Thursday, November 19, 2009

"Fort Hood Under attack review"

I think that your post entitled, “Fort Hood Under Attack”, regarding the incident at fort hood isn’t really a commentary about the U.S. national government. All you really did was recount what happened and give some opinion about how what happened was “wrong” and that you hope the person responsible will receive due punishment. This is a good opinion to defend, but I could not immediately see a direct tie to the nation government, and you do not provide a connection in your post itself. After careful thought and dissection of your post, I noticed that you could have made an argument about the fact that this person had been posting threats on the internet, but the government had failed to notice. If they had simply noticed this fact earlier then perhaps this situation could have been avoided. Although this could have been a connection to make, you did not argue any position on the subject so I believe that this was not meant to be your main point. The overall tone of your post is extremely against this action taking place, but again, I do not see this as a topic of national government, that could just be me though. I think that this topic has potential to become an argument over a topic of national government, but right now all I read is a summary of a terrible event that took place in Fort Hood, with some work I think that you could definitely develop a very strong argument.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Wiretapping without a warrant? ok... NOT!

Oh nation has, and always will be concerned with matters of having or abusing powers. From the time of our nation’s birth, the founding fathers first action was to limit the power as to not allow a single person to have absolute rule over the citizens of the United States of America. In 2005, the issue of power was tested when former President, George W. Bush, authorized the wiretapping of cell phones without the necessary warrant. Somehow, he got off with barely a scratch even though the United States is usually so concerned with invasion of privacy.
I think that this should have resulted in an impeachment for breaking the law. There should not have even been an argument over whether or not his actions were appropriate, it is unacceptable for the man that is supposed to be the face of our country to be able to break the law so easily, and then be able to back up his reasoning for doing so.
This situation is more than just breaking the law, however, and also addresses the popular issue of presidential powers. The executive branch was originally designed to have close to no power as to avoid a tyranny. The more modern idea is that the President does have the most power, but indeed that would most likely be congress. In order to defend his actions, Bush claimed that this was a duty under his power of Chief executive, a power that has never been clearly defined. I think that is a complete stab in the dark just for any excuse that would free him from blame. I also think that the President should not take advantage of the loosely defined power. If Bush is able to get away with wiretapping our cell phones then what is going to be alright for a president to do next? Things will quickly begin to get out of hand if we do not do something about the growing powers of the executive branch before these powers are unstoppable.