"Why Houston Women Keep Marching" Houston Chronicle, 17 January 2019 https://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/gray-matters/article/Why-Houston-women-keep-marching-13542347.php [Journal Entry 1 - 18 January 2019 at 00:01]
This article focuses on how the various peaceful protests put on by women and their allies in Huston has been an uplifting force for public engagement with politics. It points to numerous problems with both the Texas and National governments, including many barriers to fair voting, and asserts that the only way to counteract that is through "votes, voters, and voting."
I personally question the efficacy of trying to vote away our problems. I don't think voting is useless, I personally make an effort to vote, but it seems to have a very, very limited ability to change the systems our government runs on. The entire government was designed to prevent hasty and/or large changes, and it is unfortunately good at that. It also seems a bit foolish to tell people to end disenfranchisement by voting. Most of the people who are aware of the problem and care about it can't vote.
"Many Families Split at Border Went Untallied" The New Yorker, VOL. CLXVIII….No. 58,211 Friday, January 18, 2019 [Journal Entry 2 – 18 January 2019 at 15:02]
The count of how many children had been separated from their families only includes those counted after a court order was issued in July 2018. A sharp increase in children being separated and referred to Health and Human Services Department was noted as early as 2017. Therefore, government inspectors suspect that the actual numbers may be "thousands" more than the 2,737 that were reported.
While reading this I thought of the Nuremberg trials. I have often heard it said that the reason so many of the Nazis were successfully prosecuted was because they kept meticulous records.
As we have seen with the Kavanaugh hearing and Trump's manipulation of his own investigation, it is already disturbingly difficult to hold our politicians accountable. I worry that a combination of the Trump administration's campaign to discredit all dissenting voices as "fake news," and a lack of clear information could let them get away from this. (This, in addition to the difficulties in accountability listed by Hudson.)
Trump seems to be an excellent jester. His antics, although certainly destructive in their own right, have served to cover up other, serious, injustices.
Julian Castro, former Mayor of San Antonio and currently running for president, has pledged to allow his campaign workers to unionize and pay them $15 an hour.
If he sticks with this it could be a very good thing. This is a very good opportunity to show potential voters that he is willing to follow through on campaign promises. Not to mention the fact that this is simply good for the people working under him.
Of course, if he does make it to the oval office, I have a hard time imagining that congress will agree with anything of the sort. The vast majority of their ability to get reelected comes from businesses that are distinctly anti-union.
"It’s Not a Shutdown, It’s a Lockout and a Shakedown of Federal Workers" The Nation, 23 January 2019 https://www.thenation.com/article/federal-government-shutdown-workers-lockout/ [Journal Entry 4 – 3 February 2019 at 15:39]
The government shutdown is not a political ploy that effects workers negatively. It is a lock out of workers and a key moment in the ongoing labor struggle. Reporting that does not frame the labor struggle as a key issue has become part of the problem. It ignores or downplays the real harms of this power struggle.
Whether or not a shakedown was the president's intention, the fact that this can happen at all is horrifying. Framing this in terms of the real human harm it is doing could be beneficial for ending it. I absolutely agree that 'neutral' language can be misleading.
I feel that political opinions are sort of like music: you can try to be neutral by turning off your music, but all you're actually doing is listening to the ambient noise that always surrounds us, i.e. the status quo. In a world where the majority voice will always be heard, our only hope for equality is a diversity of strong voices rather than a vain attempt to silence all of them.
"Protesters swarm Brooklyn jail that endured polar vortex with no heat" The Washington Post, 3 February 2019 https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/02/03/protesters-swarm-dark-freezing-brooklyn-jail-that-endured-polar-vortex-with-no-heat/?utm_term=.19e554c31a36 [Journal Entry 5 – 3 February 2019 at 19:18]
There have been ongoing protests by human rights advocates and family members of the people incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. According to officials touring the facility as well as the people imprisoned within, it has been without power, heating, hot water, and hot food. The people running the prison have denied that conditions are all that bad and continually maintain "radio silence".
It is absolutely buck-wild to me that the Stanford Prison experiment went horribly wrong in about a week or two, and everyone involved was horrified, yet people are still surprised when prisons made in the same fashion turn out to be inhumane torture pits.
We have given almost supreme power to one group of people over another group of people. Then systematically enforced the idea that the people being imprisoned are disgusting inhuman monsters who deserve pain and imprisonment. Finally, we left the people in power largely in charge of monitoring themselves, and gave them the power to silence the people imprisoned.
Whether intentionally or not, American prisons function in a way that makes human rights violations nearly inevitable.
"Ralph Northam Med-School-Yearbook Page Shows Blackface, KKK Photo" National Review, 1 February 2019 https://www.nationalreview.com/news/ralph-northam-med-school-yearbook-page-shows-blackface-kkk-photo/ [Journal Entry 6 – 4 February 2019 at 12:44]
Virginia governor Ralph Northam admitted that he appeared in his med school yearbook in blackface next to another man in Ku Klux Klan robes. He has said that this does not reflect his current values and pledged to do good work to win back the faith of Virginians. He also made a statement regarding the medical procedures surrounding the care of born-alive babies which some have seen as a defense of letting them die.
I absolutely believe in the potential for personal growth and betterment. I also believe that second chances should not endanger anyone, especially those who were hurt the first time. The fact that he owned up to it so completely speaks well of him. The few mentions of things like publicly objecting to confederate statues do likewise. I am quite wary of politicians, and would need to research the physical impacts of his policies and decisions, but at first glance his apology seems genuine.
The actual quote about medical care seemed like a simple statement of current procedure, with no opinion either way. I'd need to see the full interview to be sure, but it sounded like a reasonable and simple response to a question of procedure.
I must admit, I was half expecting a rant about Political Correctness culture ruining everything. I understand logically that there are reasonable conservatives, but Trump and his wall, Reagan letting us all die of AIDs, and the bible-thumping conversion therapy camp advocates loom so large that it is hard to get a glimpse of them. (This is not to say that I hold much love for many liberals either)
EDIT: 3 March 2019.
In our class discussion of the same topic the next day, it was revealed that he did not own up to his actions as readily as this article implied. I find that this illustrates another danger of neutral language. Neutral language can mask very non-neutral articles like this one to effectively make a persuasive and misleading set of claims. If they had ranted about PC culture, I would have called the lie here, but because they kept a very even tone, I assumed it was simply a statement of fact.
I must be careful of the bias hiding in unassuming language.
"Why Trump Has Struggled to Make His Case" National Journal Daily AM (USA), 5 February 2019 NewsBank, infoweb.newsbank.com/apps/news/document-view?p=WORLDNEWS&docref=news/171674F274D67958. [Journal Entry 7 – 5 February 2019 at 23:14]
Trump is great at creating easily-sensationalized word salad, but is utterly inept at forming a persuasive argument. In order to push his policies through he must convince people that there is a need for them. If he can't give a good persuasive speech, he will never get the support he needs.
I think that Trump's unique form of destructive and flamboyant impotence isn't news to anyone at this point. I've probably only seen a grand total of 15 agonizing minutes of his speeches/rally talks, and that is quite enough to get the picture.
What I really took away from this was the analysis that most people don't agree with his rhetoric. I have felt throughout this presidency that people who oppose or at least don't like Trump's policies were in the minority. I had known that opinion polls showed he wasn't favored, but those honestly seem entirely unreliable. I was also very aware that the electoral college was not particularly faithful to the demands of the actual voters.
I think that I have still been operating under the assumption that American laws and customs assure a large degree of majority rule. Now that I've noticed it though, I think back to all the times a new policy or candidate has been voted in and a seeming majority of citizens have been unhappy with the decision.
My questions now are thus: How exactly has Trump gotten this far on what seems to be very little support? What percentage of our elections have actually resulted in a satisfied majority? How much of what our government does do we even know about? If the will of the majority is not being carried out, who's will is?