldiers' deaths.

I personally cannot comprehend how that thought enters one's mind in the first place.
In a particular case, the WBC was picketing outside of the funeral Matthew Snyder. Snyder's father sued the organization.

Snyder's family sued the church and went to trial in 2007 alleging privacy invasion, intentional infliction of emotional distress and civil conspiracy.

This was combated by the church. They said their rights to free speech were being violated. At first the courts sided on Snyder's side, but a year later they've sided with the WBC. I would be able to accept charges being dropped, but the courts decided to make Snyder pay.

The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday ordered that Snyder pay more than $16,000 in costs requested by Westboro for copies of motions, briefs and appendices, according to court documents.

I am extremely upset by this. People are standing outside of a funeral with signs acknowledging that the deceased deserved to die. And now the family is paying the group of people.
I can honestly say that some of the things this country does makes me want to pick up and leave. The injustices often infuriate me.

The Reign of AT&T Could Be Over

Since it's release, AT&T has been the only cell phone service that works with the Apple Iphone. Recently, however, there' buzz that Iphones will become compatible with Verizon as well as AT&T. This is most likely just the jumping off point for the Iphone to eventually become compatible with multiple carriers. This would be great for Apple, and their stock would probably go up. I'm all for any break-up of a monopoly. So I'd say this is beneficial in the long run.

How to Outsmart O'Reilly

This is one of my favorite videos on the internet. You've got comedian Steven Colbert being interview by Bill O'Reilly. Bill O'Reilly is a conservative, and Colbert is liberal, but on his show and in the interview he plays a character that is a highly conservative republican. Steven doesn't even attack or mock O'Reilly, but rather effortlessly makes him look so ignorant. It is so clear here that Colbert is mocking O'Reilly, and O'Reilly just does not pick up on it. Colbert says "I want to bring your message of love and peace, which I understand that is your message, I want to bring the message of love and peace to a younger audience, people in their sixties, people in their fifties, people who don't watch your show." O'Reilly responds with "People in their fifties and sixties, too young for 'the Factor' are watching your show..." .And it seems that everyone gets it but O'Reilly, as you can hear people on the set laughing.



Now in this second video, you have John Stewart doing a straight interview with O'Reilly. He's giving very intelligent answers, and O'Reilly even says in response to one of his answers, "woah, that's way over my head!". Now, by giving legitimate analysis, he is able to have more of a conversation, but also it seems that he is more vulnerable to ad hominem attacks. This second video is less entertaining, but still very interesting.

What I gathered from watching these two videos and comparing them, is that if you want to make someone whom you know is stupid look stupid, then all you have to do is sit back and let them talk.

Using Marijuana Legally Can Still Cost You Your Job

Joseph Casias is a resident of Michigan, where marijuana is legal. He developed cancer of the nasal cavity and began using medical marijuana as a pain reliever. He was an employee at Wal-Mart, but when he was drug tested and he didn't pass, he was fired.

"I was angry they did this to me because I always tried my best," said Casias, who was employed at Wal-Mart for five years. He earned an Associate of the Year award in 2008. "I want my job back. I thought I was part of the Wal-Mart family."

Joseph also says that he had never come to work high. I understand why this would be the case if marijuana was illegal, but it isn't. To me this is equivalent to firing someone over 21 who drinks on the weekends. They never show up to work drunk, and it doesn't impair their performance, so what is the problem?

I believe that Wal-Mart has questionable morals in the first place, but this is something that should be changed. Now is not an appropriate time to be firing people. Being fired for using marijuana is also going to hinder their ability to get another job if they have to say why they were fired from their last one.

Part of Michigan's law, passed in 2008, does address employers, saying a patient carrying a medical marijuana card cannot be "denied any right or privilege" by a "business or occupational or professional licensing board."

It clearly states that it is not legitimate to fire someone for legally using marijuana. I believe that Wal-Mart should either give Joseph his job back, or be sued, end of story.

Recalls can Destroy Businesses

"Peanut Corporation of America, the company at the crux of the nationwide salmonella panic, filed for liquidation bankruptcy in February 2009, just a month after it first announced a recall of peanut butter products processed in its Blakely, Ga., plant. ...The salmonella outbreak sickened more than 700 people in 46 states and led to nine deaths."

It's things like this that make me scared to eat any processed food. Clearly there is a direct correlation between the outbreak and the company going bankrupt. With the number of outbreaks and recalls that happens, it seems that companies simply aren't cautious enough about the ingredients they use and the conditions in which they make their food. Not only was the outbreak responsible for nine deaths and many more sicknesses, but anyone who was employed at this corporation was out of work. That number is most likely in upwards of hundreds of people.

So, among a climate of people just getting back up on their feet, many more are put out of work. What's more, the plants closing affect local economies. It will be extremely difficult for people to get jobs in the town they live in because so many others are trying as well. In extreme cases, the crime rate in towns go up, and as a result, value of homes go down, and the cycle continues. But corporations are never held liable for the fates of the people that lose their jobs because of their irresponsibility. Corporations have nearly no liability, but they most definitely should.
Corporations need to be more responsible, because there is more at risk than the product they make being absent from store shelves.

Biden's Big Mouth is at it Again

Oh Biden, you're always saying inappropriate things. In general, this isn't so bad. But he is the vice president. It simply gives the right wing more fuel, more things to call the Obama administration out on. But you always need someone to spice things up, right?

How Will This Law Affect You?

With the passage of the Health Care bill, many are likely wondering how it will affect them. Will the United States become a socialist nation with everything controlled by the government?! Despite what many conservatives are saying, that isn't the case.

But back to what will happen in regards to your health care:

-No Caps.

Previously, many health care plans had a cap, or a maximum amount you could spend in a year/in your lifetime before you had to start paying out-of-pocket. That won't happen anymore. This affects people with serious illnesses, as they will never be kicked out of treatment or go bankrupt because of their disease.

-Drug Discounts for Seniors

-No more being denied for pre-existing conditions (not effective immediately)

-Tax Breaks (amount would be determined on household income).

So those are a few of the things that we can expect in the immediate, and not so immediate future. Hopefully this bill will pull us out of some debt in the long run.

Health Care Happenings

This health care bill may be one of the most influential pieces of legislation to get passed or killed this decade. If it passes, the United States could be saved from trillions of dollars worth more of deficits in the future. Obama and the House of Representatives are both confident that the bill will have enough votes to pass.

The Washington Post offers a minute-by-minute update of who is voting yes and who is voting no.

here's the status of the votes as of 2:03 pm pacific time: (click image to enlarge)

This Cobbler Isn't Going Anywhere

In these hard economic times, those independent businesses that stay open seem to be the ones that offer unique services. For example, this man is a cobbler, that is he fixes shoes. Being as not many cobblers are around anymore, he doesn't have much competition. Also, as he explains, you can pay 12.50 to get a heel put on your shoe, or you can buy a new pair for 100. So, in a bit of a twisted way, the recession is actually giving him a few more customers who can't afford to buy new shoes. However, he does say that business this year is much better than last year, on the whole.

Chernoffs Stay Off the Street

The Chernoff's are all unemployed at the moment, but are managing to live on unemployment checks for the time being. It's very fortunate that this family had enough money before hand to be able to afford that. However, many people without jobs may have worked at part-time jobs, such as fast food restaurants, and they don't receive unemployment checks. Additionally, families may have 4 or 5 children to feed rather than just one. Being able to stick to a frugal life style without unnecessary spending is definitely a skill that American's, including myself, need to learn.

Nigerian prince still wants your money!

This article from CNN discusses something that I've always found funny, because of how ridiculous it seems. Unfortunately, people do fall for it.

Internet fraud cases surged by 22% in 2009, and financial losses doubled compared to the year before as scammers took advantage of Americans rendered desperate by the recession.

This article details how much money has been lost collectively by the American people because of internet scams. You've probably seen them in your junk email folder, they ask you for your banking information and you will apparently receive lots of money. Of course if you gave out your information, you would quickly lose lots and lots of money. This is very unfortunate for those who were so desperate in this recession they took a risk, and lost.

A long-running Internet scam involving a fictional Nigerian Prince is still in cyberspace, Kane said. In this scam, a "prince" promises vast riches in exchange for your banking information.
Most people don't fall for an obvious scam like that, but there are enough gullible victims to keep the fraudsters in business, he explained.

So when roaming the net, be cautious. Anything asking for things like your social security number or other personal information should be approached with care. A place where scammers find opportunities is in the job market, where they will post fake job applications to receive your personal info.

The message is, be careful kids.

They Want to Kill the Bill

In this lovely video, we have conservatives rallying against health care. Chanting "Kill the Bill". What they apparently are so livid about is the fact that the government will control health care.
Tom Price: "Is that what you want?"
People: "NO!"

Listen, Tom, what I don't want is to have to pay so much money for medical bills and health insurance that I can't afford to get through college or buy a house when I'm out of it.
We need health care reform. According to Tom Price, this Bill is "betraying fundamental American principles". Well, if you mean that it is giving everyone good care, and actually looking out for the citizens of this country, then yes, I suppose it is betraying your fundamental principles.

Teacher Calls Student Loser

A North Carolina public school teacher has been suspended for writing the word “loser” on a 6th grade student’s notebook. “He thought it was funny, the kids thought it was funny…our school district doesn’t think it’s funny,” said Jan Blunt, Communications Director for Buncombe County Schools.

I fully believe in teachers joking around with students, because most of my teachers are like that, and I have a good sense of humor. However, I think if a teacher is going to joke around with his or her students, they have to have a good sense of how far they can go without offending certain kids. The way it sounded to me from the video, the mom saw the comments, the child didn't complain about them. It's appropriate that they suspended the teacher because he had prior warnings, but I think firing the teacher would be too drastic of a move. It's unfortunate that he will have to censor himself around students.

Can Borrowing Money be Dangerous?

Many are trying to hold their own during this recession and recovery.

"Unless it's a real emergency, lending money enforces dependency, rather than someone going out there and trying to do it on their own," Gurney said. "It reinforces someone feeling like a child again, that they have to come back to their family. That's not a good place to be in."

Says psychologist Kathleen Gurney. Amid these hard times in our economy, many may be tempted to lend money to family members in need. Initially, this would seem simply a selfless act, but there can be consequences for even the most generous lender.
Ruth Mantrell, in her article for marketwatch.com, points out that borrowing money can cause problems for some one too. If one borrows money, the lender many times will become too involved in the borrower's life, as a result of wanting to know what the money is being spent on. This would be quite a nuisance, and fosters dependence on the part of the borrower. Some may even lend out money just so they can have a sense of control over others, which isn't healthy.

"The relationship is the most important thing to guard here. Have an agreement; it can be a handwritten agreement. Help the family member come up with a game plan, how they are going to pay you back," Gurney said.

What is important is that all consequences are considered before borrowing or lending money. There should be a written agreement, and a plan should be set up on how the borrower will repay the lender. This way everything is secure.

Moderate Hiring for the Upcoming Quarter

Cautiously Optimistic. That's the term most everyone has been using for the state of the economy, and rightly so. But cautiously optimistic is still optimistic. Recent data has suggested some good things for the number of jobs in America today.

Around 6% of firms say they plan on hiring, as opposed to -2% last year. Better yet, over 70% of employers don't intend on firing any staff, which should put many at ease. So the job situation we have may not be getting better fast, but it isn't getting worse, and that is a start. The fact that employers aren't hiring rapidly is a good thing, because it could cause problems if the economy began shrinking quickly.

Ruth Mantell on marketwatch.com provides the figures for the employment outlook in the upcoming quarter, and they are definitely a reason to be hopeful.

"For each industry sector, here are the figures for the net employment outlook for the second quarter, not seasonally adjusted, in order of most positive first.

Leisure and hospitality, 17% in the second quarter, up from 4% in the first quarter

Professional and business services, 15%, up from 5%

Mining, 11%, up from -1%

Manufacturing, nondurable goods, 9%, up from 1%

Financial activities, 9%, up from 2%

Transportation and utilities, 8%, up from -6%

Manufacturing, durable goods, 8%, up from -3%

Information, 8%, up from 0% "

A restored economy may not be too far out of reach.

Save Some Extra Cash

There are some relatively easy ways that you can save some extra cash, which everyone could use nowadays.
When looking for good deals on travel, George Mannes from CNN writes:

For last-minute deals and extras such as free meals, sign up for all the airline and hotel-chain loyalty programs and newsletters you can, says George Hobica, founder of airfarewatchdog.com. And check kayak.com.

And Mannes also shows you how to fix the fact that you may be getting too much money deducted from your paycheck.

With the average federal tax refund around $2,700, chances are you've been giving the government an interest-free loan by having too much money pulled out of your paycheck. With your most recent pay stubs and tax return handy, go to irs.gov and use the withholding calculator to get specific instructions for filling out new W-4s. Your payroll department will adjust your withholding accordingly.

Also, Mannes says, Qualifying Expenses (aka things that your job will pay for) could include more than you might think, such as contact lenses solution or at-home pregnancy tests. These benefits should be taken advantage of.

So take advantage of these things! A little savings here and there can add up in the long run.

Good Enough for God, It's Good Enough for Palin!

I got a good laugh when I heard about Palin writing her talking points on her palm, but it really didn't seem like a big problem to me. I'd probably forget some stuff if I was under that much pressure to impress the nation to. But then, she said this:
"Hey, if it was good enough for god scribbling on the palm of his hand, its good enough for me".
My main problems with this statement are that:
1) God and Politics should be completely separate. Separation of church and state, for cryin' out loud. (She should've written that somewhere on herself). The fact that "god wrote on his hand" has nothing to do with her inability to remember what she wants to talk about.
2) She just compared herself to god. God wrote on his hands, so I can do it too, since me and god are pretty much the same.
I may be an atheist but seeing as Palin holds her God in pretty high regard, she should not have compared herself to him/her.

We are not a "Christian Nation", and it's slightly disturbing that some identify it as that. Personally, I'd vote that politicians shouldn't be allowed to use any reference to religion in there campaigns, end of story.

Nissan LEAF

Boy oh boy, am I smitten for the new Nissan LEAF.

This car is 100% electric, 0 emissions and boasts 100 miles of driving on a single charge, which is absolutely wonderful. Oh and it's a 5 passenger car. None of that smartcar 2 passenger junk. This will let the car be usable by so many more drivers.

A full charge costs less than 3 dollars. Another awesome aspect is that you can preheat or pre-cool the car before you get in it using your smart phone, and the LEAF can send your phone an alert when it is fully charged.

All this information can be found on the Nissan website, which says the car will be available late 2010. And it claims the LEAF will be "affordable", whatever that means. I have high hopes for this car.

Waiting on Health Care

Health care is still a highly debated topic, even after the health care summit. It seems some progress was made, but there are still a lot of things that are holding this bill back from being passed. David M. Herszenhorn writes for the New York Times about the issue:

Some House Democrats who voted for the health care bill in November have said that they will oppose any version of the legislation that does not include the tight restrictions on insurance coverage for abortions that they succeeded in inserting into the House measure. Mr. Obama’s plan adopts the Senate provisions on the abortion issue, which are less restrictive.

This means that there are still things to work out with the issue of abortion funding, among other things. I am pro-choice, and therefore believe that the government should fund abortions. While each party is trying to get what they want in the bill, the Democrats are working at a way to speed up the process of passing this bill. Herszenhorn writes:

At this point, Democrats and Republicans have concluded that the only way the health care legislation can be completed is for Democrats to make revisions to the Senate-passed bill and attach those revisions to a budget reconciliation measure.

To be completely honest, reconciliation confuses the heck out of me, and I'm still trying to understand it. But if the bill can get passed faster, I'm all for it. This bill just needs to get passed, one way or another, because as soon as it is, focus can go back to pulling the economy up and getting it back on its feet.

Bargain Hunting... At the Doctors?

The basic idea of this, is to show that if you need a "simple" procedure, it is in your best interest to go looking at different practices, because some are radically cheaper than others. So why doesn't everyone do this? Well, in my family, we all have one doctor that we've been seeing for almost our entire lives, and we trust our doctors. So I think many people would rather just stick with their own doctors and be confident they will get good treatment. And though this "bargain hunting" may be beneficial, it might not help those whose health care only allows them to go to a specific doctor or hospital. That all being said, I think it's worth considering, especially if it means saving a chunk of cash.