Death Penalty in Texas Blog6

“I do not think that people need to be on death row for ten plus years. That is ridiculous. People should not have to sit around that long knowing that they are going to be put to death." I disagree with this statement. If people do such a horrific crime that they are going to be put to death, I believe that they need to sit in jail and think about what they have done. I mean, what an easy way out it would be if we were to shorten the appeals process and execute the guilty ones right away. The perpetrator of the crime would have very little time to ponder over his guilt. Also, the prosecution would not have the time to reconsider the case in the off-chance that they made a mistake, and an innocent person might be executed wrongly. I do agree on the Willingham case there have been too many cases in the news lately that are showing that an innocent person has been executed here in Texas such as Willingham. Texas needs find a way to not let it again and kill innocent people.

The government offers very little opportunity to those that abuse the justice system. If you do not have the money to buy your freedom you are left to suffer the consequences. They are tainted for the rest of their lives as criminals. To be regarded as unequal seems to be more of a repercussion than death. We need to change a system and process to better provide a solution to people that could possibly be placed on death row. For example there are countless ways to die naturally; these types of destructive actions are easy ways to label humanity as arrogant.

"Texas think green" Blog 8

This is a great idea that they are passed the grant and it” will give Texas $5.8 million for attic insulation, weather stripping, high efficiency appliances, and other improvements to low-income households over the next two years. The building of a solar panel and having "energy districts" might be seen by 2015 and by doing this will keep electricity demand low, so that Austin can avoid a power plant built by 2020” (Toohey, Marty). This people must be able to accommodate enough solar panels to generate more electricity than the household uses, should a homeowner choose to add panels. We just need to watch and see if this really effective the use of solar panel to help to prevent the pollution and lower the use of power plants as Hector said in his blog. Austin is starting to change its view on the environment, as we can tell, passes and its increasing rapidly on the pollution as every year.
The city established its first conservation programs in the early 1980s. In 1999, the City Council ordered Austin Energy to make energy efficiency its top priority. The city now spends about $25 million a year on such programs. Both business and environmental advocates clashed over many points of the plan. Also both camps quickly agreed that Austin should emphasize energy efficiency. How Wood and Reed are ambitious about cutting the energy demand of megawatts by 2020, and not satisfied by the Austin Energy goal of 800megawatts and striving for 1,000mw goal, it will put one foot ahead of the other states by keeping the planet cleaner.

Blog 7: Fry: Wind farms reap a grim harvest

The wind power development adds another threat to birds will not breed near tall structures for fear and springtime booming sage grouse is being replaced with the eerier whoosh of whirring turbines. Global warming threatens ecosystems, and act to reduce carbon emissions to maintain the planet’s biodiversity. But one potential solution carries threats of its own to be mitigated. “Wind power is the fastest-growing form of alternative energy, with projections that it will grow twelvefold over the next 20 years. This will mean about 175,000 turbines installed on more than 30,000 square miles of land — more land than in New Hampshire, New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware and Rhode Island combined”. Wind is the only sector in the USA that is free from the federal regulation and each month new wind installations springing up like daisies, too little for environment review.

The wind development is far less destructive than many types of energy production, such as mountaintop-removal coal mining, wind power's threats to wildlife are not inconsequential. The high winds frequently overlap with the bird habitat. The habitat issues, bird collisions with wind turbines are mounting. It may look like those blades spin lazily in the breeze, but their tips can reach speeds of 200 mph. If the bird strikes this blade then it will kill the birds and every year as many as 11 bird killed by each turbine. The environmental and wind industry is discussing how to save the birds and wildlife habitats.

The wind industry has asserted that wind projects allowed anywhere where there is good wind power potential, and protected areas. Wind Advisory Committee has agreed to recommend large "no go" buffer zones around sage grouse and prairie chicken breeding grounds. Wind developers also have agreed to consult early with the Fish and Wildlife Service on new wind farm proposals. “The difficult issue of how to protect flocks of migrating birds from collisions with the turbine rotors but the American Bird Conservancy and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology has organized a team of experts to develop recommendations and a research agenda to tackle these problems and knowledge gaps”.

Imprisoning a Child for Life

I notice too many people are devoid of empathy. They are little better than the criminals they criticize in that they cannot see another's suffering. Criminals are often victims of our dysfunctional society. We failed these kids and now we want to lock them away and throw away the key. Exactly how many children have you rescued from the ghettos of America? Exactly how many children have you saved from abusive drug addicted parents? If you never had to grow up in a living hell then I think you ought not to jump to conclusions about who ought to be treated with compassion and who should not. These forgotten children are neglected until they commit some terrible crime. We spend millions to keep them in prison but hardly lift a finger when the first signs of trouble show up in school. We should be ashamed of ourselves for failing our youth yet again. America has grown to be a highly dysfunctional and corrupt society and the signs are all around us. The knee jerk punishment squad needs to realize we already have the world’s largest prison population, and the largest military budget maybe we need to change our priorities and how we solve our problems.

Unfortunately, our youth today may be sadly lost to a value system that evolved from the depths. As for those who are educatedly challenged and do not have the mental capability to mature and conduct their own affairs, the dreaded "institutionalization" probably should be the alternative to setting them up to be influenced to re-offend. By "institutionalization," I do not refer to the prison system, but life in a structured setting that allows them to flourish to the best of their capabilities, be away from the wrong elements of society, and enjoy the securities they so desperately need and deserve. Many parents of challenged children do not have the knowledge or social resources, forget the monetary resources, to raise, nurture, and maintain these children, now turned adults, with forever children mental capabilities, in their homes without serious consequence to all.

Reform and Your Premiums

Why is the debate about making health insurance affordable and not making health care affordable? Where is the analysis of what is driving up the costs of health care, making it unaffordable, and addressing the underlying issues? - free care by hospital ERs (the most expensive place for us to deliver free care), malpractice insurance/tort reform (also contributing to unnecessary procedures), the army of bureaucrats within hospitals and physician groups to deal with the various insurance companies (including Medicare), drug pricing, common medical errors and hospital acquired infections, lack of quality/price transparency...I'm sure the list goes on. Those who have insurance, myself included, have no idea what the costs are of various procedures or the disparities between providers. Therefore, there's no incentive question them or to shop around. For example, I recently learned that my child's pediatric dentist charges $150 per tooth for a sealant intended to prevent cavities because her teeth are grooved (aren't they all?). My own dentist, performing the procedure on adult permanent teeth, charges $75 per tooth. Not only is there a significant price disparity, but I as a consumer am not convinced that the procedure is really necessary since she will lose these teeth in a couple of years. How much of us really know what's being paid on our behalf for routine medical checks or procedures? Everyone's answer to this is single payer, but I don't trust a national system subject to shifting political ideology and Congressional oversight...particularly when there seems to be no discussion of government officials taking part in this system. I agree the insurance companies need to be removed from the equation, but in order to also address all the others feeding at the trough there needs to be more personal responsibility for health care and its costs - perhaps that means paying for it like any other consumer service.

Abortion and Health Care Reform

What a joy it must be to live in a truly free country. Either abortion is legal or it isn't. Since it is a legal medical procedure every health plan should pay for it. We are supposed to have freedom of religion in this country, but certain parties are oblivious to that. The pro-life crowds are hypocrites who only care about life in the womb, but care nothing about the lives of people who have already been born. It's time they kept their religious beliefs to themselves, and stopped forcing them down the throats of everyone else. Most religious beliefs are based on fairy tales and mythology, and have very little to do with morality and ethics. They are based on nothing but control, especially the control of women.

It is not rational to force a woman to bear and then raise a child she doesn't want simply because she had sex. Where the ‘respect for life’ is when unwanted children are born into the world? Many of the world's criminals were mistreated as children because their parents didn’t want them. I don't see society stepping up to raise these children who are born to reluctant mothers/ parents. Pro-lifers only think of the birth of the child- they don't consider the life of the child.

Abortion needs to be covered by any health care insurance system. It is ironic that those who would deny abortion coverage in order to protect an unborn human life care nothing for ensuring that any baby born, including those with severe disabilities, have a means of support medical or otherwise once they are out of the womb.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/01/opinion/01thu1.html

Mr. Obama and Mr. Hu on Warming

Howsoever important the global issues of common concern are, the national policy actions, due to domestic compulsions and varying perceptions of national interests by respective governments, are rarely guided by them, unless, of course, a common catastrophe or extinction threat does become imminent. The problem of climate change though happens to be one such issue of common global concern, yet there seems to be little prospect that a major breakthrough would be achieved either at the current get together of 100 and odd world leaders at the UN or at the forthcoming Copenhagen UN summit on climate change. For, instead of realizing individual role and responsibility for causing climate change through excessive energy consumption and burning fossil fuel, leading to greenhouse gas emission and warming of atmosphere, the member countries of the UN do seem to be generally indulged in mutual accusations. Thus, unless there is an agreement on a common policy framework to tackle the problem of climate change, and the member countries do show some genuine commitment to voluntarily reduce greenhouse gas emission in order to keep the atmospheric temperature to an agreed safe levels of 2 degrees Celsius of the pre-industrial stage, there is little chance of any progress on this front. In this respect, a clear acceptance of the judicious and pragmatic principle of 'historical responsibility and distributive burden sharing with equity' could become the starting point. Simultaneously, the western industrialized nations too should agree to help developing countries fund and transfer clean technology to facilitate their transition to green economic development, which might lead to a win-win situation for all.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/23/opinion/23wed1.html?ref=opinion