Political blogs

I looked up some of the website. But, I couldn't find any interesting issue for me. So I will just focus on the features and differences between the websites. The blogs are more like a voice of individuals. It is good that somebody has own opinion but some of the writings seem lack of grounds or rational something. Also, one of the blogs looks like.. He or she doesn’t have any reader because I could see few comments. It reminds me of “access” to public sphere. Even if writer has a good opinion, it can be a brilliant piece of writing or just covered up.

Dangerous Thinking

A few hours ago I checked out this post on the Capitalism Magazine website:

http://www.capitalismmagazine.com/politics/law/privacy/4524-Spying-and-Privacy-Rights-Spying-Absolutely-Always-Wrong.html

I saw that they had a PRIVACY section under politics, and thought that since privacy is such a keen concern of mine currently, that it was worth checking out. Unfortunately, the latest posts dated back to 2006, but one caught my eye and I thought it worth discussing.

In his posts, Mr. Hurd argues for the invasion of privacy to catch terrorists. It seems a decent argument at first, and I do agree with some of his points. But near the end of the article his dangerous thinking pours through.



"I want my government to spy and do whatever else it takes to catch terrorists."


And in the final paragraph he states, "I have no problem with the standard of spying President Bush has drawn."


In my opinion, these two lines reveal the two major thoughts that are wrong with his picture.


1. A by-whatever-means-necessary approach is thoughtless and hardly ever considers the ramifications that it might impose on the larger public.

2. It shows that a STANDARD for the INVASION OF PRIVACY has been set, and believes that to be perfectly fine. If a government invades privacy, it should be deemed a necessary action that has to be made in an instant. There shouldn't be a standard for the regular government invasion of privacy.



What do you think? I'm a just a crazy conspiracy nut, or is it possible that many US citizens don't put enough value on their privacy?

places invoved in my topic.

My topic is “Encouraging club activity at CSUSB”. So, this issue can happen everywhere on campus or even off campus if students think about that outside of campus. If I have to pick one certain place to talk about “where”, I will say student union without hesitation. That is because club advertisement or meeting occurs inside or around the building. When students see that kind of gathering people, they could think about involving some clubs. Also, the office that in charge of club is located on second floor of the building. If I display something about club activity to make students know about the information, Student union will be the first place to start.

"Are You in Control?"

Hello, hello. I found this great video about internet privacy. I think its artfully done, and although it almost sings like propaganda at moments it's a sort of propaganda for user awareness.



What do you think about your role on the internet? Are you aware of what kind of ripples of information are out there on you?

Expected audience for my topic?

It would be any college students. But, it is especially for students at CSUSB becuase they might have wanted to join any clubs at this school and couldn't find certain club to join. Students might not be active to try to find a club that they are interested in. But, it would be fault caused by this school too. I am really curious why this kind of situation happens. I am going to make a questionare to know the reasons and have an interview with some staffs of the student union office. And, I want to post my writing and share the information after I solve the problem and establish the information.

Narrowed down topic.

My topic was "how to make college life more enjoyable and memorable" Even though I knew I had to make it more specific and detail, I did not know what point I should start from. There would be a lot of things to think about college life such as academic life, building social network, volunteer works, study abroad programs, various school activities or someting like that. Among them I decided to focus on club activity because it was hard for me to find some clubs that I can join. The clubs at this university do not seem to be active and suppoted by this school except for Greek clubs. I was trying to know what kind of clubs this school has and what I can do in some clubs. I went to the office in student union builing, got the list of the clubs and emailed about five presidents of the clubs. Some of them did not reply my message and some of them said "our club doesn't exist anymore." I felt weird because I could see many people enjoy school life through joing some clubs in my country. But it seems not to be common at this university. I don't know why this problem happens. But, I want to solve this problem and encourage people to join some clubs for their more enjoyable college life at CSUSB.

Maybe Finally Probably Have A Topic... Maybe

I don't know why I'm so indecisive... or maybe it's because I've been trying to pinpoint what problem I actually want to focus on. In my writer's notebook, I ranted for pages about the general issue of the negative reputation that the U.S. has been getting based on our media, entertainment through television, current music trends, internet interactions, movies, magazines, etc. Having lived for a few months in Italy, I was bothered by what television shows were selected to be shown on MTV which, at least in my apartment, took up 2 of 8 channels available. I remember watching Teen Mom, Jersey Shore, and The Hills. The image Americans were getting was that we were all trashy, immoral, stupid, and care too much about celebrity life to take a stand on real issues. I remember some angry Italian college boys screaming at my friends and I that we should take our stupid selves back to the states. Even a priest said in front of the congregation that Americans are like King Herod and all we do is kill babies. Hmph. Anyway, I realize there are enough people focusing on the TV shows that are promoting negative behavoir and projecting a negative image of the general American public, so I think I might switch gears and focus on the internet. Specifically, youtube.com. Now I spend plenty of time browsing random videos and enjoy it as much as the next person, but it's what is in the comments that really bug me. Why is it that comments on a simple music video turn into heated battles between racial groups or countries spewing hate at each other? I believe the fact that these problems are so frequent means there is no hope for any of us. J/k. I'm just in a bad mood. The fact is that a great deal of people, including a large chunk of the world's youth, have taken a stand on many issues. However, this enormous public forum called the world wide web has shown that they are expressing opinions in the wrong way, communicating with slurs, ignorance, and impatience. Ignorance may very well be the key issue. How can we stop or at least decrease the lies told about each other, whether about religion, race, or nationality, to be able to conduct ourselves in a civilized manner?

I understand I still need to find a better focus. I'm still brainstorming trying to get it right. Hmmm...