"The only people who can change the world are people who want to. And not everybody does."

Why does the media play the speculation game? This question is one that plagues our country and frustrates many Americans and the topic of this morning's conversation. Why is it that the media feels as though they always have to be first in reporting everything that happens? The two answers we discussed to this question are because news organizations are, in reality, just corporations looking to make money and because the American public demands news "here and now" and they refuse to wait. A topic that came up was the selection of running mates for Barack Obama and John McCain and how the media tries to figure it all out, before the mates are even announced. Within this topic, it was talked about that Barack Obama had to send out a text message announcing Joe Biden as his running mate at 3:30 in the morning instead of seven hours later when it was planned to be announced. This was because CNN figured out Obama's choice at midnight and released it to the public and Obama wanted to be the one to announce instead of having the news announce it for him. The rest of the discussion about the media was in a forum style with questions being asked by the audience and my faculty advisor, Anthony Moretti, and Mickey Edwards. We also talked about the great difference between the American and British media. The American laws use a phrase called "actual malice" (new language) that has to be proven in order for any person to sue for libel distributed throughout the media. The British laws allow for prior restraint to be used to stop something from being distributed through the media, such as national secrets. Without prior restraint in the United States, the American media are allowed to print anything which they so choose, so that there is not "actual malice" used when printing things, including lies, which can be used to damage, and even ruin, a person's career and life. Whether this is a good or bad system depends on the person you are talking to and in which cases you are talking about. I personally feel that the American way, with true freedom of the press, is the better way to go.

After our media discussion, Joe Spencer, the chair of the St. Paul Arts and Culture Committee, came to speak to us about the cuture in St. Paul and the reason for the Republican National Convention coming to Minneapolis-St. Paul. He answered many questions as to why St. Paul was picked for the convention and what benefits St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Bloomington (south of Minneapolis where the Mall of America is at) all reap from the convention. It was also said that the Twin Cities was the only place, except for New York City, which got into the final four cities for consideration by each of the political parties. One quote that stuck out from what Joe Spencer said was that the convention brings "15,000 Republicans, 15,000 international media personnel and 15,000 out of state people who aren't as fun as the delegates." I thought that last part was pretty funny.

Once Mr. Spencer left, the group of us watched John McCain introduce who his running mate was going to be. Afterwards, my group went to lunch with former congressman Mickey Edwards where we discussed modern politics, Congress, and the Presidency. As a former congressman, Mickey Edwards' view of Congress, members of Congress, and Presidential power and authority. It did not hit me until a little later that I was actually eating lunch with a congressman. That is simply an amazing experience. The whole Washington Center experience overall is an amazing experience.

As far as John McCain's VP choice, I agree that it is a good pick, but I believe it is way to obvious what the McCain campaign is doing with picking a woman to be VP and try to get Hillary voters to switch over to McCain's boat. I agree with some pundits who say that had Hillary been chosen either as the nominee or as the VP candidate, Sarah Palin would not be on the ticket. That being said, I think it is a solid pick for the reasons that Palin is conservative on social issues, but is also a "maverick" like John McCain. Aside from disagreements on arctic drilling policies, McCain and Palin seem to agree on most other issues, a good thing for his campaign.

As far as my mid-term assessment of my experience here and my goals, they remain the same. My experience here has been far better than I expected and I continue to hope for a greater experience as the program continues.

I've also interviewed two people in the past week. One was Feras Amr and the other one was Mickey Edwards. I interviewed Feras on Wednesday and Mickey today. Feras Amr is originally from Palestine and came to America in early 2001. On September 11, 2001 Feras gained his citizenship just as the attacks on the Twin Towers fell. Feras and I talked about the true nature of Islam, about the perversions of Islam which terrorists use in order to justify their actions, and about the Israel-Palestine conflict. The most interesting subject would be a tie between true Islam and the Israel-Palestine conflict. The true nature of Islam, as told by Feras, is similar to what we learn in an introductory class such as Religions East and West at Ohio Northern. Feras explained some of the principles of Islam that are commonly misunderstood such as cutting the hand off of a thief or stoning to death an adulterer. He revealed that the only time when a person's hand is to be cut off for stealing something is when it is above a certain value and when it was not out of necessity. Another way of not having your hand cut off is if that stealing was in response to something which, in a small way, justified the theft. The situation that Feras posed to me was that if my employer does not pay me and I steal from him as retribution, then I would not get my hand cut off. Under Islamic law, I would be punished, but I would not have my hand cut off. About the adulterer offense, the only time which a person can be stoned to death is when there are four witnesses who say practically the exact same thing about the offense. If one of the four says "I think I saw.." or something similar, then the adulterers will not be stoned. Instead, they are released and the four witnesses instead are discredited and no person will again believe them on anything important. The Israel-Palestine conflict was very interesting to talk about with Feras because he lived in the West Bank until just 7 years ago. He worked with two fellow Israeli's, one who served in the Israeli Defense Forces, and got along with them both, except for during the stint in which his one friend worked with the IDF. During that time, Feras was not allowed to make jokes, or even casually talk to his friend, although nothing had changed whatsoever with Feras. This made him very angry and Feras stopped talking altogether with his IDF friend until 2 months after he was done with serving in the IDF. His father is also trying to get into the United States on a visa and he has everything lined up, including an interview, but the Israeli forces will not allow him into Jerusalem where the United States embassy is to go to his interview. There was no reason given for the rejection of the application for a temporary pass into Jerusalem to Feras' father, but because it is in Israel, no reason is needed to be given. Feras explained to me the four levels of society in Israel. The top is, simply, the Jews. Second is the Arab-Israeli's. The third level consists of the Christian Arabs living in Israel. The bottom level is the Palestinians. All Palestinians, Christian or Muslim, are in the bottom of the social stratus, and are therefore denied even basic rights such as going to work, access to food and water, and freedom of movement. On the third subject, Feras' viewpoint on the perversions of Islam was to subject them to the rules of a truly Muslim state where it would more than likely either imprison or execute Osama bin Laden and his followers. I found this interview probably the most interesting half-hour/45 minutes of my stay here and I really appreciated the view of Feras.

Mickey Edwards' interview took place today over lunch and was also very interesting. A few sample questions asked were "What do you think about Congressman _____?", "What do you think about pork-barrel politics and why does it occur?", and "What do you think about McCain's pick of Palin?" The question about the many congressman included at least 5, but my favorite was about Senator Byrd. Byrd, like Mickey, carries a copy of the Constitution in his pocket with him at all times and is a very stout supporter of following the Constitution to the best of his ability. Mickey admitted that he probably would not agree with Byrd on 90% of issues, but he respects and likes him very much for the reasons that he follows the Constitution and works across the aisle on many issues. The question about pork-barrel politics was also very interesting. Mickey explained it in this manner: If I like a certain bill or issue and I have a friend who doesn't have an opinion either way, I would ask that friend to vote yes. Later, when he has something on the table that he is passionate about and if I'm impartial, as well as my constituents, then I would return the favor and vote in the way he would like. He explained the excessive spending tacked onto bills, such as 24 billion dollars on an Iraq war spending bill not at all related to Iraq, as money for projects that don't have the importance or time to go through Congress separately. Mickey said that he wished that there would be enough time to see a more thorough examination of spending and open debate on all the spending, however because there are only so many days in the year and so many hours in session, it would be unreasonable and not feasible to expect Congress to debate every amount of spending. He also explained "earmarks" as the following: Earmarks are spending appropriations which are not included in the proposed budget. The President has to submit a budget for approval by Congress, but this budget is made up by OBM beauracrats who don't necessarily have the best interests of the people in mind. There is very little oversight by anybody for the making of this budget and by submitting the budget to approval to Congress you get the people's representatives who get to approve the budget and also add any spending which the OBM might have overlooked or not included. Mickey also thought that the pick of Palin was very smart but he is unsure what sort of impact it will have on McCain's campaign.

Those are my two interviews thus far. Three more are to come.

Technorati Tags: