The Death Penalty

The death penalty is an extremely controversial issue in America, with people almost split evenly one whether it should be continued to be enforced in the criminal justice system. With many varying ideological and societal factors, it is almost impossible to find a general consensus. When deciding if the death penalty should remain in the United States criminal justice system, I oppose its continuity due to its alarming costs, numerous errors in conviction, and its inefficiency to repel murder rates.

Although it may appear odd, it is a fact that usually sentencing a criminal to life imprisonment is less expensive then sentencing one to death. According to an article by Maria Waters "Facts About the Death Penalty", Waters states that in North Carolina the death penalty costs "$2.16 million over the cost of sentencing murderers to life imprisonment." The article also shows that "capital cases are 70% more expensive then comparable non-capital cases." Even though with life imprisonment the federal and state governments must feed, provide, and hire guards for the incarcerations of capital offenders, it is still less expensive than the long and often unsuccessful process of sentencing one to death. Because it is financially better to sentence on to life imprisonment, the general population and citizens of the U.S. would benefit at the end of the death penalty. The financial cost is not the only flaw with the death penalty; there are also numerous cases of convicting innocent people to death.

According to the same article Waters states that since 1973 "over 130 people have been released from death row with evidence of their innocence." This statistic demonstrates the numerous errors that have been made when prosecuting an innocent person to the death penalty. It can also suggest that because their have been such a large amount of people exonerated, there is probably a large amount of people who have been put to death who were truly innocent. Another factor to consider is the ineffectiveness of the death penalty lowering murder rates 

According to the article "Death Sentences Drop to Historic Lows" by Laura Sullivan, Sullivan states that in this year "murder rates fell to where it was in the 1960's." she continues to state that it is a large drop of murder rates from the 1990's "when the U.S. executed more inmates than in at least half a century."(Sullivan) With this, one can see how the death penalty has no affect on the murder rates at all, and may in fact have the opposite affect. Because it doesn't help to decrease the murder rate the usefulness of the death penalty is seems much less existent.  

Although it is true that criminals should receive equal punishments of the crimes they committed, the death penalty is a separate issue. Because there are no financial gains, or notable deterrents to committing murders linked with the death penalty, it is not profitable to enforce the death penalty. And because of the numerous errors of innocent people being convicted, the death penalty appears to do more harm than good. 

The State of Homeschooling

When considering the issues applied to the educational system of home schooling, one must consider the academic advantages, limits students may have, and large parental responsibility, because they determine the students overall educational ability and the course of ones future.

           The main reason one would consider adopting a homeschooling system is for the academic advantages it would yield for the student. Many studies show students who partake in homeschooling are academically superior compared to students of the traditional public schooling system. According to Brian Ray's article “What Research Shows Us”, Ray states that home school students score on average “at the 65^th to 80^th percentile on standardized academic achievement tests” compared to the “public school average of the 50^th percentile”. With this one can see the obvious advantage that homeschooling provides students with a more advanced academic understanding. This gives the implication that a student will be more academically prepared than an average student for future situations such as college, or careers. This also suggests that dedicated parents are more inclined to teach children than certified teachers. Although home school students appear to be at a greater advantage with academic skills, other limitations such as extra curricular activities can be placed upon a student.

            Although academic learning is the main factor in a student’s education, things such as extra curricular and social activities are also key components in a student’s educational well being. According to Ray, a small amount of homeschooled students “participate in public-school interscholastic activities such as sports and music”. The lack of extra curricular activities can damage the overall idea of homeschooling due to the importance of such activities. Activities such as sports and music are not mere hobbies for some people, they are subjects that people are able to set goals towards, and  strive to constantly bettering themselves and reach succession. This can have an enormous affect on a student’s true passions and interests, and can provide students with the situations of striving to succeed. With the enormous importance that a young student’s education has on their entire life, it creates a large amount of parent responsibility.

            According to Peter White’s article "Cons of Homeschooling" the first two disadvantages to homeschooling he lists are “Family commitment” and “Some parents are not cutout to home school their children”. When a parent home schools a child, they must be fully committed and able to constantly educate their child. The clear truth is that not all parents are committed or able to teach their child properly. Due to this, some students can be left at a huge disadvantage, not learning proper criteria or in the correct manner. With public schooling systems, teachers are more likely qualified and reviewed to be fit to teach children. However, being the parent of the student usually would give one a much greater incentive to educate the student. Overall this implies that parents need to be fully committed and personally able to provide their child with a proper education, because it will greatly dictate the rest of the students life. Another issue with parental responsibility is the problem of diversity. According to Rob Reich’s “The Civic Perils of Homeschooling” a problem with homeschooling is that because our country is so racially and ideologically diverse, students should encounter situations and people that “their parents have not chosen or selected in advance.” Because the parent serves as the main source of education for the student, the parent may undoubtedly corrupt the child’s ideas when it comes to religious, ethical, or political ideas. And because a child is not exposed to the other ideas or views in their homes as they would be in a public school, students could be more easily become a mere by-product of their parents ideologies. This further adds to the responsibility of the parent, to expose their child to different scenarios, and not choose all of their child's beliefs.

The Results of the Proposal is Negative

          In a chaotic state the nation’s economy is in, people are exceedingly concerned about what their tax dollars are paying for. A large amount of tax money goes to the US welfare system, designed to give financial aid to families and people in desperate need of assistance. With the large impact the welfare system has on impoverished families and tax payers, the proposition to enforce drug tests on welfare recipients has been controversial. I disagree with the suggestion to require drug tests of welfare recipients due to the high cost of the proposal, and the relatively low amount of recipients using drugs.

          With the huge economic debt, and ever increasing need to cut back on spending, the last thing that states and federal government need is another useless program or regulation to squander money on. However some people managed to have found just that with the idea to require drug tests from welfare recipients. According to the article “States Adding Drug Test as Hurdle for Welfare” the drug tests the states pay for “costs up to $40, and the state will reimburse those who pass” (Sulzberger). When taking into consideration that in Florida “7,030 passed, 32 failed, and 1597 did not provide results” (Sulzberger) the drug tests, which would mean that just the state of Florida alone, could end up paying $280,000 for reimbursements to the participants who passed. And if the entire country took up this proposal, then millions of dollars would solely be wasted to the drug tests. To use these millions of dollars for the drug tests of the welfare system, rather than utilizing them for the welfare system itself is a preposterous idea. The high cost of the drug tests would not be so ridiculous, if it wasn’t for the uselessness of them due to the low amount of drug users among welfare recipients

          .  According to the report “Illegal Drug Use” by the Center for Disease Control, the percentage of people over 12 years or  older “with any illicit drug use in the past month: 8.7%”(CDC). When taking into consideration that “unemployed adults are about twice as likely” (Sulzberger) to use drugs compared to employed adults, we can conclude that around 17% of unemployed adults use drugs. However when looking at the welfare recipient drug test results of Florida that were provided, less than one percent of the recipients used drugs. However there were 1,597 results that weren't provided. Even if assuming that half of the non provided recipients failed their drug tests, which is probably larger than reality, than around 10% of the recipients used drugs. With this we can see that the large majority of people who receive welfare don’t use it for drugs, but rather use it to support families.

The argument that drug tests would save welfare dollars by preventing recipients from spending the money on drugs is completely nullified by the fact that the drug tests themselves would be at a much higher expense. Due to the high cost of the drug test, and low amount of drug users among recipients, we can conclude that these drug tests are a huge misapplication of valuable taxpayer dollars, and a waste of time.

  

Is the Risk Worth the Reward?

The world appears to be in the midst of both an economic and environmental crisis. Between these two lurking giants, the debate over the expansion of oil drilling lies. It appears that the decision to enlarge, or reduce the expansion of oil drilling will inevitably assist one of the problems, but greatly increase the harm of the others. When deciding if offshore oil drilling in the US should be increased, one must consider the potential benefits towards economics, and the potential hazards towards the environment.

The US economy is in a volatile state. A completely unpredictable market and a 9 percent unemployment rate are making the idea of expanding oil drilling extremely attractive. Offshore oil drilling could tremendously help the economy in multiple ways. One way it could help the economic problem is that it could give thousands of unemployed citizens a job and a source of income. With these additional people obtaining jobs, and making money, the money they spend at businesses and stores could benefit those businesses, and in turn those businesses could hire more people too. Another way oil expansion could help the economy is that with the additional oil in the country, oil prices would most likely go down. With lower oil prices, people would now be able to spend less revenue on gas, and spend their money in other places and businesses. Companies would also benefit because now with less money being spent on their delivery trucks, and tractor trailers, more money could be spent on products and hiring additional people. Although these benefits are a very likely outcome, there are some potential environmental problems.

          In 2010 an underwater oil valve in the Gulf of Mexico controlled by the company BP broke, pouring out millions upon millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf. With BP’s slow response time and ineffective solutions, the wildlife of the Gulf of Mexico was greatly impacted. Science Daily is a website that provides articles about modern day science related news. According to Science Daily’s article “One YearLater, Oil Spill’s Impact On Gulf Not Fully Understood” even an entire year after the oil spill the local bird population is still affected, “nearly all the young birds and a huge proportion of the adults had at least some oil on them.” This oil can cause dangers for the birds such as choking hazards and sickness. Some people hope to expand oil drilling to the Arctic Ocean. People must take the Gulf disaster into perspective when considering about expanding oil drilling to places such as the Arctic or other coastal regions. If an oil valve in the Arctic broke, it could be more devastating than the oil valve in the Gulf, due to the fact that a valve in the Arctic would be further away than a valve in the Gulf, and would most likely take more time to respond to. The additional oil could also damage the world’s global warming concerns. However although these are alarming concerns people must know that these are only possible concerns, and not definite dangers.

Go to College to Get More Knowledge

With the ever increasing difficulty Americans are being presented to find jobs, and huge college tuition prices, many people are wondering if going to college is the answer to economic success. In the article "Will Drop Outs Save America" Ellsberg argues that it is a wiser decision for new entrepreneurs to stay out of college. I however believe that going to college is a better financial decision for people to make, due to the high risk new businesses pose to owners and the average earnings that college graduates earn rather than high school graduates. 

In his article "Using Goldratt’s Thinking Process to Improve the Success Rate of Small Business Start-ups" Ellsberg shows the reader how hugely successful companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, and Twitter, were all created by college dropouts. And although these dropouts are among the wealthiest people of the world, there is a large amount of businesses that fail. In an article by Lloyd J. Taylor, the article states "businesses with fewer than 20 employees have only a 37% chance of surviving four years" and "Restaurants have the highest failure rate, with only a 20% chance of surviving two years"(Taylor). With this information we can see how it is such a huge risk to start a new business, and how few people actually make a success off of them. If ones business failed, it would be much safer for a person to have a college degree to fall back on. With a college degree people would usually find jobs with higher salaries.

The article "College Degree Nearly Double Annual Earnings" the article states "Workers 18 and over sporting bachelors degrees earn an average of $51,206 a year, while those with a high school diploma earn $27,915"(Longley). This article shows how people with college degrees almost make double the amount of money compared to people without degrees. Because having a degree usually earns people more money, and appeals more to employers, it is obvious that having a college degree is beneficial when searching for a job.

Many people however feel that college is far too expensive to go to, and is not worth the benefits. Although college is very expensive to attend, it does pay off in the long run substantially. With college degrees people on average earn much more money, and if one owned a business having a college degree could be appealing to investors due to the experience and knowledge the individual has. And although Ellsberg supports people immediately starting businesses out of high school, it is a much wiser decision to get a college degree to keep your options open, and possibly earn a decent salary for a number of years, and use the money earned to start up a new business.

No More Halloween?

Halloween is right around the corner, a holiday that is beloved by children around the world. And although a festive event would appear to spread joy, it is causing some controversy. In one elementary school celebrating Halloween in school has been banned. The reason for this is because one student is a Jehovah's Witness (I believe the child is, but possibly a different religion) and does not believe in the idea of Halloween. The principal banned Halloween in the school so that the student would not be upset or discriminated against. I believe that this is ridiculous for the school to ban Halloween. When schools celebrate Halloween, it is not meant to anger people, or tell people that it is the right thing to do; it is to let the children have a fun time. They don't tell kids that if you don't celebrate Halloween you are wrong, just that Halloween is a holiday that kids can have fun. I can not see how allowing people to celebrate a holiday like Halloween could upset someone so much. And now because one kid could have possibly been a little upset, every single other kid now has to be upset and get there Halloween in school taken away. It just seems like you can't celebrate anything anymore, because people will get offended. Some people might disagree with me saying that banning Halloween is the right thing to do because it could offend the child. I do not see how this could offend anyone. I wonder if a child’s religious views are against the destroying of trees, will pencils and papers be banned. And also why didn't someone just simply ask the child if he would be offended or have a problem with Halloween. It amazes me how little things can cause such an enormous deal. 

Hypocrisy at it's Finest

Recently a radio ad in Texas advertising a concealed hand gun class has sparked a great deal of controversy. In the ad the owner Crockett Keller said "If you are a socialist liberal and/or voted for the current campaigner in chief, please do not take this class" and "If you are a non-Christian, Arab, or Muslim, I will not teach you the class.”. Many people support his ad and even congratulated him, while others want him to be punished for offending certain types of people. In his own defense Keller said he was using his right of freedom of speech, and was expressing his opinion. This controversy seems very similar to another recent incident. A man named Tarek Mehanna is currently on trial accused of aiding and spreading the ideas of the terrorist group al-Qaida. Mehanna has visited Yemen where he is thought to have contacted terrorists. He has also translated violent jihad messages into English, was found with texts describing al-Qaida training, and says that he loves Osama Bin Laden. Mehanna's family is defending him saying that he too is just practicing the 1st amendment and never harmed or planned to harm anyone. With the Keller situation, most people defending him are white Americans, a large amount of them who dislike Muslims. With the Mehanna situation most people defending him are most likely Muslims, a large amount of them dislike non-Muslims. Both of these men are defending themselves with freedom of speech, even though their views are polar opposites. The point I'm trying to make with these two current controversies are that people can be so hypocritical. Some people who support Keller because he is using the 1st amendment probably hate Mehanna and ignore that he was possibly using his first amendment and want him punished. And it's the same thing for Mehanna supporters who hate Keller. It is completely contradictory if someone takes account for the one of the two men’s freedom of speech and not the others. Some people might disagree saying that Mehanna was obviously trying to harm Americans, or that Keller was obviously trying to harm Muslims. I'm not saying that either men are guilty or innocent, but you must take in account for both of their freedoms of speech, no matter if you agree with Mehanna’s or Keller’s views, or what the situation is.