Republicans Reduce Funds for Social Security

      The articles states that because the Republicans won the 2014 midterm elections, they are making limitations on benefits for the disabled. The part of Social Security that supports the disabled Americans is predicted to not allocate enough funds in in 2016. Because of this, the Republicans changed the regulations so that no transfers may be made between the disabled support program and the retirement program of Social Security. Before this, it was a fairly common practice for legislators to use the power of the purse to redirects funds from one program to the other. The more conservative members of Congress are downsizing all of Social Security by getting small cuts from its funds with the threat of cutting the disability program specifically. The article explicitly states "If the fund runs out, the SSDI will face immediate cuts in benefits of about a fifth, so Republicans figure Democrats will agree to some "reform" of traditional Social Security (read: cuts) to save the disabled."
      To counter this seemingly ludicrous idea, the Democrats have come up with a simple solution; put all of the money into the same source and draw from it as needed. Because of this, no transfer of funds would be needed to be made. This makes a clear statement on the Government's intentions and to what degree the government will advocate for protection of the citizen.
Link: California Court Ruling Could Limit Drought Fighting Tools

Border Security

      Personally, I am of the persuasion that border security should no longer be expanded. In fact, to lessen the necessity for border security will alleviate the economy. This is due to less spending on border control, the lower cost of labor, and the increased revenue from Social Security. The border between the United States and Mexico is costly to keep active and ready, for it requires technology (cameras, vehicles, communication means), fence maintenance, and people who are posted at the checkpoints must be paid. Unlawful immigrants participate in Social Security if they have a job, but they receive no benefits from doing so. Therefore the practice is making money without needing to give back to them.
      It is my desire that the number of border crossing deaths would be reduced and the border would be more easily accessible by those wishing to cross into the United States. I am by no means suggesting that the government does not restrict the border in any way shape or form. The increased security causes unregistered immigrants to make more extreme actions in an attempt to cross the border. These actions include crossing vast deserts or highly dangerous areas. Ask to your self if securing our borders is worth many human lives a year.
Links: Politics Fewer immigrants are entering the U.S. illegally, and that’s changed the border security debate, Illegal immigrants benefit the U.S. economy

Restricting Water Tiers

California Courts Deny Tiered Prices for Water

           In California, an appeals court ruled that it the act of pricing water depending on how much water each house used. They ruled this is illegal because no government agency is allowed to price more than the cost of the service. At some point, while the tiered pricing was enabled, the price of the water was nearly four times the standard cost. The reason this tiered pricing was enacted is that the state of California needs to conserve water, and this method had proven to be an effective way to ensure people would limit their water use. It is imperative that California reduces the amount of water used because they are having a drought and they cannot risk losing their water reserves during the drought. The agencies perceive the ruling as a detrimental measure to their goal of conserving their resources
      This is interesting because the notion of tiered internet speeds is currently under question. Net neutrality, which is the idea that internet cannot have tiered speeds, needs not to have the same decision as the California water case because it is not a government agency which is providing the service. As brought up in the video, one man believed the price of everyone's water should be increased. This equivalent is something I believe no one wants, except for the executives of the businesses that will profit from the tiered internet. Therefore, it is critical to ensure equal internet cost to all.
Link: California Court Ruling Could Limit Drought Fighting Tools

Congressional and Individual Opinion

Congress and Congress Members

            In this article, by Harry Enten of FiveThirtyEight, describe how statistics show that people dislike Congress as a whole, but everyone likes their own representatives for Congress. Many statistics show that the approval rating for members of Congress and Congress as a whole have a direct correlation. This means they rise or drop in numbers at the same rate, more or less. Although, there is a percentage threshold in favor of the individual members. This means, that 15 - 25% more Americans believe in the members of Congress rather than Congress as a whole. The article also explains that the low approval ratings in Congress will hinder the Republicans who were expecting a boost in approval ratings because of Obama's poor rating. But since their own rating is so low, it will not be as effective against Obama had the Republicans been . Congress has done things to cause their approval rating to be low, meaning the rates are fairly justifiable.
      Fairly close to the time that this article came out, Congress chose to shut down the government. During my simulation of congress, we were able to pass many laws which appealed to many different demographics. It might anger some people, but since we were being effective in our office, they could not be as angry at us as they could with a congress which passes no legislation. The ineffectiveness of Congress has cause people to feel disdain towards them.
Link: Disliking Congress, as a Whole And as Individuals

Obama Slows Withdraw of Troops in Afghanistan

      Obama stated that he plans to continue the withdraw of troops from Afghanistan, but he ensure that the troops will be fully withdrawn from the nation before the end of his presidency. He will keep the troop levels at 9,800 soldiers still in Afghanistan. This decision was based on Obama's meeting with the president of Afghan, Ashraf Gahni. Obama's administration advised our president to continue supporting Gahni's cause. The act of continuing support there would increase the deteriorating relationship between the two nations. He affirmed Gahni's ability to act as a commander in chief for his nation. He said that he was using the role in a new way, one of which no one was has ever taken before. He assures he will not abandon his original plan to pull the troops out of Afghanistan. He says that Afghanistan is still a dangerous place and that we should not be careless. He also states that the Afghan security forces are better equipped to than the threats in their area. Keeping the troops there gives increased security and food for the Afghan forces.

      President Obama was well within his legal rights to do this. He is the acting Commander in Chief and had logical justification to do so. The president is attempting to amend partially wounded ties with another country while maintaining his original plan to remove the troops from Afghanistan. I personally believe the decision is a sound one. Obama clearly used his administration to determine this, making it a more informed decision.

Link: Obama Agrees to slow U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan

Unit Three and the Crowded Republican Party

Republican Candidate Possibilities

      The article explains that the number of Republican candidates prior to this year has been small. In these previous years, a clear nominee was always found. Whereas, now, there are no obvious winners for the Republican nomination in the 2016 election. If the approximated number of Republicans running for the nomination is accurate, then the Republicans will have the most packed election pool since 1976. Because of how vast number of election possibilities, the number of variables are increased making it harder to predict, accurately, the party's nomination. This causes the polls to be scattered and indecisive, leading the party in no clear direction. The number of candidates that may run is only one less than the record number for any election ever.
      Though the competition is still alive and real, the one who is able to assert dominance over the other candidates first may very well earn the nomination. The article states that George W. Bush was facing off against five other candidates, but once he showed "strength through endorsements" he was able to have the position secured. Something similar may be happening in the current election. Scott Walker's increasingly good polls may earn him more endorsements and allow him to persuade the polls more, which may very well deter possible candidates from running.

Link: The 2016 GOP Field is Shaping Up As Historically Crowded — And Unpredictable

Skewed Polls and Unit 2

Polls Bias and Inaccuracies Explained

     Nate Silver, the author of the article, analyzes the tendencies for firms to prefer a certain political party over another. As the chart demonstrates, polling figures tend to be highly skewed towards the favor of one party or another, depending on organization of where the poll was taken. The polls taken by the organizations are not intentionally favoring one or the other, but the polling firms get their data and information, unintentionally, from sources which have a greater favor one way or the other, the article explained. The "likely voter adjustment" is another method used by the author to estimate the accuracy. This method is most simply explained as evaluating polling results from firms' results for registered and likely voters. The article also explains the necessity for random sampling. Random Sampling is a method to ensure the data is not favoring a side in any way. To ensure this, all variables must be randomized; time of day a person is called, the wording of the question asked, mode of contact (not land-line exclusive), and location of the people being surveyed must all be random. Nate Silver uses polls from many different sources, despite the fact that they are inaccurate. He finds their historical bias and adjusts their polls using the aforementioned methods. Then, the adjusted polls are used to find the most accurate outcome from the calculated estimate.
     Nate Silver has been successful at predicting election outcomes because he realizes the consistent mistakes/tendencies that polling firms make. His insight to the common error is supposedly scientific polls allows for more more improvement for the future. For example, if one were to point out an obvious flaw and fairly simple way to fix it, then it would be extremely beneficial to fix the glaring error. Because of his ability to find errors, the accuracy of future polls should be improved, assuming the firms attempted to reduce their inaccurate practices. The important of proper random sampling cannot be stressed enough. The process to get truly random and accurate data is meticulous, but the results' accuracy should be worth more than the extra effort. If the accuracy of the polling firm goes up, then their credibility should as well. As credibility goes up, one would imagine, the ability to make more money would go up as well.

Link: Calculating 'House Effects' of Polling Firms