NO MORE BLOGS

First of all, Mr. James, I am so happy and thankful that you are letting us write whatever we want to for this blog. Now, since I get to write about anything, I think that I will write about why I think that we should not have to write these blogs. I do not think that we should have to write these blogs because they take up way too much time. One blog takes about forty-five minutes to an hour to write. This is not including this one because this one is easier, and we do not have to do any research in order to do this blog. The research portion of the blogs takes a good amount of time. It is much easier to write about something that you know about. Since, you are giving us the opportunity to write about anything we want to, we are now given the opportunity to write about information that we will know about. An additional reason why I believe that we should not have to write these blogs is because of the word requirement. Writing five hundred words (especially on a subject that you are not familiar with) can take a while. I could see maybe two hundred and fifty words. That is a bit more reasonable. Also, I think that we should not have to write a blog for every class that we have a week, which comes out to be three blogs that we have to write. With other homework from this class, homework from other classes, and jobs, it can be difficult for us to write five hundred words in a blog, (on a subject that we do not know about or any subject) three times a week. I do not think that it is necessary to have to write a blog that many times a week. I know that it is good practice for us to work on our writing skills, but I do not think that we should have to write one for each day of class. I think that one or maybe even two may be more reasonable. (One would be very good and zero would be even better)! If you let us write on any subject that we please, then that would be much better than doing what we had to do with our blog entries before you graced us with more freedom on this one. Do not think that this is an attack on you as a person because I think that you are a pretty cool guy. I just do not think that it is necessary to write these blogs. Also, do not think that I am angry with you at all. I just do not like writing these blogs. I know that the decision on what we do in this class is up to you, and you have the write to assign to us pretty much whatever you please. I just wanted to let you know how I (and I am sure many other students in my class) feel about writing these blogs.

Donald Trump and Scotland

In my opinion, the point of views put forth by these news sites are not very much different. They are both basically just describing the situation of Donald Trump wanting to build houses and golf courses on the coast of Scotland. They are pretty much giving both sides of the story. However, the guardian.co.uk website goes into more debt about the situation. It discusses why it would be good for Scotland’s economy and it would create more jobs if Trump built a golf course on the coast of Scotland. It also talks about (the ABC news site talks about) how it would be bad if he built his project on the coast because it would be in the habitat of some of the animals that live in that area that he is trying to build on. He states the case that the sand dune will be more stabilized if he builds on top of them and will not be easily carried away by the wind. I do agree with this statement that he made. However, I do not think that it is a good enough reason to build on top of the sand dunes. Despite this, I believe that he should be allowed to build whatever he wants to on the coast of Scotland. I believe this because “money makes the world go round.” If they go through with allowing Trump to build on the coast, then there is a chance that their economy will become better and new jobs should result from it, which is always good for society. I think that it was pretty dumb of that one guy, who lives on the land that Donald Trump wants to build on, not to accept that money that Trump offered him. I know that if it was me, I would have taken the money with no problem. I hope that Scotland does let him build on the coast of Scotland. I do probably mainly because I do not live in Scotland. I also do because I like to see people succeed in life and though he has been very successful in his life, it would be nice to see him succeed in something else. I think that he should be able to do whatever he wants to do with his money as long as he is not putting anyone else lives in danger nor taking away anyone else’s liberties.
I do not think that Donald Trump’s argument that he is an environmentalist who wants to help the local economy might be plagiarized from “Greed is Good” speech. I do see a correlation between his argument and the speech, but I do not think that it is close enough to say that it was plagiarized. This may have inspired his argument, but I do not think that he directly used information from it. I do not think that him building something on a sand dune that is home to many valuable animals in Scotland would really qualify him as an environmentalist. In my opinion, he is contradicting himself.

3 Good Online News Websites

Just as I mentioned in the last blog of mine, I really do not read the news nor do I look at the news online nor on television. However, I three of the online news sites that I find objective, honest, worth reading, and somewhat appealing are the New York Times online site, the ABC News online site, as well as the Fox News online site. The one out of these that I probably like and have viewed the most is http://nytimes.com/. I have viewed this one the most and probably like it the most because I had to look at this website for my American Government class last semester. Otherwise, I probably would have never even attempted to look at this website. In that American government class that I took, the professor forced my class to look at the New York Times website at least once a week because he would give us a quiz over something that would be on that website every Wednesday. He would do this to keep us up to date with the news that was going on around the world and not just in one area or state, like New York or Georgia. This website does a good job of not only providing information on news that is going on around the world, but it also does it in a way that does not distract you too much from the content of the website. It does this because this website might not be one of the most appealing news website on the web, but is provides some good information in a way that may be boring to some people. However, it was perfect for me because I can get distracted very easily. It is especially easy for me to get distracted when I am doing something that I really do not want to do, such as looking at the news. This website may not be good for all people because of its lack of a visual appeal, but it was just fine for me. The next news website that I will discuss is http://www.foxnews.com/. I have only viewed this website maybe three or four times at the most. The reason why I chose this website is because I like the Fox News that is on television. If I ever do watch the news, it will be Fox News. I would because they present the news in a way that catches my attention and joke around with it a lot (especially the early morning news). The joking around with the news is all right with me viewing the news just to be looking at it and not for an assignment for a class. As for the Fox News website, it is a little more visually appealing that the New York Times website. It seems as though the Fox News website covers more information about celebrities than the New York Times website does. That is what I like about the Fox News website the most. Last but not least, I will discuss http://abcnews.go.com/. In my opinion, this is the most visually appealing website of the three that I mentioned. This alone would make me want to view it. It seems as though this website pays a little less attention to celebrities than the Fox New website does, but more than the New York Times website does. All three of these sites are great to look at if you want to know anything about the news. Basically, if you want to see strictly the news of important issues going on around the world, then look at the New York Times website. If you want to look at the news as well as some entertaining and interesting things going on in the lives of celebrities, then look at the ABC news website and the Fox News website.

Foreign and Domestic News Outlets

Truthfully, I do not watch the news much at all nor do a go on websites to view the news. However, by looking at the websites from the links that were in the question I can see a few differences between the foreign media outlets (that were provided) and the United States media outlets that were provided. The United States media outlets seem to talk more about and have more information about celebrities. I really do not know many celebrities from foreign countries, but I did not see many if not any mentioned on those to websites provided in the question. The fact that celebrities are included in the news outlets may be saying something about the traits the Americans have. Someone may be able to conclude from this that Americans really care about what celebrities are doing. This could mean that Americans are very nosy people. This could also go back to the discussion that we had on the first day of class about how celebrities are some of the main reasons why people may think that something is cool or hip. This is because Americans pay close attention to what celebrities do and wear. That is one my observations from these foreign and domestic news sites.
I really can not tell if these websites are politically biased or not. However, it seems as though every time I catch by father watching the news on the television, (he usually watches Fox), there is some sort of bias. For example, it seems as though they are always saying something bad about Obama. An example of this is when they kept going on and on about his pastor and how they did not like the things that his pastor was saying. In my opinion, the news reporters should not have put him down because of what his pastor said. I did not just see this on Fox news, but I saw it on other news stations that my father was watching as well. This is just one example of how I think that American news is bias and politically bias against Obama.
There really is not a noticeable difference between the style of the layouts of the United States news websites and the foreign news websites. They each have their own style, but they are not distinguished enough to really spot a difference between the two. One of the similarities that I noticed is that all of them talk about the Olympics in some way. This should be expected considering that the Olympics is a world event and all of the countries from these news websites are competing in the Olympics. One of the differences that I noticed between the two United States websites and the Corriere della Sera is that the Corriere della Sera really does not talk about the upcoming United States presidential campaign. Well, at least I did not notice it on the main page of its website. It is kind of weird that the BBC does talk about the upcoming election, but the Corriere della Sera does not talk about it. Maybe this is because the BBC is a more well known and popular website than the Corriere della Sera. Those are a few of the differences that I noticed between the American news outlets and the (two) foreign news websites.

China and the Olympics

China and the Olympics

Even though China has human rights violations, loads of pollution, and restrictions on the press/media, I believe that China should still be able to host the 2008 Olympics. I think that they should because China is a major world power. They have been for a while and still are. They are one of the most highly populated nations in the world as well as one of the largest. I think that all great nations should have the opportunity. Also, I think that this is good for China to host the Olympics because it is allowing them to open up more to the rest of the world, which is something that it has had major problems with in the past. China has been a nation that was private and stayed away from the rest of the world. China hosting the 2008 Olympics shines some light on this situation and may help improve China’s relationships with other countries that it may not have communicated well with in the past. I think that all nations have problems and that these three problems should not be the reasons why China should not be able to host the Olympics.
I do not think that any nation has any moral high ground to criticize the Chinese government, especially the United States. I say this because the United States has pollution problems of its own that need to be resolved. Even if the United States’ pollution problem is not as bad as the Chinese pollution problem that is going on right now, it still has no right to look down on and criticize the Chinese government for pollution problems because it has its own pollutions issues. Also, the United States definitely has no right to look down on the Chinese government for its human rights violations. I say this because of all of the years of slavery and discrimination that African Americans and women had to go through. Just because the United States’ human rights issues are not nearly as bad as they used to be that give it no right at all to criticize the Chinese government. The United States still faces problems with human rights and racial and well as gender discrimination. The United States had to work through its human rights problems (and still is). So, it has no reason to criticize the Chinese government when it has its own issues in the same area even if the may be a little different. Other nations certainly have no reason to look down on the Chinese government for there restriction on the press/media because I am sure that almost every nation has tried to hide something from other nations at one time or another. What I am basically saying is that other nations have no reason and no right to look down on and criticize China for its problems when they have problems of their own. Even if their problems may not be the same, they still have issues that need to be fixed. People are really realizing and paying attention to China’s problems right now because they are hosting the Olympics. If it was not for them hosting the Olympics, several people probably would not even know about these problems that China is facing right now. In my opinion, nations should attend to their own business and deal with their own problems. Once they have dealt with them then maybe, just maybe, they can talk about other nation’s problems. Those are my thoughts on China and its issues.