Immigration Laws needs to be refurbished

I came across an article titled “Good and Immigration Law” written by one of my classmate, Fabian Mangana. His article is about some of the pros and cons of the recently passed “Arizona Immigration Law”. I agree with him that Arizona’s “Immigration Law” is a “win/lose situation in some ways”. A “win” situation because it’s a fact that the violence situation in Arizona State is increasing and getting out of control and something needs to be done about it, but it’s also a “lose” situation because the way Jan Brewer is proposed to do it somehow it creates a racial profiling, which at the end it results in a violation of our civil rights.
I agree with Mangana that if you have nothing to hide, it should not be a problem, but it’s not about having something to hide or not, it’s about our civil rights as resident of United States, legally or not and racial segregation. He mentions that he wouldn’t mind to get pulled over and get ask for residency proof, but then exactly what are you going to show them, your drive license (DL)? Here in Texas, you can get a DL with a “Temporary Resident Identification Card (I-688)”, so once you get a DL and maybe later on your I-688 expires and you become “illegal”, in other words anybody can carry a DL and not necessarily means that person is a “legal US resident”. I’m from Puerto Rico, and my facial features are very similar of somebody from Mexico, so if a get pulled over and get ask for my proof of residence, even that I have nothing to worry about, there is really nothing that will proof that, unless I carry my birth certificate with me at all times. Also give that kind of power to our “law enforcement” officers it’s giving too much freedom and chance for corruption. I believe that what needs to be done is start making the requirements to get a “proof of legal residence” more strict. Also creates some sort of agencies that assist the IRS in going to private companies and ask for proof of legal residence of each worker without discriminating what racial backgrounds the workers have. Also just like Mangana proposed that “current illegal immigrants should go through an application process to become legal citizens, with a deadline of about 2 years. Once that deadline passes, everyone who resides in the United States of America should carry paperwork and if it’s determined that you are here illegally, you get deported.”I understand that we need to take control about the immigration status in our country and I believe this could be at least a good starting point.

Puerto Rico Democracy Act of 2010 and its political status

The Puerto Rico Democracy Act of 2010 (H.R.2499) is a bill that would provide a federally authorized referendum giving Puerto Ricans the choice between the options of retaining their present political status, or choosing a new status. The referendum would be split in two votes, the first vote would ask whether Puerto Rico (PR) should keep its current political commonwealth status or if it should be change. If the majority of the voters chose to keep the present status, then PR would be authorized the cast an identical vote every eight years. In the other hand, if the majority of the voters request to change PR current political state, another ballot will be require to select between independence, sovereignty in association with the United States (US), or statehood. Whichever the results is, the President and the Congress will be notified, but there is no requirement of them to take any action in response to the vote. Under the H.R2499 act, the ballot would be open to all voters in Puerto Rico who are currently eligible to vote, as well as all U.S. citizens born in Puerto Rico who comply with guidelines determined by the Puerto Rico State Elections Commission, whether they live in Puerto Rico or not. During the referendum, all ballots will be required to be available in English and a certification of the voting results must be given to US. Also Puerto Rico would have to run with all expenses associated with any voting process. I have read many comments of people relating to Puerto Rico as a financial burden, since according with them PR median household income of approximately $18K per year would not be able to share the “dreaded federal income tax and assuming a segment of the national debt.” It surprised me people can be this ignorant and publicly comment without knowing the truth. But here is my “two cents”, Puerto Rico is been United States territory since the Organic Act of 1900 (Foraker Law). Puerto Rico had fought in all wars involving US since it became United States territory. The US President can call for military duty any Puerto Rican to participate in a war if a draft is implemented. Puerto Ricans already paid federal taxes in the form of Social Security as well as other federal taxes. In other words Puerto Rico already share and support any issues related to United States, but in addition they have “taxation with no representation”. As of now, Puerto Rico has no vote in the US presidential elections, because they don’t have any representation in the Congress, so they have 0 Electoral College votes. So, think about it, if you live in US and move to PR you will not be able to vote in the US presidential elections because PR have 0 Electoral College votes, but if you move to China, you will NOT lose your US Presidential voting rights because you can vote absentee in the US embassy. In my opinion, Puerto Rico should be given the opportunity, as many times need it, to become a state of the United States of America. Puerto Rico already pays the price to be an American, so they should be heard as well during presidential elections and other decisions of this country. As a Puerto Rican, born and raised in the island, I think Puerto Rico should be a state, but one thing I must disagree with the H.R.2499 is that the Puerto Ricans NOT LIVING in the island would be able to vote for Puerto Rico’s political status. I think that only Puerto Ricans RESIDING in the island should be the ones deciding the future of PR, because they are the ones that will be getting directly affected by the voting outcome. Nevertheless, since according with the bill, I will be able to vote even though I no longer live in Puerto Rico, you can bet that I’ll be there in the front line casting my vote.

Step up or you'll see where ignorance is taking you...

As an assignment of my US Government class I had to read all my peers blogs and one of them actually called out my attention the most. The Blog is titled Apiodicy, and it is about the ignorance that we carry constantly about our nation politics and what our government representatives were, are, and can be. Also it kind of mentioned the amount of power the president is getting due to the lack of interest that we give to it. I totally agree with her in how the government is intruding into our every day right to privacy. I believe that our government at a “slow but steady pace” is taking control of our surroundings forcing us, the people, to take the decisions that they want us to take. The Corporate Controlled Media is an example of how the government is persuading your decision making on national topics that affects our lives. Due to this control propaganda everyday uninformed citizen’s are mislead, therefore they decide to not question their elected officials on issues that could affect our constitutional rights and our future as a democratic nation. With this said, we need to step up and start getting more informed about our nation’s issues and what exactly our constitutional rights are, and doing so we may become an actual important part of the decision making for our nation instead of being a government controlled marionette relying so much in the government to guide us in the decision making process. We need to realize that all our nation’s matters, directly or indirectly, affects us in one way or another.

Political Campaign Finance Reform

Do you know why and how the money for the electoral campaigns is regulated? Well, money has been related with the elections since the origin of the electoral process in the United States. The elections started with candidates like George Washington. When he ran for the Virginia House Burgesses in 1758, his election manager “prized” each one of the voters with a half gallon of alcoholic beverages as a token for Freeholders on the Election Day. Since then, during each electoral campaign, more and more money has been involved during the electoral campaigns. In 1971 the Congress passed a comprehensive redo of the campaign finance regulations with the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA). But the FECA was too broad, so in 1974 was amended with the introduction of statutory limits on contributions and created the Federal Election Commission (FEC). In 2002 the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) was signed into a federal law. The BCRA is commonly known as "the political effort in the United States to change the involvement of money in politics, primarily in political campaigns.” This Act revised some of the illegal on expenditures set by the FECA, and prohibited unregulated contributions, which usually referred as “Soft money.” But it doesn’t matter how many laws the Congress passed,there are always going to be a loop hole and the candidates are going to use it during their campaigns. For example there is a limit of $2,300 on contribution per individual, but during the last campaign for the presidency of United States in 2008 between Obama and McCain, they were able to accept over $70,000 per individual on behalf of their campaigns. They divided the donations to “meet the law requirements” and gave the rest to their political party’s committees. So as you can see, at the end it does not matter how many laws are created, the truth is, that the size of the pockets of the candidates will determine who the winner is during the elections.

Affortable Care Act... what is it and why I think we need to stop arguing about it?

Matthew Yglesias wrote in his blog an article called: "What's in the Affordable Care Act?". This article talks about some of the things that he believes are the most important benefits coming with the Affordable Care Act (ACA). He empathized how with this act "kids" will be able to stay in their parents insurance until they reach the age of 26 years old. Also he mentioned that no insurance will be able to deny health insurance coverage to children with pre-existing conditions. Between other things he talks about the increment of funding towards the community health centers, the new rebate for medicare beneficiaries to cover the prescription drug coverage once they hit their gap, and how the consumers are going to be more protected against the insurance industry malpractice, or should I say abuse?

The Affordable Care Act (Bill H.R.3590) is a “product of the health care reform agenda of the Democratic 111th Congress and the Obama administration.” This act was designed to “protect” and increase the benefits of the patients. There are many benefits coming with this law, but like everything in this world it has a cost. There are people in favor that believes that due to the large number of uninsured Americans, direct and hidden costs have been created and it’s shared by all, “and that extending coverage to all would lower costs and improve quality”. There are also people that are opposed of to this law because it requires people to have a health insurance, their argument is that this violates their personal freedom and that other ways to reduce health care costs should be considered. I believe that both sides are correct to a certain point. Some of the people that support this act is because they have a loved one that have a medical condition and aren't able to afford treatment without medical insurance. Others are opposed to this act because they only think about themselves, how they would get affected now and not how it might affect them later. In my personal opinion I believe this act would affect people more positive than negative. I used to think like the people that are against this act, because all what I cared about was me and how things would've affect me economically. But now I have a family to take care of and a baby girl that was diagnosed with autism. I have seen how much health services cost when you don’t have a health insurance. I also have seen how, even having insurance, you can still getting denied some services. But thinking in changing insurance is something out of the question, because almost no insurance will cover for services of a “pre-existing condition”. So instead of arguing, yelling, threatened each other and trying to find ways to eliminate this act, what we need to do is act like adults and find a way to amend this bill in a way that “everybody can meet in the middle” and get benefit from it.

Toxins and Autism

I came across an article called “Do Toxins Cause Autism?” by Nicholas D. Kristof, an OP-ED columnist for the NY Times since 2001. Mr. Kristof’s is a journalist widely known for bringing to light the human rights. Mr. Kristof’s article is intended to create consciousness about the amount of toxins that are in the environment and their possible consequences. He’s also trying to bring to light how neglectful the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been. Mr. Kristof points out how there is over 80,000 chemicals registered and how the EPA had only required safety testing in approximately 200 of them. He emphasize that the increasing amount of cases of children with autism, now almost 1 percent of all children (according with a report from the CDC), could be related to toxins in the environment. He also commented that the theme of Autism, “despite their financial and human cost, is something that presumably won’t be discussed much at Thursday’s White House summit on health care.” After reading Mr. Kristof’s article, I mostly agree with it. My daughter has autism and many of the chemicals in the food and the environment affects her in different behavioral ways. We had to go to almost 100% with organics and natural producst in an attempt to provide my daughter with a cleaner and healthier home environment. The reason why autism is not a subject that many people will use during the health care summit is because is all about politics. Politically speaking Autism means more money spent in rehabilitation, so that means not many people will vote for it. Politicians don’t care about the children with autism and the possibility of rehabilitation. They don’t like to spent money in anything that does not affect them directly. All what they care about is how they can get more votes to be re-elected. Also Mr. Kristof mentioned that the theory of vaccines causing autism had caused “catastrophic consequences in lowering vaccination rates in America.” I believed that vaccines have something to do with my daughter’s autism. My daughter was reaching all her milestones on time. When she was vaccinated at twelve months old, was then when our lives changed and autism became part of our lives.

Government strong arm tactics on gun control

NVW News released that “on Friday, June 19, 2009, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report to the US Congress regarding the so-called firearms problem in Mexico.” The GAO report, ”laments the alleged lack of information on gun purchases by US citizens and even faults a lack of background checks conducted on citizens making private firearms sales.” The GAO is pretty much blaming the increment of violent on the border to the American gun owner. Due to all this allegations the ICE, ATF and APD have been working together during the last year in a long-term operation targeting “illegal gun trafficking” that has been going on during the local gun shows in the Austin area. It is not illegal for a private citizen to sale a gun without a license, unless the seller or the buyer had been charged with felony or his/her immigration status is illegal. According with the GAO released reports the majority of the guns involved in Mexico crimes come from US, but this not true, “the fact is, only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been traced to the US,” said Snyder, who also serves as an advisor to the National Association of Chiefs of Police and the American Federation of Police. It just seems that all this exaggerations are just a tool of the government to create more control over the American gun owners in order to justify violating the rights of citizens to own and bear arms, the second amendment of the Bill of Rights, a constitutional right that sticks in the craw of the liberal-left power structure in this country.

The way that the events are taking place it kind of remind me of a theory that I heard a while ago of how the Nazis obtain their power over the Jews. The Nazi government introduced the Gun Control law, which states: “Those now possessing weapons and ammunition are at once to turn them over to the local police authority. Firearms and ammunition found in a Jew’s possession will be forfeited to the government without compensation. Whoever willfully or negligently violates the provisions will be punished with imprisonment and a fine.” The Gun Control law deprived private armies in a mean to defeat them. So at the end if you compare the way that Hitler was elected and obtain all his power thru the voting boxes, was convincing the people that what his was doing was for their own benefit but at the end was only for his own benefit to have complete control over the Jews without giving them a chance to defend themselves. To avoid making the same mistake that the Jews made, we need to continuously defend our rights, specially the right to bear arms.

Thomas Jefferson said: “When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.”