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This will be a good case for the Supreme Court to set some standards, because according to Lawyer Stephen S. Smith, “There is a fair amount of First Amendment law in the area of sexual explicitness and obscenity, but there is not nearly as much law on the issue of violence and what may be restricted or not under the First Amendment in that arena.”  Opponents of this law argue that there is a rating system for video games that allows parents to decide on what their child can play.  They also believe that these video games are protected forms under the First Amendment.  Supporters of the law believe, “The Supreme Court has upheld laws keeping minors from buying or having access to pornography, alcohol and tobacco. And the California law does not ban parents from purchasing or buying the video games for their children.”  I know this statement is not a bank, but it makes no cents to me.  This case seems closely tied with the recent ruling by the Supreme Court, in which depictions of animal cruelty were kept legal until the law banning them becomes more descriptive.  Supporters are hoping that because the court also chose to hear this one, that they are wanting to focus on this more narrow topic of video games.

My first comment, “Why would the Terminator sign a bill banning violent video games?” This just seems ironic to me.  I personally think that the Supreme Court should vote the law as unconstitutional and let the U.S. sell violent video games to minors.  It’s not that they are selling Grand Theft Auto IV to a five year old.  At least in Iowa, you have to be at least 17 to buy/rent a video game rated “M.”  The Miller test could be applied to see if these games could be classified as obscene, but if they ban the selling of these games to minors, then what would be the difference between that and allowing a minor to go to a rated “R” movie.  They would have to ban both, and this would create too much controversy.  I also believe this law should be banned, because they don’t have hard evidence.  The law was shut down in the first place, because they didn’t have the evidence that these games were actually harmful to minors.  I myself played Grand Theft Auto: III, Vice City, and San Andreas for the PS2 when I was in middle school.  All of these games were rated “M” and were very violent.  I have only received one detention between middle school and high school and I have never been arrested.  I’ve never even been pulled over, and I have been driving since I was 12.

Bill White is trying to do something very tough here.  Texas is a state flooded with Republicans and taking over as a Democrat governor is very tough to do.  Let’s look at what he’s got going for him.  He knows that being labeled as Democrat may hurt his chances, so he is trying to take a more independent route and claiming to be conservative.  This is a good call, as Texas is mostly conservative.  One of the other main things going for him is his appeal to the Hispanic population.  There is a growing demographic change in Texas, with the Hispanic population growing.  Since Hispanics tend to vote Democrat, White feels good about his chances.  Despite this, there are many disadvantages to his campaign.  As mayor, Bill White was a member of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, and we all know how them Texans love their guns!

I personally hope the best for Bill White.  He has a shot at winning the gubernatorial race, but he needs to put a lot of effort into his campaign game.  It is easier to enforce and activate voters than it is to convert them, so he needs to activate new interest in his campaign.  Using his fiscally conservative label, he may do well in activating new interest into his campaign run by Democrats.  He also needs to enforce the Hispanic vote, because he will need their vote in order to win.  I hope that Bill White beats Rick Perry, because he seems like a very fit candidate.  Whether the many Republicans of Texas think so is a different story.

It seems that community newspapers are coming out on top right now, but what about the information in metro-dailies that isn’t covered in a local paper?  The internet is taking a lot of the blame for that.  Many large news companies post stories online, absolutely free.  If you want to know about the Ed Thomas murder, (which wouldn’t be found in a local paper) instead of buying a daily paper, you could go online for the information absolutely free.  

I can definitely relate with this issue because my family has done the same thing.  We used to receive The Des Moines Register, but it just became too pricey.  We now only get The Grinnell Herald Register.  The panelists all agreed that news agencies are crazy for providing news online for free.  I agree with them in saying that online news sites should require a paid subscription.  I believe it is necessary to do this if metro-daily newspapers want to remain living in the future.

            Reducing the deficit is on the forefront of Bayh’s agenda, and is also on President Obama’s agenda as well.  What centrists are not happy about is the left liberal’s inability to cooperate.  Leftist liberals are being selfish and wanting to run congress their way, and they are abusing centrist democrats for leaning a little bit more to the right on these issues.  Bayh wants the budget to be reduced but the left liberals aren’t cooperating to form a plan to get it done.  A reason democrats could be trying to lean more to the left is because they are following suit of the Republican Party.  The Republican Party in the past has been more on the conservative side, than democrats have been on the liberal side.  The democrats just could be trying to compete with the Republican Party.

            I believe that the Democratic Party is doing something wrong here.  I don’t know why they are being such bullies to fellow democrats when they should be cooperating with them.  If they want this health care reform bill to be passed, they should be working with their fellow democrats to form policies and ideas they can all agree with.  Cooperation is also needed with the republicans.  I think Bayh is right in thinking that something NEEDS to be done to reduce the deficit and that congress should strengthen bipartisan efforts.  Overall I feel that the Democratic Party is going to regret doing this when elections come up next fall.

If Obama “continues on the path that he has America on today,” Palin said, “he’s not going to win.  That’s what a lot of Americans are telling him today, and he’s not listening.

“Instead, he’s telling everybody else, ‘Listen up and I’ll tell you the way it is.’ Well, we have a representative form of government in our democracy. And we want him and we want Congress to listen to what the things are that we are saying.”

Sarah believes that the upset victory of Republican Scott Brown to fill the Senate seat has told our nation that we all are fed up with Obama and he needs to change his attitude.  When asked if she would run on the Republican ticket in 2012, or if the Tea Party would become a separate party, she responded that the Republican Party should absorb the Tea Party as much as possible so they can work together in the 2012 race.

            Sarah Palin believes that if Obama doesn’t change his ways he would lose and possibly to her.  Could this happen?  Right now the bad taste of conservative President Bush is still in our mouths so I think it would be hard for America to make the conservative switch.  When she mentions that we have a representative form of government and he’s not listening, there are some key arguments that could be made.  One, is that the Tea Party and part of America want to see the “change” Obama proposed way too fast.  He may have added on to the deficit, but something needed to be done to get the U.S. economically stabilized somewhat.  Plus, the national deficit was extremely high before President Obama was elected into office, an act committed by Republican former President Bush.

            In my opinion I think Sarah Palin is crazy.  She believes she has a chance because of Obama’s failure to represent us and listen to what we are saying.  I think President Obama made a good job of pointing out in the State of the Union address that change can’t happen in a year when our country is so far under debt wise and economically.  I’m hoping that a lot of people will continue to be “nature of the times” voters and not vote for Sarah Palin, or any conservative Republican as they may still look back on Bush’s Presidency and how that turned out.  Even if President Obama doesn’t do a good job in these next 3 years, people might still see Sarah Palin as an inexperienced woman, just like in the 2008 elections.  This being said I wouldn’t mind her running in 2012 if it meant that her stupidity and inexperience would cost her the election.  Good Luck Sarah!

With the new age of technology newspapers are starting to die out.  People nowadays have the information on their finger tips with easy access to political articles online through their laptops, or even in their pockets through their cellphone.  Professional journalists are being taken over by politically participating bloggers who are just ordinary folks.  This new world has led us to the question of the millisecond, “Should we be concerned about the ‘death of the newspapers’?”  My answer is YES.

Political bloggers and analysts rely on professional articles to base their discussion on.  If we eliminated the professional unbiased articles our news wouldn’t consist of hard facts.  It would just be a bunch of people’s opinions, which wouldn’t be very reliable.

Taken from source #2

If field reporting dies out, the world will become a less known place. Vast areas will simply not be covered, and those that are will not be covered from multiple perspectives. Precisely because reporters are imperfect, because they by necessity capture only a fragment of reality, it is essential that numerous firsthand accounts exist. If Reuters, the Times and all the other newspapers with foreign bureaus have died and only the AP reporter is telling us what happened in China, readers will be forced to accept his or her version without being able to compare it. And that faint gleam of empirical evidence will be lost amid the infinite amount of commentary that will instantly dominate the Internet.

The consequences of the “death of newspapers” would be harmful to our society.  Without the firsthand reporting, we would fall into an ignorant pit of doom with many people not knowing what is really going on.  This is what source #2 has to say.

The civic consequences would be just as calamitous. With little empirical evidence about the world, the country would divide further into solipsistic, isolated communities. There would be no agreement on even the most rudimentary facts: We would look back nostalgically at those days when “only” half of Americans were so ill-informed, and susceptible to government propaganda, that they believed that Saddam Hussein was involved with 9/11. Rancorous division into exclusive camps would become even more pronounced than it is now, making political compromises even less likely. In this ignorant yet loudly opinionated future, our shared civic culture would degenerate, and demagogic leaders would flourish.

I believe in the statement, “The Internet gives readers what they want, newspapers give them what they need.” very strongly.  If you are a sports junky, you would go online and read a lot of sports articles.  This is informing you on what you want, but its not informing you on other important issues such as what political candidates stand for, or what is going on to help with the earthquake in Haiti.  You are getting what you want, but not what you need.  You are still an ill-informed ignorant citizen.  With newspapers on the other hand, you see various types of stories (including sports) which allows you to be well informed in all the areas that you should be to be a good citizen.  This next quote is also taken from #2.

It’s much easier to consume unfamiliar information in a newspaper than on the Internet. Because of the physical layout of a newspaper, you’re much more likely to read a story you aren’t interested in than you would if you were online. Even if the same reported stories were available online, they would not be as widely read. Online media is tailored to respond to the individual’s conscious desires; it is less capable of stimulating latent ones.

I believe that yes, the new-age of digital news is good for obtaining knowledge faster, but it lacks in first-hand reporting and keeping the public informed on all the issues of our society.

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