In response to Hannah Newborn

In Hannah Newborn’s post about STAAR testing, she talks about how the test scores have not changed that this presents a critical issue in education. I think that teachers and people in charge of the curriculum should not have to bear all the blame. Although the argument can be made that teachers should just teach harder, the same argument can be made for the students as they should just study harder. A student unwilling to learn can be considered a lost cause at times and having a teacher that wants to teach them will not always make the student learn.

However, I completely agree with the fact that if standardized is such a big deal to the education of students, then these test should be taken better care of and students should not have to worry about whether their test were graded correctly or if they were even graded in the first place. Standardized test can decide the fate of a student on whether they have to go to summer school or even repeat a grade, losing any test or being graded incorrectly should always be seen as unacceptable.

I don’t think that standardized testing should be taken away completely because although these test can at times be random on what they test, they can serve as a way to gauge just how well a student has been taught over the year. This does have its drawbacks such as having a curriculum specific to the test instead of a curriculum that could help with development of the student’s mind. However, there is now better alternative to standardized testing and I believe it is up the citizens of Texas to take charge in correcting these major educational problems.

The Unlawful Polititians

In our Texas Government course, we have learned that Texas has some some trouble with keeping politicians in line. With the people that Texas residence vote in running amok and the supposed net that is the law trying to keep them from wrong doings failing, I believe that Texas has failed in keeping the government to be for the people and not for business.

This can be seen in Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, as he has been seen doing some shady business with his recent trips to North Texas. It seems that he has recently used over $78,000 in his trips expenses up to North Texas. Now the problem here is that  he is using the money and that it’s the fact that he is using the money for his own personal gain. In his trips, he is seen being picked up my many people that look to be security and this can be described as overprotective for just normal trips. There is also the fact that he has a business in the north and he is using the money to help his business.

I am baffled that there is no policing net that can prevent such things. Paxton has been doing such trips frequently and with taxpayer money, and yet no one has told him anything. Even with his recent criminal charges, this man is running around using taxpayer money for his personal gain and business. I think that such a man has no role in government if he feels the need to use his time in such a matter. There have been comparisons to Governor Abbott’s travel spending and it’s within the same range as Paxton, however Abbott is a governor and that is understandable. Paxton  is certainly not the only politician that has had problems with the law and or has worked the system in someway for their own personal gain.

I believe that with the constant wrongdoings that certain politicians have done, there needs to be a way for the people or for some group to police them and truly enforce the law. Maybe this can be seen as the fault of Texans for electing such a person, and maybe there needs to be a way to better educate Texans, but something needs to be done with unlawful politicians that are never punished.

Comment to Lien Fon Chi

After reading the blog post by Lien Fon Chi, I have to agree with his point in that parents may think that they have their child’s best interest when opting them out if the vaccination and that this can come with severe consequences that will harm the general public. I feel that his by bringing in historical evidence such as how measles and whooping cough have come back supports his argument and shows how dire the situation can be if people continue to opt out of vaccines. I feel that parents should not have the option to opt out of vaccines because of how many places make them mandatory and more importantly schools. Why should children that could be a potential disease threat be allowed to attend the same schools that children with the vaccine? I feel that this would anger many parents if they knew that their children could be in danger of catching what children have. Lien’s comparison of the banning of peanut products to banning children with diseases is a little over the top but it’s not so much that it changes how solid his argument is. I feel that Lien’s conclusion of making getting vaccinations a standard of being a member of society is the single most important point of this blog post. I believe that many would conclude that getting vaccinations to prevent diseases would help the general public overall, and I cannot see as to why anyone would want to opt out of lifesaving vaccines. I believe Lien’s argument is strong, to the historical evidence and the research of increasing diseases, it is hard to find a way in which to form a counterargument.

The Representation of Texas

Throughout Texas' history, Texas has been predominantly white. However with recent changes in the demographic, there has been a change and there is no majority race in Texas. I do not think that the majority white male Texas Legislature can represent the state that Texas has become. Too many people are stuck in the past of how Texas use to be, as a white majority state and are not willing to face the growing minority races in Texas, including the upcoming Hispanic plurality.

When looking at the current state of the Texas Legislature’s ethnicity one can see that the white are still the majority but with Hispanics begin the closest at 21%. With these percentages the projected Hispanic plurality may find trouble in being able to be represented equally. This can be problematic to Hispanics because of how Republicans have generally been the party that has been against immigrants and have put forward anti-immigration laws. So how can a party that is against immigrants even hope to be able to represent them without trying to change their ideology just to stay in power. Looking at the ratio of males to females working you can see that the people that primarily work for the Senate are white males, which can lead to unequal representation of the new Texas. With so little women in the Senate, we can begin to question if white males can really have the best interest to represent women equally. The most recent case of unequal representation would be the current case with planned parenthood and how the benefits that it brought to women have been cut short and with the harsher regulations make helping difficult for planned parenthood.

Not only is there no majority race but the current way in which Texas Legislature operates creates a gap between the average person that may want to represent the people but cannot afford to work only 140 days in two years and have the low pay that results because of their time working. This leads to the only people that are realistically able to run for office being none other that the rich people of Texas and the rich are certainly not an accurate representation of Texas as all types of income levels have different ways to look at politics.

I feel that Texas must work on their representation in order to better their government that should be run for the people by the people that make up Texas.

The Lesser of Two Evils

On March 21st , 2016 Erica Grieder wrote an article about how republicans should start to stop looking into a way to stop Trump and should just vote for Ted Cruz called "Seriously, Republicans. It’s Time to Drink the Cruz Kool-Aid." Erica Grieder is a writer and senior Editor at Texas Monthly. She seems to be heavily biased against Trump and is really pushing everyone that votes Republican to vote for Ted Cruz, because Cruz seems to be the only person that has a chance at all to beat Trump.I feel that I agree with Erica because she seems to have looked at the grim situation that the Republican party is facing and is giving a possible solution to their problem. However Erica is heavily biased against Trump and she knows that because she lays down what Trump has done for her to hate him.

I agree with the author that if the Republicans don’t want Trump as their front runner and believe that his nomination will lead to the downfall to the Republican party’s chance to win the Presidency, that they must vote for Ted Cruz because he seems to be the only candidate to have a chance at this point. Erica has valid points on how people should stop trying to ignore their Trump problem and that picking a lesser of two evils at this points is just what they need to do so that they can have a chance to win the presidency. I think that Republicans should be looking towards what could happen if they think that having Trump is the worse choice and that they should try to get a nominee that isn’t as bad as Trump.

Commentary on Rodney Ellis

On February 18th, 2016 Rodney Ellis wrote an article explaining his reasoning as to why he will support Hillary Clinton in the presidential race called "Why I'm for Hillary Clinton." Rodney Ellis has been a Texas senator since 1990, and is the vice chairman of the Senate State Affairs Committee. With these credentials I can safely say that he is a credible source however he does have a bias since he is a democrat, which can be seen in who he is voting for. Ellis wrote this article in the hopes that his argument on why one should vote for Hillary would sway those voters that are on the edge of picking between Hillary and Bernie or maybe even try to get some people that are looking into what a democrat would support. I believe that Ellis made some good points on Hillary's backstory and giving a small history on what Hillary has done and supported in the past. However, it falls short in that it only mentions her actions in racial and social issues, which are important but one cannot just become president because of those two things. There are economic issues and other types of policies that one must address in order to sway voters. I think this is mainly a way to get people that are worried about these issues and try to pressure them by saying that no one else is doing anything about these problems and that no one has plans to address them.  It seems that Ellis wants to try and hide the more controversial ideologies that Hillary has and try to only talk about the problems that any person would want to fix. I believe that Ellis did an okay job in trying to convince people to vote for Hillary but there are other problems that could also be address.

The Republican Party Struggles with Hispanic Voters

On February 10th, 2016 Ashley Lopez wrote an article on why the GOP will have to change for the uprising Hispanic voters called “Why the GOP May Have a Hard Time Courting Texas' Hispanic Voters in 2016.” The article highlighted the Republican’s shortcomings when it came getting Hispanic voters. In an interview with Muniz he says that he thinks “the party is going to see a long-term negative effect,” because of their alienation of the Hispanic community.

I believe that this article is worth reading because of the impact that the future Hispanic population will have on Texas politics. Now that the population of Hispanics will eventually become the plurality, the Republican party will have to start thinking up ways to attract the new voters. Not only will they have to change how they speak about Hispanics but they will have to change the image most young Hispanic voters already have about the Republican party.