No girls allowed

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/25/us/politics/25vibe.html?_r=1&ref=politics


President Obama is what many would call a laid back sort of guy, he can easily be found just shooting hoops with some friends and associates, but many criticize this sort of fun, saying that Obama is constantly in the company of males, not only when playing basketball, but also when making decisions.

Despite the fact that Obama has many women in positions of power and the gender split of power is technically 50/50 critics still complain that women are not as visible and while they technically hold positions of power the public doesn't get to see them make decisions or even talking to the President and it appears as though the most important sectors of the white house such as economics and national security are a boys club only.

While some people feel this way others reget the idea that there is any sort of sexism in the white house and admit that it is natural for the president to bond with people he works with in different ways.

SWINE FLU epidemic?

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/10/24/h1n1.obama/index.html

Worried about swine flu? So is President Barrack Obama, as is evident by him calling it a 'national emergency'. Obama has taken action that he believes will help everyone deal with this epidemic that's sweeping the globe. This action is the ability of certain health care facilities such as Medicare, Medicaid and state Children's Health Insurance programs, to temporarily waive or modify certain requirements to help health care facilities enact emergency plans to deal with the pandemic. While this is normally flu season the swine flu has been taking America by storm with millions of people being diagnosed, I have to agree with Obama and say that this is defiantly an emergency.

While the H1N1 virus is clearly a legitimate disease I feel the swine flu scare is a little over the top. Not that many people have died from it and if it's not drastic enough to shut down school then I don't believe that its particularly devastating. So far the only change I've noticed is people washing their hands more and carrying around hand sanitizer. My little brother just got diagnosed with Swine Flu and so did a girl on my swim team, but I still live at my house and I still go to swim practice, not that I think I am immune to this disease, I just think people are taking it a little too far, not to imply that all the people that have been diagnosed aren't really sick. I'm sure they are, as far as how sick I couldn't be sure. However I'm sure that there are some that are more sick from the swine then others.

Presidents New and Old

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/10/25/obama.carter.reagan/index.html

After the newness and glamour of having Obama as president has worn off people are finding parallels with Obama and other former presidents. Jimmy Carter was one of the former presidents being compared. Critics claimed that Obama like Jimmy Carter didn't have much political experience but came at a good time when people were looking for change and a new face with new ideas. Another similarity was when Carter was first in office he had a very high approval rating but once he was there for a while it dropped down over 30 percent. Obama's not doing so well in the polls right now either. Critics are predicting that now that people have seen Obama cannot change the world as quickly as they expected there will be a drastic shift in the scheme of power and people will begin to vote for more republicans because they're so sick of Obama's broken promises.

Different critics have said the comparison to carter is weak and that one with Ronald Regan would be more appropriate as Ronald Regan also came into political power in the midst of a large war. However due to Regan and Obama being opposite parties many think the similarities stop there.

So while you could make connections between past presidents and the one we currently have, the fact of the matter is none of them are really the same.They may have similar ideas or circumstances to deal with but people are just trying to compare them to try and predict how America is going to turn out and no one can. No one knows what will happen next because while history is important it cannot tell us our future.

Popularity lessens

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/10/21/obama.poll/index.html


It seems as Obama begins making decisions and actually doing something about being president his popularity begins to drop. Over 51 percent of the American people disagree with the decisions currently being made by our nations president. While it appears that this is the normal trend for a new president people still remain concerned. Some say Obama may be like Regan where people don't like the things he says or the decisions he marked but they like him as a person. Although polls have also said that 1/3 of Americans did not think he deserved the Nobel peace prize. Oddly enough Hilary Clinton has risen in the popularity polls, American public used to hate and mock her and know they like her more than Obama, some wonder how this could be.

This writers opinion on this is that the public expected most of their problems to be solved by now. They wanted the war to be over, our solders home, they wanted the economy to be on its way to being solved, and they wanted universal health care. That's what Obama said he'd take care of and so far none of that has actually happened and thus I think that Obama's numbers will stay low until he makes significant change.

Health Care

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/20/obama.health.care/index.html

The discussion of health care is still a hot topic amongst everyone in the US and it seems as though Obama has been answering the same questions over and over again, particuarly about taxes. "Will taxes raise?" seems to be the quesiton on everyones mind despite the fact that Obama has been repeating that they will not. Obama is comparing getting health insurance to auto insurance, saying that everyone in America should have auto insurance as well, because it would make accident payments less messy. The requirment for health insurance is not a tax increase the current leader of our nation assures us.
Obama suggests that the costs of medicare advantage get cut which will save the government billions without costing people their medical attention that they need. The assistance will be the same he claims. Republicans believe this plan to be too good to be true, and think there must be some catch.

I beleive however that health care is something people should just step back for a while and properly examine before they jump in and yell about thier opinons on it and what we should do to save everyone in the whole world. While I do believe we should help people with universal health care I'm not sure these problems will so easily be solved by another plan or press conferece so before we do another one of those perhaps America should come up with a close to pefect plan of how were really going to solve the worlds problems in one fatal swoop.

Human Rights

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/10/11/obama.gay.rights.reax/index.html

While President Obama appears to be all for gay rights it seems that not all his supporters share this belief. The President may not campaign for same sex marriage but he supports civil unions which allow people similar rights of a couple. As of right now a lawful marriage is defined as being between a man and a woman although that may change in the recent years. What Obama does support changing or rather abolishing is the "don't ask don't tell" policy which does not allow openly gay people to serve in the military they are supposed to 'not tell' their sexual orientation as a way to eliminate discrimination. Many people are opposed to the 'don't ask don't tell' policy because it requires people to essentially lie to others who they count on with their life. One final thing Obama is trying to improve gay rights is getting the legislation to expand the definition of hate crimes to include attacks based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

What this writer thinks is people should all be equal in their rights to marry and their ability to tell whatever they wish to their war comrades. While I am happy that Obama supports most of these important gay rights issues I wounder how high they rank on his list. It must be very long and I wonder if he will ever get to actually accomplishing all the goals hes set for himself and America when hes in office and that includes the goals that seem less important to American as a whole which includes gay rights issues. So while I am happy that Obama seems to want to cure the US of all social ills I hope he realizes that once he promises to fix one thing he actually has to do it and not just say he plans on fixing it eventually. Hopefully he will take enough time and effort into all his plans of a better America.

Obamas plans for peace and what they got him

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/10/09/president-barack-obama-wins-nobel-peace-prize/

Recently, last Friday to be exact President Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace prize. It is reported that he was awarded this great award due to his radical plans for peace and goals for a better America.

Obama is reported to feel very humble about the whole victory stating that he does not deserve to be associated with all the other Nobel peace prize winners that there has been. Not only does the president get the honor and distinction of winning he also gets a 1.4 million dollar award.

Awarding Obama the prize not only shows the love and trust Americans have for him, but also the amount of faith people have in his plan. People actually trust in Obama and not only hope that his peace plan will work but believe that it will.

Other important people believe that Obama hasn't really done anything yet, and thus doesn't deserve the award. They ask what has he done? While Obama has many plans for peace many haven't even began to be carried out.He plans on reducing the world stock of nuclear arms, easing American conflicts with Muslim nations and strengthening the U.S. role in combating climate change. Some critics believe that it was just people getting too carried away with hope, or Obama fans with rose colored glasses. One critic was so harsh as to say it was Obama's "star power" that got him this honor.

As for this writer, I think that good intentions and plans are good enough for me. While planning for peace is certainly not as good as actually achieving peace, it's a lot more than presidents and other politicians have done in the past. The effort that he is putting in is worth the award, maybe if everyone won small awards for big plans the world would be better.

War wages on?

When President Obama was campaigning he promised America that one of his main priorities was getting the troops out and stopping this war. Now however the President seems to be singing a different tune. The idea of taking the troops out of Afghanistan is now being debated and considered despite the fact that it once was a definite thing that was happening. Officials seem to be split on the war however Americans are much more decisive about the war 58 percent are strongly opposed and only 39 percent support it according to recent polls by Cnn.

There is no word as to what Obama's will decide but this writer is guessing hell go all in for the war. Obama may believe we can win it if we simply add more troops and while this writer does not support the war herself she has enough insight to make an educated guess. This guess is that President Barack will want to finish what he started no matter how messy and how many people oppose it because I'm sure that in the end he believes that the good will outweigh the bad and as a concerned American I hope this turns out to be true.

Chicago Olympics a no go

As we saw in class on Friday the Obama family failed to bring the 2016 Olympics to the US, and more specifically to their hometown of Chicago. What was shown on the broadcast was a very disappointed Barack Obama who had actually flown to the place of the meeting to help Chicago win the location bid. While many might say this is very self less thing of Obama to do(to promote the US) others believed that Obama did not need to go, and leave the US when it needed him. Obama left when he was in the middle of debating issues about Afghanistan and health care and many think this should have taken priority over the bid of the Olympics. According to Cnn one man, John Boehner said "... I think its a great idea to promote Chicago but hes the president of the United States not the mayor of Chicago. "

While this man may not have supported Obama's trip to support and cheer for Chicago I do. I think people voted for Obama for two reasons because we wanted change and also because Barack Obama, as far as politicians go is a real and relatable person. People like that for president because they want someone who is like them who will understand their wants and needs.

I feel that supporting his hometown was exactly what most Americans would do. If we had the opportunity to have the Olympics in Albany I bet people would get really excited and be all for the idea. Just as Obama was really excited for his hometown, and I don't think he should be penalized for doing something that seems like the normal reaction. I trust that Obama will do his job properly and will get everything he needs done, done people should have more faith in him and trust that he will do the job people voted for him to do.