Who Receives Welfare?

      In “Some Help Just Hurts” by The Proud American presents an argument on the topic of welfare. She states that there are a lot of people that take advantage of the welfare programs in this country that sought out to help out people that are in dire need. I agree with her in that in order to receive welfare one must pass drug test amongst a thorough background check. These I believe are needed to fully ensure the person receiving the help truly needs it. The problem with her argument is that she believes that food stamps are used to buy, “drugs, fake nails, hair-do’s, alcoholic beverages, $65 birthday cakes for little Johnny, to clothes from Neiman Marcus.” Food Stamps absolutely cannot buy all but one of those things. The cake is the only thing that FOOD STAMPS can buy from that list.  She has a misconception of how the food stamps work and what they can actually buy.  Another thing that she does not have full knowledge over is that abusing food stamps is illegal and a crime. Abusing food stamps or lying to the government in order to get food stamps is a major crime that can be punished with a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. I think she has a misconception and a preconceived notion of who gets food stamps and the image she sees is not the majority description of the person who is receiving the assistance.  The average person receiving this help is completely opposite to what she thinks, it is a middle income family in need of a little assistance.

Detective Work Needed!

            In recent years there have been huge swings in the price of crude oil that has made an immense dent on the pockets of the consumers. The prices have gone from the low of 69 dollars a barrel to the high of 145 dollars a barrel in this time period. These fluctuations have put a huge strain on the consumers because they are the ones that get the short end of the stick from these situations. The thing about this is that supply has been steady for the past 6 years and demand has not fluctuated in such a fashion that can make the price of crude to swing as high as it has.

            The government needs to call on thorough investigations in the crude oil industry and demand real answers as to why these fluctuations exist. If one follows the laws of supply and demand, one can understand that huge oscillations cannot exist if both supply and demand are constant. There seems to be other motives for the instability of crude oil so the government must stand in to find the culprit of the instability and remove it from the equation. Manipulation of the oil market through speculation to drive up prices is not needed in the market because this is not helping the economy grow and prosper. Oil is a major player in our economy and manipulating it is giving a lot of power to a few which puts the economy and the consumer in the hands of the speculator’s wrath.  

Understanding Politics

GMARTIN on their blog “Obama for reelection yes or no” presents an interesting comment on what Obama is fixing to run on and why we should not reelect him to the Presidency. Martin states that the reason why we should not reelect Obama is because he has not made a dent on the major issues that he originally sought out to conquer. The blogger does recognize that things do not change overnight but does not recognize to see the politics at play in Washington. If one looks at history of law making and the history of the administrations that were able to accomplish some of their goals, one can see a correlation of parties in power. When the party in power in the legislature is the same as the one in the executive, those administrations get more done. If those differ, the administrations will not accomplish much because of the politics that are played in Washington.   
 Another thing that Martin mentions that Obama has not done well with the economy and that his job plan costs $447 billion and that is too expensive. Martin is not understanding what that job plan is aimed at doing. There are two major things this plan is aimed at accomplishing; one is better our infrastructure and restart the money flow. First is better our infrastructure, this is the basic needs to support an economy. Better and rejuvenate our roads, highway systems, airports, ports, sewage systems, energy, etc. that will help sustain the economy. Without these an economy will not grow and the key is to make it grow. This leads to the second goal which is to restart the money flow.  The number one goal for an economy is to maintain money moving because that means things are being produced, bought and sold. This means that everyone is making money and everyone is growing. Now if the government does not start up the money flow by spending this money no one will.  People arguing against this will say privatize infrastructure and things will get done. Now if a company does all of these jobs, they will not do it for free. They are going to make a business out of it and charge people to use these things at a rate that is more expensive than what the government will take as tax.

Are Corporations People?

                The argument that corporations are people is a very intriguing one because it is trying to give a large entity with the potential to generate an immense amount of money a human role. Corporations can have similarities to human behavior because they are created by man, so they will be fashioned in a similar manner. When we look at any situation, problem, or anything in our world and we try to understand it, we will give it human characteristics. When we do that we bring it down to our level so that we can find solutions, foresee problems, etc. This is actually a very efficient and smart way to tackle the unknown and make sense of our world. The thing about this is that even though they are fashioned in our manner and we explain a thing through human characteristics does not mean that that thing is human; in this case corporations are not human.

                The fact of the matter is that even though we do give corporations human characteristics to best understand them, they are not human. Corporations are entities that generate money that help our economy grow and be stable. They are good for people when they are managed correctly, but when misguided can be detrimental to human stability.  

                Even though a corporation has a birth, a productive life, and the potential of death does not make it human. If that were the case, any living object would be human; such as a worm, bacteria, a tree, etc.  Another human characteristic is that a corporation has “feelings.” Just because we use the word feel for a lack of a better word to describe what a corporation will transpire over time and explain the reactions to what can affect it does not really make it have feelings like a human. This would mean that water is human because it feels and reacts by moving when one blows on it. The violation of human rights is also a human characteristic that can be placed upon a corporation because it can mistreat the worker (the human). This will also mean that a hurricane is human because it has the potential to mistreat or violate the rights of the people it comes to contact with.

GOP, Corporations, and the Average Person

In Corporations, People, and Truth, Gary Gutting presents a great argument over what corporations really are and what they stand for. This commentary by Gutting is a response to GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s response to hecklers in which he stated that “Corporations are people.” He breaks down this statement to figure out if corporations really are people. If one is technically speaking, as Gutting mentions, “corporations are people because they are made up of people; but corporations do not feel, hurt, or love, so in reality they are not people.”  He goes on to question whether corporations are pro consumer (fundamental human value) or pro shareholder (profit making). In the end the corporations will decide and lean toward the profit making side of business. He ends with a good quote from Michael Foucault that states, “Of all power structures, it’s not that corporations are bad but that they are dangerous.”

                When looking at this topic and comparing it to what is happening in our nation and world today, one can really get emotional over the statement that Mitt Romney said. When one is comparing a corporation, which is intended to make a lot of money  and  a whole lot more to a certain few,  to a person who in today’s world is struggling to make ends meet, that person will get a lot of push back. These types of statements really make the GOP look and sound insensitive to the average person. I understand that people need corporations to make jobs but at the same time corporations need people to work in them and to trust in them so that they do not falter. Neither side is more important than the other and Romney’s statement makes it seem and sound like the corporation is more important than the individual. In order to have a healthy economy both sides need to trust each other. It is like Foucault says that corporations are not bad; as a matter of fact they are needed for our economy to grow and prosper. The thing is that if the corporation is just in the lookout for the few and bends the whole; that can become dangerous very quickly

Economics and Politics is there a link?

In “Does Economics Still Progress?” Paul Krugman wrestles with the idea that challenges whether economists of yesteryear know more, less, or the same as the ones of today. He goes on to state that he dislikes when people talk about economics as a science because he thinks that economics progressed over time. He goes on to compare economists from 1931 to 1971 to today and states that he does not know whether the economists of today are brighter than those from those years. Krugman then states that economists now-a-days really do not find ways to fix problems and only find partisan solutions. He also states that “liberal economists by and large do seem to be genuinely wrestling with what has happened, but conservative economists don’t.”

                I do agree with him that economies progress and I would add that it is ever changing. There are always new things being invented and new products and companies that make the horse different. The thing about this is that economics is a science because there have been ideas that have been thought of that still pertain to the things that we are seeing now. There are constants in economics that make the problem have similar solutions, so even if it is a different horse, it is still a horse.  The issues we are seeing now are similar to those of 1931 and 1971. The economy is still about competition and we still have companies competing, the only difference is that now-a-days this competition is not only domestic. We are now competing globally as well as domestically. Then looking at domestic economics, we still have wealthy people and poor people. Most of our population is not wealthy and are underprivileged just like in yester decades.  I do not agree with him in that only liberal economists are truly looking at the problems and trying to find solutions and that the only ones that thinking under party lines are the conservatives. I think both sides play with all of the issues and both sides make partisan decisions. His editorial is called “The Conscience of a Liberal” so I can see why he is biased, but I also consider myself a liberal and I understand the game of politics. Conservatives are not the only ones playing politics, liberals do too. That is the way politics work, if one understands power one knows that any party playing for that power will work to get that most of the power  all of the time.

To Trust or Not to Trust?

    In HPV vaccine, Merck and Rick Perry's money, Sheila Krumholz and Michael Beckel discuss the role that companies play in politics. In this case they are looking at the questioning Rick Perry confronted by the other GOP candidates about the mandate of the HPV vaccine on young girls. They question his motive for making an executive order for this mandate to pass; was the decision taken because it is known that Merck has given Rick Perry a lot of money for his gubernatorial campaigns. The issue of being bought was raised by the other GOP candidates. The reason that this is an important editorial to read is because it puts to question the motives of decisions that are taken by our leaders. One then has to question how strong lobbying is and how much that affects our lives? Are we fed certain drugs because that company gave our leaders a lot of money or is it that those drugs are the best? As citizens we must feel that our leaders are being honest with us when they are making decisions that will affect us. The problem when these types of situations arise is that one starts to mistrust all of our elected officials. In order for a government to work, the citizens must trust its elected officials. When gains to a leader and the company is the result of a decision, that creates a huge mistrust of the system which creates bad government.