Black Friday

If you participated in this year's Black Friday, I'd encourage you to rethink doing so.

I personally don't participate in Black Friday, not only because I strongly dislike overwhelming crowds of people trampling each other to get into department stores, but for a larger reason: Black Friday perpetuates capitalism. Capitalism is one of the most prevalent issues in our society today, virtually to the point where it controls the lives of every single person in the United States.

Is there a link between Black Friday and capitalism? Yes: an increase in demand on days such as Black Friday encourages an increase in production and resources needed to fulfill that demand. In order for production to happen, workers are thrown into a system that oppresses each and every one of them as well as the poor because all of this only profits the rich minority, who trick the workers into thinking that they are playing a role in "stimulating the economy" while they, in reality, are simply units in a mass-production complex. Not only does this harm the workers without them knowing it, but it harms the environment as well. What keeps factories going? What are electronics (yes, your phone and computer) and clothing made of? Think about it: deforestation and the pollution of air and water are byproducts of this demand. Worst of all, capitalism perpetuates greed, both among the public and large corporations; humans are naturally selfish and we will never get tired of wanting more. In the end, the only people who really benefit are the capitalists themselves.

I understand that going shopping on Black Friday is a tradition for many families in the United States. Clearly, however, we must take a step back and think about the deeper implications of this "tradition".

Federal Emergency Relief Act

The Federal Emergency Relief Act was put into terms on May 12, 1933.  This act provided grants; that did not have to be paid back much like a loan; to states in use of helping with relief from a catastrophe.  This use of help became a huge part for Civil Works Administration and after many wars. Employing over millions of people who helped relief programs. Its job was to help end the Great Depression and unfortunately this program along with others fell short. Instead it came to World War 2 and the million of jobs resulting from it to end the Great Depression. Although The Federal Emergency Relief Act only had a 3 year life it helped many states and programs.
The Federal Emergency Relief Act of 1933 was mandated that it shall end after 2 years of being placed, having to then be replaced the Works Progress Administration was created.  This took over and improved the programs put into place by the Federal Emergency Relief Act, and was created by the authority of the Emergency Relief Appropriate Act of 1935.

Roosevelt and The New Deal

Often referred to as the First New Deal, the First Hundred Days was a period of time in which Roosevelt tried his best to get people back to work as soon as possible. He based his deal around the three R's: relief, recovery, and reform. "Relief" were short-term solutions to stop the help ease the immediate suffering. These included the Emergency Banking Act to try and save the banks and the Unemployment Relief Act which was able to provide jobs through projects such as reforestation. "Recovery" was the beginning of the economic stability. These included the Economy Act to balance the budget and aid the veterans and the Tennesee Valley Authority which constructed dams, prevented flooding and provided jobs. "Reform" aimed to prevent crises like the Depression from happening in the future. These included Acts such as the Agricultural Adjustment Act and the Federal Securities Act. The Agricultural Act set up the AAA which paid farmers to prevent overproduction. The Federal Securities Act made it illegal for brokers to conceal information when selling stocks to prevent any future issues. Overall, this deal was very ambitious. However, knowing that the New Deal did not get us out of the Great Depression, can we still consider it successful? Why, or why not?

What programs from the New Deal are still around today and what are their effects now?

Over the last couple of classes, we have been talking a lot about the New Deal that was put into place when Franklin D. Roosevelt took office in 1933. The New Deal created a lot of programs that were meant to help the nation get through the Great Depression by creating jobs and opportunities for the unemployed and to stop anything like the Depression from happening again. Some of these programs are still around today. If they were taken away, what do you think would happen to our society? Would we return to the Depression or are there new safety measures in place that would stop that from happening even if the previous safety measures were removed?

Thoughts?

Changing Perceptions of Government

When Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected into office, he immediately began taking huge measures to help the American people. He came to power in the midst of a deep depression, in a time where the people had little faith in the government. Before he was in office, the government was a passive entity in the lives of individual citizens. But Roosevelt saw that his people needed the government to be more involved, and to help them with their specific needs. He poured relief into the country, creating countless initiatives during his Hundred Days. This direct aid helped changed people's perceptions of the government. They created a connection with their federal government because of this. Roosevelt not only helped pull the nation out of a deep depression, but completely changed the role of government in the life of an average American citizen.

What is Social Security?

I remember getting my first paycheck and looking down the list of deductions and seeing one for social security. While seeing the deductions on your paycheck may be annoying, it has many positive effects that many people benefit from. This idea was originally implemented by Franklin Roosevelt in his Second New Deal he passed the Social Security Act in 1935. At its origin, it established a pension. It provided security for those injured on the job and unemployment insurance. It also provided aid for mothers and disabled people. Currently, 59 million people benefit from social security. The 9 digit code that is your social security number may be required for many things. The social security number was started in 1936. It was first created to be able to track salaries of Americans but today is used to verify identities. Social Security numbers are assigned at birth. Social Security has been a lasting effect of the New Deal, and one that many Americans today still benefit from.

Black Friday

Thanksgiving has been a widely celebrated American holiday for centuries. A more recently created holiday, however, is Black Friday - the day after thanksgiving. The tradition started in the mid-20th century, and has since been a huge hit among americans. Every year, it marks the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. Stores all around the nation post once-a-year discounts for people to take advantage of. Some shoppers are so vicious, that people have actually been trampled to death during the initial stampede into the store. When it first started, stores would open at around 6am. Now stores are open from the midnight right after Thanksgiving in order to squeeze more revenue from their customers.

Does your family participate in this American tradition?

God in America?

During the early 1900 a big topic rose in America that was a arguing topic for several years. It was based off of religion and if it should play a role in children education and how far you can go believing or using the bible until science intervened.  In other words it was the struggle between 2 groups weather or not science was the root of life or Gods word in the bible. This lead to many cases and arguments. Religion served as an engine for law reforms during this era of American History by making Americans pick a side that will eventually split the country until a trial came to follow. Many Federalist believed that life should and people should believe deeply in Christianity and use it as a basis for life. While others thought that evolution got in the way of beliefs and science, leading to conflict on who to believe. Leading to many trials such as Bryan's. Who was asked to support his views on the bible, by Darrow who called him into witness. Darrow questioned Bryan, specifically about Genesis when God created light and night, tricking Bryan to look stupid and idiotic in what he believed in. Believing "One miracle is as easy to believe as another". With this being radio live the whole world saw the stupidity of the fundamentalist and realized that they were believing something without being able to reason with what is stated nor having any support. In the ended this ended the split and lead to end of religion and evolution in studies for views were being intertwined. In the end many still stuck to there beliefs but the impact this had on many peoples life's and views was outstanding. Blaming or assuming events were to come based off of religion, for example many thought WW1 was the end of the life believing that bad things would happen because of their sins. It changed peoples views and caused many arguments between people along with riots.
 

Lorena Hickok

Lorena Hickok was mentioned in our book. She was hired to tour around the country to report the hardships of everyday Americans back to the White House.
Her childhood was tough, her father beat her and her sisters and they were constantly moving around so that her father could find work. At the age of 14, she ran away and was a maid. Her mother's cousin saved her from this life and she went back to high school and enrolled in Lawrence College but flunked out a year later. She worked for a couple of different newspapers mostly writing the society section, the only position that was available to women. During the war, she moved to New York City in the hopes of being a journalist covering the stories but was fired within a month.
She enrolled in the University of Minnesota but left school without completing it. Thomas J. Dillon recognized her talents and mentored her allowing her to cover more dramatic stories at the Minneapolis Tribune. The Associated Press hired her and she came to fame.
She covered the Roosevelts during the presidential campaign and formed a close friendship with Eleanor Roosevelt. Harry Hopkins hired her to visit 32 states to give detailed reports on living conditions following the New Deal. She was very valuable to Eleanor Roosevelt, editing her columns and accompanying her on diplomatic visits. Eleanor invited her to live at the White House but Hickok had to leave as her diabetes worsened.
Her ability to overcome adversity and to continue trying after failure is what stands out to me today. Despite multiple setbacks, she would always look for a new way or a new angle.

The History of Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving goes way back, starting initially during the 1600s. However, it was not declared a national holiday until two centuries later -- the 1800s.

Thanksgiving can be traced to how previously, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans paid tribute to their gods after the fall harvest. For the pilgrims, it was used as a way to celebrate the end of a long drought in 1623 that had threatened their agriculture.

Thanksgiving actually ended up changing from the last Thursday of every month to the second to last Thursday of every month by President Roosevelt in 1939, in order to create more sales during the Holiday season. However, this was met with large amounts of opposition, and was changed back to the last one.

How do you guys celebrate this holiday?

Great Depression Vs Great Recession

Recently we've been learning about the Great Depression. Watching documentaries and reading various articles online to find information. I never knew much about the Great Depression and always had a preconceived notion of how bad it was. I was totally wrong, the Great Depression was definitely worse than what I thought it was. It wasn't just half the population it was basically all the population trying to deal with massive financial losses and issues. With the Great Recession since it was so recent most people know how it started but with the Great Depression I never truly knew how it started. In my mind I always thought the stock market was just a recent "business" but never understood that it started a very long time ago. Reading many different articles and watching the documentaries, I believe the Great Depression is overwhelming worse than the Great Recession. They both have similar issues and big differences such as how they started. One of the most obvious similarities of the two are how they affected the majority of the population financially. People lost mass amounts of money as well as some lives were ruined for good because of the stress and pressure put on these people. Overall, the Great Depression was bound to happen but the Great Recession could be blamed on citizens with too much power in government.

Reflecting on the Election

It has been almost 3 weeks since America elected a new President, and the aftermath is beginning to unfold. Immediately after the election, there was a wave of fear throughout the nation, combined with a wave of misogynistic and racist behavior that felt briefly validated. Many people protested, both peacefully, and in a destructive and violent way. Now, that has become less common, and we are more in a state of fearfully watching, waiting to see how this will go. In Trump's 100 days, nobody is sure what may happen. He has begun electing officials who are against many of the things that democrats have been working for a long time. His new head of the EPA is someone who does not believe in climate change. The woman he is looking to be in charge of education is opposed to public schools and greatly supports for-profit Christian schools. These are worrying, and all we can do is watch and wait, and hope that this goes well.

Great Depression and Great Recession Differences

The Great Depression and The Great Recession were both large economic failures, and both has differing reasons they happened and effects they had. The Great Depression started in 1929 and lasted until 1939, while The Great Recession started in 2007, and only lasted a few years. The Great Depression lasted much longer, and it was a much larger and more serious crash, and it effected many more people. The Great Depression was caused by a big stock market crash, and people taking out all their money of the banks, which caused the banks to run out of money and fail. It caused mass unemployment, people to lose money, and the unemployment rate peaked at 25% during that time. The Recession was much less serious. It was caused by housing prices increasing because of bank loans, and it increased debt caused by the housing market. The unemployment rate was about 10%, compared to the 25% of the Depression. So The Great Depression was a much more serious and longer lasting crisis, and was centered around banks and stocks, while the Recession was shorter lived, less serious, and dealt with banks and the housing market.

Early Depression Impact

Yesterday in class we learned about the Great Depression. Some of the most important points were that the bank failures caused 9 million savings accounts to disappear, forcing people to sell their furniture and belongings to make enough money to survive since a lot of them had also lost their jobs. At the beginning, people blamed themselves because they thought they hadn't worked hard enough, and as a result of this didn't expect the government to do anything about it. But as the Depression dragged on, they started questioning why the government hadn't done something to help the people by then. They started to blame President Hoover for not doing anything to help the country, and started using his name to represent bad things, such as Hoovervilles, which were shantytowns of unemployed people at the edges of cities. To escape their hard times, people went to the theater and where entertained for hours while only paying 15 cents, danced to swing music, which was a form of jazz, and listened to radio dramas, which were becoming very popular at the time.

Great Depression vs. Great Recession

Jamie Kesten, Merlyn Boljonis & Quinn Lavin

The Great Depression (Affects on the Average Person)

Although an estimated 40% of the U.S population did not face any hardship during the Great Depression, others had to deal with real issues. First of all, there was a decrease in marriages and divorces. The reason for this drop was due to the marriage/divorce fees which people could not afford. There was also over 1.5 million cases of husbands leaving their families because they were too hard to support. There was also a reported 25% unemployment rate.
There were also positive effects. Some of these positive effects include the rise of employed women. Before this, it was considered that the men in the family should be the breadwinners and support their families, but due to the lack of jobs for men, there was a rise in women seeking work.

Great Depression vs. Great Recession Infographic by Reuben, James, and Peter

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18352725-depression-vs-recession

My Great Depression Vs Great Recession Infographic

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18279836-great-depression-vs-great-recession-infographic

Great Depression vs. Great Recession Infographic (Dylan and George)

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18283331-infographic 

Great Depression vs. Great Recession

Great Depression vs Great Recession - Paige Labuda, Matt Carpenter, Jordan Shaver

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18352747-infographic

Great Depression vs Great Recession - Dan Appel, Trevor Straus

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18283715-thing
https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18283715-thing?presentation=true

By Dan Appel and Trevor Straus

Stock Market Values Impact on Economy - Jordan

Following research about the impact of the Stock Market crash of 1929 on the American Economy and life, our group came to multiple conclusions.

Because so many people lost huge amounts of money, they in turn lost their jobs as well.  Companies were unable to employ people as they had lost the funds required to maintain their business.

The Stock Market value directly influenced the rates of homelessness during the Great Depression. This is because as the value of the Stock Market tanked, many people lost huge investments, leading to mass financial crisis. Because of this financial crisis, people were unable to pay for their homes, which, in turn, put them directly on the streets.

Great Depression vs. Great Recession

Pictochart Infographic

Pictochart by Josh H. and Quinn W.
https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18201417-great-depression-vs-great-recession

Great Depression vs. Great Recession

The Great Depression and the Great Recession, two similar economic downfalls, were actually quite different. They had different causes, the Great Depression being caused by the economy not being diverse enough and causing everything else to fall because of a chain reaction. However, the Great Recession was caused by banks making too much money through loans which pushed up house prices and increased debt. Also, the Great Depression was generally more severe in each area than the Great Recession was, except home foreclosures. The Depression had 9,000 banks in total fail throughout the 30’s, while the Recession had 492 bank failures from 2005-2013. In addition, unemployment during the Depression reached a peak of 25%, with up to 15 million Americans lose their jobs. But during the Recession, the peak unemployment rate was 8.5%, and 8.4 million jobs were lost. Lastly, the rate of home foreclosures in the Depression exceeded 1%, but during the Recession 3.5% of homes were in the national foreclosure inventory, and there were more than 4 million completed foreclosures. So, while the Great Depression was more severe in the aspects of unemployment and bank failures, the Great Recession was more severe with home foreclosures.

Infographic

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/18283326-great-depression-vs-great-recession

Ian
Abel
Erik

The Cause of the Great Recession

The Great Recession was caused by many different issues. The problem that led to the Great Recession was that the there was a lack of regulations, which included a lot of financial firms not acting conservatively and taking on took many risks; the federal reserve failing to control bad mortgages; and policymakers that were not well informed on the current economic situation. The main reason was the crash of the housing market. The issue was that too many people had mortgages on sub-prime mortgage rates, that they could barely afford. When the housing bubble crashed the rates skyrocketed creating a financial crisis. In all experts believe that the Great Recession was avoidable if there were better planning and observations.

Why Wall Street Crashed in 1929

As we have been learning about in class recently, the end of the roaring 20s consisted of a massive crash in the stock market. Many believed that the market would simply continue to grow forever, while others realized that the kind of explosive growth experienced in the 20s could not last long.

There were a huge variety of factors that could be attributed to the crash, but some were assuredly more important than others.

For starters, the "buy now, pay later" mindset became popular at the time -- meaning that many Americans had amassed great sums of debt.

Many other factors also helped -- automobile sales decreasing, less steel production, and eventually stocks reaching a plateau.

What do you guys think was the biggest cause of the crash? Leave your thoughts below.

What role does the first lady play in a presidency?

Most of us have heard the accusations that President-Elect Donald Trump's wife, Melanie Trump, repeated segments of one of Michelle Obama's speeches nearly verbatim. This got me thinking: what does it take to be a first lady?

The first lady has no official responsibilities but usually is still an important figure in the presidency and American society. For example, Woodrow Wilson's first lady, Edith Wilson, is well known to have been filtering the information that her husband saw, giving her a great amount of power. When Wilson suffered a stroke in the middle of his term, Edith kept it secret and essentially took control over the presidency.

Recent first ladies like Hilary Clinton and Michelle Obama have also been noteworthy. Hillary Clinton was already in political science and as such had a large amount of power. She participated in many democratic events and later even ran for president. Michelle Obama is a lawyer and a woman rights supporter and has done a large amount of work in those areas during her husband's terms.

This brings us back to Melanie Trump, who works as a model and does not have a college degree. Now, I am not saying that this means she will be bad at her social duties, but it seems as though she doesn't quite fit in. Despite being the first lady not being a hugely important job, I am curious (and slightly worried) to see how the next one will perform.

Early FDR Presidency

President Roosevelt was elected in 1932 after he promised Americans he would help the country recover from the depression and go into better times. He beat President Hoover, who wanted to let the economy fix itself without federal intervention, in a landslide election. Once he was inaugurated, he passed a record number of bills in three months with the intent of helping the economy. Some of these included the Reforestation Relief Act, which gave 250,000 men jobs maintaining forests and planting trees, and the Federal Securities Act, which regulated the sale of stocks and bonds. There were also smaller acts, such as the Beer-Wine Revenue Act the legalized the sale of beer and wine, that helped increase the money that was flowing into legal businesses to help the economy.

After Reflecting on Modern Foreign Policy

After writing position paper #5 and doing lots of research on our modern foreign policy and how it relates to the 14 points, I have found that the goals Obama and our government have now are very similar to the goals of Wilson then, after WWI. The idea of self determination and being a model of democracy both stood out to me as important goals because they relate exactly to what Wilson wished for our country.

But Wilson's main point, the League of Nations, was not accepted. This showed a rather isolationist view in America, because people were afraid of entangling alliances. Similarly, our new president-elect Trump has seemed to support a rather radical isolationist viewpoint. If he follows through on this viewpoint, it could completely change our relations with other countries, because it would be such a difference from what we had with Obama. Do you think this is a problem or a benefit for our country?

Decrease in Buying and Selling of Goods

When an industry or social class fails, it is expected for others to rise and compensate for it. But during the Great Depression, they could not compensate due to the chain reaction that happened. After the stock market crashed, the rich were afraid of spending lots of money since they had lost some of it. This meant that they wouldn't buy as many goods industries produced. This led to there being an overproduction of goods with no one buying them. The poor could rarely buy anything without credit, but with their low wages and the Depression, they couldn't pay back the loans. This meant the middle class would have to compensate and buy goods, but a lot of them were losing their jobs because no one would buy the goods and they had to be laid off. This was a problem in the lower and middle class, which led to a cycle of people not being able to buy things because they lost their jobs, so more people would be fired because the industries weren't selling enough products. The book mentions that this could have been avoidable if the Federal Reserve hadn't increased the interest rates on loans because then banks and companies could have stayed in business, leading to more people working, and in turn more money to buy goods, which would keep businesses and industries alive and making products.

Causes of the Great Depression

In class today, we had a long discussion about the causes of the Great Depression. The Great Depression lasted for the duration of around 1929-1939. There was not one specific event that caused the Great Depression, but rather an accumulation of different declines in many different aspects of the economy which caused a chain reaction and allowed for no way to fix it.

For example, one reason that we discussed was lack of diversification in the American Economy. The economy following the 20's was largely based on only two industries, construction and manufacturing. Because of this lack of diversification, if one industry begins to fail, which they did, then it would cause all others to fail with nothing strong enough to counter it. A large part of manufacturing was the automobile, but after a certain point sales declined because everyone who needed or wanted one already had one. Also, construction was not always reliable because it was hard to predict whether a city would need a skyscraper built or not. Another industry, agriculture, was terribly failing after the end of WWI leaving it with a much smaller number of consumers.

With these industries failing, it causes people to be laid off and for there to be less jobs. This makes the poor, working class even more poor and a lot more people were in poverty. With people in poverty, they could not buy things that helped fuel the economy and continue the circulation of money. It was a vicious cycle that could not be lifted.

Trade declining during this time with other countries also isolated the Americans even more and there was nothing to save them. Tariffs caused international trade to be too expensive and to have no consumers willing to buy.

Is there anything the Americans could have done to prevent the Great Depression, or reduce its length? Are there any other causes or effects that you guys want to add?

How could we prevent another crash in the economy?

As shown in history, there are rises and crashes in the economy. I'm looking into what the main cause of these crashes are, specifically in the 30's, and how we could prevent another crash. As we learned, in the 20's there was a peak in the economy. Things were looking great and only looked like they were going to get better. However, when everyone bought what they needed, they no longer needed those things. That caused them to stop buying things like cars, washing machines, and buildings. This made it so the people that earned money from selling these things earned less money, so they didn't buy as much. This led to a domino effect that affected everyone. So to me, the problem seems to be that people cannot stop buying things. People need to keep needing. As long as wealth is distributed, it will be there. If people start to get greedy and hold onto all their money, it will affect others, and things can fall apart. One flaw I see to this is that no matter what, some people will want to hold onto their money. This is just an idea, and by no means am I an expert on the economy, but what do you think?

The End of the "Blue Skies"

There was no a single cause of the Great Depression, but rather a combination of many. It all started with the low interest rates that made excessive borrowing very easy in the 1920's. Then the stock market crashed, which in turn led to banks failing because their loans were unable to be paid. This completely wiped out millions of depositors' savings. During this time, the wealth gap widened and lead to problems such as overproduction and then underconsumption. Both of these led to more goods being produced than consumed. This caused a huge problem, resulting in less production and mass layoffs. Perhaps the worst action that the government made was imposing high tariffs on foreign sales in hopes of "protecting American businesses." The opposite effect occurred as the European countries raised their tariffs on goods imported from the US, leading to a decline in the world economy as well, spreading the woes across the globe. What could the government have done to lessen the damage?

The Risk of Putting Money into Banks

Compared to the banks of today, banks during the 1920's were incredibly unstable. They allowed people (especially stock brokers) to easily borrow money from them. In turn, the average person borrowed money from the stock brokers in order to make risky investments in hopes of getting rich (also known as buying on margin). This resulted in lots of debt being acquired. Even before the Great Depression, banks declined at a rate of 2 per day. When the stock market crashed, all of the problems accelerated and loans accumulated, resulting in bank runs which in turn ended with even more banks closing and millions of people losing their money. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, but was it possible to see this coming? What could have been done to reduce the effects, if it was inevitable?

Election Reflection

Good job, America. Over this past week, I have lost count of the number of times I felt embarrassed and ashamed to call myself an American. As someone who fits into over half the categories of people a certain person has insulted, I am terrified. Nobody should be discriminated for their gender, race, sexual orientation, or anything for that matter. Imagine seeing the person you like in the hallway at school and immediately losing your mind because it's apparently no longer safe to love differently. Imagine a certain adult telling you to "cover up", "change your shirt" and "look less like a slut". But this isn't about me. This is about every individual who belongs in each category of people that have faced discrimination over the past who-knows-how-many years. I've read countless tweets and articles about simply unacceptable things that have happened within the span of the past week. I'm sure most of us have joked about moving to Canada to escape this mess (I know I have), but I have decided to stick around for the next four years to fight for progress for the country I have known, at least, up until last Monday. America does not deserve this, and neither do you.

In class talk

In class today we watched a documentary that describes how judgement changed and society changed overtime. Multiple examples were given, one being, women started dressing more openly. These women were called flappers or vamps depending on how much they go against the rules. Flappers did what they wanted to do like drinking alcohol but still following some laws/rules. While vamps did everything flappers did but much more rule breaking and going against societal norm. Hotels were one physical object that started proving America was changing. In addition, some citizens didn't enjoy the change and decided to join/start the KKK. People wanted America to go back to the old day and didn't like the change which is what the KKK offered per say. Another group of citizens liked the future but wanted the comfort of the past.

The Mystery Behind Mr. Stewart's Bench Press o_o

Mr. Stewart appears to have an impressive physique. As a fitness enthusiast myself, I can certainly appreciate when someone puts in hard work at the gym -- and Mr. Stewart seems to be putting in that work.

But when asked about how much he can conquer on the bench press, Mr. Stewart evaded the question. So we must wonder -- what is his secret?

Does he use alternative exercises? Maybe dumbbell flies, push ups, or dumbbell presses? Does Mr. Stewart secretly bench 3 45s on each side? (315 lbs). If he doesn't bench press, how much is he dumbbell pressing?

Or what if it isn't an exercise at all? When confronted about his mysterious bench press, Mr. Stewart said that it was all in the polo. Maybe his polos are all intricately tailored to make him look larger? 

Or what if he's juiced up on oodles of creatine and nitric oxide?

What is the secret?

We may never know. Leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Election

More election information came out regarding Mr. Trump. Multiple more countries have reached out to Trump to offer congratulations and their wishes to being able to work together. He also had an interview with CBS where he talks more on stances. He solidified that he does want to build the wall. He also clarified saying that the people he will make sure to be deported first are illegal immigrants that have a criminal record. Also to add, his stance on deporting all illegal immigrants wasn't 100% clear. He stated that it will all be decided when it comes to time, he could allow the illegal immigrants with no criminal history to become citizens if they're in the US. Trump was asked about Obamacare again and stated he will be repealing and replacing it, but he added he wants to keep two points that Obamacare has. People who have Obamacare right now will be added to his new healthcare plan and children under their parents government healthcare will have coverage until they're 28 years old.

Why Mr. Stewart Only Wears Polos

Mr. Stewart told us today why he only wears polos and khakis while teaching. He said that the consistency in his clothing is preferable over inconsistent clothing to students, and he cites a study he did on the topic in the past.

I find it quite interesting that consistency in a teacher's clothing vs inconsistency in a teacher's clothing actually has an impact on said teacher's students.

Is this a subconscious thought process or do students actually record what their teacher wears everyday? Leave your thoughts below.

Media and Politics

This post is a follow up to my previous one. I feel that a second big issue in politics and elections today is how opposite one another Democrats and Republicans running for higher office are. Politicians are afraid to cooperate or go against their political party's views because it would hurt their chance of re-election. We're also getting politicians who lean more towards their political side and are farther from the middle. I think this is because news outlets and other media sources tend to support one view point very heavily. People who consume this information see these half-truths or even false facts, and are led to believe that the other side must be stupid for ignoring these blatantly obvious truths, unaware that they're not actually truths. News outlets might also say that the other side is more extreme than it really is, making people oppose the other political party more than before. This could be changed if we had more honest and fair news sources, but that is unlikely to happen any time soon.

Voting in America

In class a few days ago, we discussed the election, the electoral college vs popular vote, and some other things. Personally, I believe that the way the electoral college gives different types of people a more equal say in government is a good idea, but that it's very poorly implemented.

First off, the way most states have a winner-take-all voting system is a bad idea. Republican votes in California and Democratic votes in Texas are entirely irrelevant. This means that politicians only have to attract voters in states that are on the fence for who they're going to vote for, rather than having to try to attract as many voters as possible. It also makes it harder for there to be change in politics, as third parties have essentially no chance of winning any states entirely, and people, knowing this, feel that third-party votes are wasted and would never vote for them in the first place.

In order to fix this, I believe we should make two changes to our current voting system. First off, we should make electoral college votes be proportional, if a state has 10 electoral college votes and one candidate wins 60% of the vote, they should get 6 electoral college votes.
In addition, we should switch to a two-round voting system, which means that you can vote for whoever you like at first, but only people who pass a certain percentage of the vote make it to the next round, like a sports single-elimination bracket. This would let people not be afraid of voting for candidates who don't have a very good chance of winning the overall election, because if that candidate didn't win, they could still pick their second choice and not feel that their vote was worthless, and if that candidate won, they'd feel confident voting for that candidate again in the second round because that candidate already managed to get a good percentage of the vote, and would have a serious chance of winning.

While these two changes would not fix everything in politics, I feel that they would make voting more fair, by making everybody's vote count, and they would also allow more change in the political system, which many people currently want.

1920s Mass Media

Popular culture took on an entirely different state during the 1920s, when radio, print media, and movies became big. It developed new stars, erased regional divisions, and shaped a culture. 

First, print media became a large influence. While newspapers and magazines had been traditional sources of information for a while, they expanded into Americans buying about 200 million copies a year. More people bought more material, which meant more people were becoming more informed on common issues. This meant that borders that divided people started to fade away, leaving a more unified people based on a common understanding of events. 

Next there was radio. The first commercial radio station was KDKA in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which broadcasted the results of the 1920 election. After that broadcast, people began to understand the potential of this medium. David Sarnoff was an especially influential figure in the world of radio. When the Titanic sank, he stayed at his radio post for 72 hours, relaying the names of survivors to land-bound relatives. After Radio Corporation of America bought the company Sarnoff worked for, he proposed that there was a nationwide broadcasting network. That led to the formation of the National Broadcasting Company, and then television was built off of that. 

Finally, movies were a huge medium that developed during the twenties. The then silent films were a way of escaping the tragedies of World War I, and ticket sales rose higher than ever before. Once sound was added, the movies changed popular culture in waves. It was then when movie stars became the ultimate celebrities, and exposed people to new styles and ideas. 

Consumer Culture in the 20s

Consumer culture is a culture that "views the consumption of large quantities of goods as beneficial to the economy and a source of personal happiness." In the 1920s, this idea was created after companies used branding and marketing to promise a better to life to customers if they used their product.

When new minds began to make new inventions, it was to make their life easier. Charles Strite didn't like being served burnt toast, so he invented the pop-up toaster in 1919. Clarence Birdseye created a system of flash-freezing food in 1923. George Washington Carver made numerous products based on purely agricultural means.

With these new objects being made and sold, producers needed to tell people why they should buy this new product instead of saving money and sticking with their old product. Producers began to send out advertisements that promised an overall better life if consumers bought their product, even if it was as simple as a new kind of soap. Soon, for consumers it was a sign of prestige if you had the newest model of a product, which spurred the consumer culture even more.

People began to notice that they couldn't keep up with the production of all these new products by paying out of pocket. Thus, credit was expanded until nearly everyone was using it to buy their products. Before, people thought it was shameful to borrow money or use loans to buy something. But now, buying on credit was so easy that people were able to buy all these new products without feeling like there was an end in sight.

The Election Results

When we found out the results of the election, most of America seemed shocked. All the polls prior to the elections favored Hillary to win over Trump. They had Hillary at 67% chance to win and Donald Trump at 33% chance. However, I disagree with this idea of chance. I think that there was a 100% chance for Donald Trump to win, we just didn't know it was going to happen. Why were we misdirected into thinking that Hillary had it made? Why were the polls wrong? Was it because they had a bad sample of people? Or was it because they lied about their results? Or was it because Trump Supporters were actually the silent majority? What do you think?

The Effects of Protest Votes

Throughout this election, many different news outlets, famous celebrities, and politicians have advocated for the benefits of voting for certain candidates, whether if they were to be genuine votes or even just out of protest. However, I would argue that although it is beneficial for people to vote in general because this aids the democratic system as a whole (through self-representation), overall protest votes to third parties are detrimental, since their effects are generally the same as just abstaining. For example, in Florida, a state generally known for being a "battleground state" and a "swing state" because of how many electoral votes the state has and because there is a major political divide throughout the state, around 3% of voters voted for someone part of a third party. And as we all know, Donald Trump ended up winning Florida by a few hundred thousand votes, a surprising margin for the state considering that in recent history, it has generally swung to the democrat party. Now, if the voters who had given their "protest votes" had either voted for Clinton or Trump based on similarities between their personal beliefs and these candidates' political views, they could have actually changed the outcome of Florida's electoral votes, since in theory, these people could have swung the state towards Clinton. However, because they instead chose to protest against Clinton and Trump by not even voting at all, their effect on the Florida election didn't change the outcome, since only the votes towards the two major candidates were the determining factors of where the state swung. Now, although you may argue that the whole point of a "protest vote" is to just vent frustration at the political system as a whole, I believe that there are much more beneficial ways to do so whether they are through becoming politically active in local communities, participating in rallies or protests, or even just voicing their frustrations to others around them. All of these things, no matter how effective or not, are still more politically beneficial to a person who wants change because they allow people to directly impact politics to a certain extent rather than just pacifistically voting in protest. In my opinion, the entire of idea of giving protest votes is poor because in many situations, the people giving such votes are politically uneducated as they choose to not at least research specific third parties to find a fitting one to them before voting. Instead, people just say, "I'll vote Jill Stein because I heard she was the most liberal" or "I'll vote Gary Johnson because he's more of a Republican than Donald Trump" without even researching either candidate and their views. Furthermore, instead of giving votes in protest and not contributing whatsoever towards an honest election, people should at least research who they are voting for in the first place and find a third party that they genuinely support, because after all, although third party votes generally don't affect the actual outcome of the election, they can at least represent your true viewpoints. Take Utah, for example. In this state, even though thousands of Mormon Republicans didn't support Donald Trump for personal and religious reasons, they still found an independent politician, Evan McMullin who truly represented their beliefs and voted for him. Because of this, McMullin actually received 20% of the state's popular vote, which affected the outcome of the state's overall popular votes in a way that represented the genuine beliefs of individuals throughout Utah instead of just representing the contrived "protest votes" against Donald Trump and towards a random politician they didn't care about. So in conclusion, I believe that protest votes are just a pacifistic and uneducated way of going against the bipartisan system which influences elections in a very negative way. Instead of giving protest votes, I think people should either find a third party candidate they genuinely believe in before voting so that at least their vote represents their views, vote for a Democrat or Republican who resembles their views the most, become politically active, or just abstain.

2016 Election: Concerns With The Future

For this election, I was really divided on who I supported. At the end of the day, I didn't support anyone and just waited to see who would win and await it with the same level of dread. Either way, I'm concerned about the future of the economy. As being close to going to college, suddenly having an economic depression due to choices made by the president would not help pay for it, since it is already hard to pay for. I'm also concerned with America being thrown into an unnecessary war in the future, as I am almost old enough to be drafted if needed, and by the time I'm old enough there would be a need for more soldiers. Mostly though, I'm concerned of the laws that might be passed with a republican senate and house.

Discussion on election

Last night we got the results on who is going to be our new president. And well Trump won and a lot of people are upset over it. We vote for what we would like to change in our near future. I am also upset over it not only because he won because well we really had to look at which one of the both sucked less? because they both did not have to offer as much as we would like. I think women should have the right over their own body, I mean it is OUR body. Trump is very racists, he wants to build a wall but have the Mexican's to pay for it. Not to mention who ever is an immigrant he thinks that "They're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime, they are rapists" Like no people can come here so they can have a better life. Yes some people commit crimes but he is just targeting the immigrants, people who were born here can be just as guilty. Anyways, lets all book our flights to Canada! :) 

In-Class Discussion Overview - the 2016 Election

Today, we held an intriguing discussion over the 2016 election.

We discussed primarily, why and how Donald Trump won the election. We fell onto the topic of social media, and how Trump has a significantly bigger presence on it. However, that led me to think about propaganda as a whole, outside of social media.

Regardless of whether we like Trump or not, he undeniably is brilliant with motivation.

Trump simply excels at it. His slogan "make America great again" appeals to millions of voters, and gives them a common phrase to unite under. Additionally, his extremely hyped up rallies are simply genius, he brings people together in a way that few world leaders have been able to in the past. He makes voters feel genuinely interested in him and what he stands for.

On the other hand, Hilary has no slogan, no hats with a slogan, and nowhere near the kind of hype that trump has behind him. Hilary voters are generally not thrilled to vote for her the same way that trump voters are excited to vote for him.

And that's a key difference between the two, and a huge reason why Donald won. He created excitement like never before.

How I feel about the election....

Honestly, last night what the results of the election happened, I was really disgraced by America's decisions. I understand that the United States are a democracy but I didn't know that majority of people are able to overlook degrading comments just to support a white man's face. I understand for many people this was choosing the better of two evils, but how could a white man who is described as a bigot really be better?
Arguments for this include that Hillary is shady, but isn't trump shady too? Trump not only is shady, but he degrades women and he is very racist. Sure his degrading comments about women happen every day; at school, on the street, at home. But just because this is normal, does it mean it is okay? Cat-calling women is not okay, even if you call it 'locker room talk'. I understand a lot of men participate in this activity but making a leader of this country someone who motivates these actions is pretty irrational. Talking about touching his daughter or talking about how a model was overly fat and gaining wait is so disrespectful. I watched a video that has children say quotes that Trump said about women (I will attach that below), and the video is quite sad.


How do you feel that he is now our president? How will this affect your family? Are you scared?

Class Discussion about the 2016 Presidential Election - November 9th

Today our class had a discussion regarding the recent presidential election and the results. We discussed the multiple factors which eventually lead to the outcome of Trump winning the election over Clinton.

The discussion was quite interesting. The point that stuck with me most was the fact that Trump had a huge social media presence, which may have contributed to his victory.

The point stuck with me because it is something I definitely saw myself. Trump's social media presence, on Twitter especially, from what I saw, was much greater than Clinton's presence. This social media presence may have allowed people to relate with Trump more, which put more people in his favor.

This connects to the overall idea that Trump won mostly due to the fact that people were able to relate with him. Because of his casual way of speaking and saying whatever he wanted, people saw themselves more in him.

This idea connects to Andrew Jackson, and how saying that he was a "bastard child of a prostitute" actually helped him during the election, because people were able to relate to him through this.

Presidential Election

This presidential election in the end both sides of the parties had done wrong. I do think that Hilary did not handle the email the proper way, but at the same time if that the worst that she did and made people skeptical then tats a shame. Having had her life documented the past several month probably urged her to keep some aspects of her life private. But I do not think that deleting these emails was the right move.  I think that this is what cause this skepticism and actually lost many followers. I do think we have to remember though that people make mistakes and if this was the absolutely worst thing that she did. I think we have to second check what we consider  criminal act. After the reopening of the case Hilary did nothing wrong in the end and only lost followers because of this. But I do not think Trump was any better.  He said some things that greatly offended many women and possibly men of America, and it is something that can be really hard to excuse. He made suggestions that would only set our country back and lead to not much more success.  We as Americans after this election must try to see Trump and his views the best we can. But most importantly we must make our voices heard so that we still can determine our future for America.

The Election

I believed Trump was going to be the next president for over a year. It wasn't his outrageous policies or stupid ideas the media made him look like. He was someone just like us normal citizens, he isn't a politician, even though we're not billionaires like him, he's a citizen. He isn't controlled by money and doesn't need to follow a political norm to make things happen. The media paints Trump as anti-black, anti-LGBTQ, anti-latino and many more. If you dig deeper you can see that Trump wants to fix the inner cities where crime is growing. He wants to fund them with more money to help the problems and infrastructure problems their facing. Trump openly went against the normal Republican value of "anti-LGBTQ" and publicly stated he was against the bathroom ban in North Carolina. He was also the first presidential candidate to hold up an LGBTQ flag which he publicly did at a major rally of his. Trump wasn't ever against all latinos like the media puts him at, he wanted to uphold the current laws in the US. If you're here illegally over extending your time, you're breaking the current law. He is publicly upholding the law that many people think is unjust. He is all for legal immigration and if you're here legally, he approves it. It's just, when people start to break the laws or overstay your green card, he has a problem. If you're worried or scared for him to be president, look at it this way, give him a chance. Everything he said may have just been for show to gain the nomination. All the outrageous ideas he has proposed such as banning Muslims or deporting all illegal immigrants won't ever happen. None of these things he has proposed would ever happen, it's impossible for those to pass in the branches. If you look beyond all the outrageous ideas he has and outrageous person he is that the media portrays him as, you'll see he's just like us and wants the best for our country. He wants to bring people together, whether you voted for him or not, he wants peace and no division in the US.

The 2016 Election

As average students at LAHS, I am very confident that 90+% of the student body would have voted for Clinton, had we the opportunity. In polls taken in three of my classes, only 2 people said that they were in favor of Trump. So, where did America go wrong?

There are indefinite possibilities for "what went wrong." However, after surveying an extensive amount of articles, I have come to the conclusion that the majority of America just does not have the proper amount of education. Adding on top of this, the new generation of people seem to be much more desensitized and lack empathy. What the Trump supporters are unable to see is that if Trump becomes president, it is not only America that gets affected, but the whole world.

Many analysts have described him as a ticking time bomb, just waiting to go off. If he says something stupid to the wrong country, we can possibly find ourselves wrapped up in another World War. Furthermore, the global markets are "plummeting" as Trump's lead rises according to The New York Times. At the time of this post, the chances of Clinton getting elected are slim to nothing, and if this stays true, there is the potential for "global financial ripple effects." Asian stock markets plummeted and the Mexican peso took its steepest drop against the dollar since 1995. All of this is happening even before Trump takes office. I believe that had all Americans received the same support and education that we do at LAHS the results would have drastically changed. Thoughts?

Reflection on Religion VS Science

In essence, religion was a way of life that was more traditionally conservative compared to the scientific, novel view of the world which challenged it. The theory of evolution kicked off the beginning of the scientific age in America. Charles Darwin, an English naturalist, formulated the well-known Theory of Evolution. Though many at the time believed that all living beings came into the world in the very beginning, Darwin proved them wrong. Over several billions of years, organisms changed: to adapt to their environment, pass on favorable characteristics, among other reasons. Science challenged the literal word of the Bible, in this case, creationism. While religion provided hope for many, science threatened to tear that hope down. Liberalists believed that science was the only thing that could possibly explain what God had accomplished. However, religion had the potential to explain everything except how God was created. Because of this, many believed the fundamentalists were stupid, and that no intelligent Christian would believe in the teachings of the Bible. Surprisingly, many scientists were religious, and many religious people believed in scientific concepts as well. Religion was even woven with politics in presidential election speeches. All in all, the conflict between religion and science throughout American history could be simplified, so to speak, into one between the worlds of the old and new.

Why Electric Power is the Modern-day Internal Combustion Engine

Soon, we'll be learning about the early 1900s, where the internal combustion engine became more common.

The engine was revolutionary - allowing the power of vehicles for the masses. As the engines became more and more reliable, suddenly nearly anyone could go anywhere they wanted -- whenever they wanted.

However, the engine wasn't, and still isn't, without its flaws.

For starters, it is remarkably inefficient. Internal Combustion engines only use around forty percent of the energy they produce, and the rest is wasted. 

Additionally, they produce massive amounts of emissions, harming our planet. The engines also are immensely complicated, with multiple gears and many, many moving parts. The multitude of moving parts makes combustion engines significantly less reliable.

None of these issues were discussed in the early 1900s, when they were just beginning to be more common. After all, the technology was incredibly advanced for the time, and very efficient compared to other forms of power.

But now we're 100 years ahead of that time, and newer, better power options are available.

Electricity is the future. Electric power requires very few moving parts, making any vehicle powered extremely reliable. Additionally, it's better for the planet.

Not to mention that electricity produces tremendous amounts of torque - allowing for the performance of a multi-million dollar vehicle for a fraction of the price (0-60 in 2.5s for some of the fastest vehicles available to the public). 

Thus, just like the 1900s were revolutionized by the internal combustion engine, modern times are being revolutionized by electric power.

The Significance of Labor Unions and the Red Scare

Throughout the early 20th century, manual labor workers pursued better treatment from the companies they worked for due to having to deal with long working hours, low wages, and dangerous working conditions. However, after World War 1 where the government had surprisingly sided with the labor unions over corporations in order to prevent strikes that would hurt the nation's war effort, the government stopped paying attention to how companies treated their workers as such rebellions weren't as detrimental to the government as they were during WW1. And as a result of being exposed to the freedoms of workers rights and then immediately having them taken away from them by corporations, these workers were extremely angered by the mistreatment that they would have to endure, influencing them to commit many strikes and public demonstrations against the capitalist system. Such strikes include the massive Seattle strike where 60,000 workers struck and caused a nationwide panic, the Boston police strike that led people to believe that "the Reds," or communists had taken control over Boston, and several anarchist bomb plots against politicians which had began to unfold. Because patriotism had become such a major aspect of American society at the time due to government influences from WW1 as well as general hatred towards non-American culture, there was an extremely exaggerated response to the rebellions of workers against corporations all over the country, which led to the Red Scare. As explained by the textbook, the Red Scare was the "postwar fear of radicals" which had become popular throughout the entire country, usually associating strikers, anarchists, and extremist immigrants with Communists or "Reds." As a result of this major distrust for Communism and the foreign ideas associated with it, patriots all-across the country tried to weaken anti-government sentiments and persecute minorities/radicals for their views, which led to drastic legislation and social oppression towards non-WASP and unpatriotic individuals. This is significant, because it ties directly to the escalation of social tensions between the millions of new immigrants living in the US and the white Americans who had lived there before them, since labor workers and immigrants wanted to pursue their ideas without being persecuted by the whites who had strongly disliked them. Also, the Red Scare was extremely important because it weakened nationwide pushes for civil liberties for minorities and workers and caused American distrust towards Russia and Communism due to associating radicalism with them and their beliefs. However, was it necessarily just for Americans to pursue such patriotism and suddenly support the oppression of new immigrants seeking the freedoms promised by the US and its Constitution? It is arguable that the Constitution and American legislation at the time was to be interpreted by society and its judicial system to whatever capacity they chose to see it, however I believe that this way of thinking is what allowed American society and governments at the time to actively oppress immigrants and radicals with no ramifications other than slight decreases in corporate revenues. And because the effects of the Red Scare and general hatred towards labor unions had such a big impact on minorities and non-patriots, I don't think that the law can necessarily excuse the ignoring of civil liberties in favor of Americanism. So overall, I think there is a major question that needs to be asked of the labor unions, Red Scare, and their effects, which is: Were the actions taken by politicians and society against labor unions and immigrants "American," in terms of morality, legality, and the ideas associated with Americanism at the time?

Religion and Reform

Post war America was a low time for the country. There was an economic depression, the working class went back to its old, poor conditions, and nativism was widespread. The country needed change and reform.

In class, we watched a documentary about how religion changed during this time. The reason vs. religion argument was a great ignition to democratic reform. With new scientific evidence that challenged traditional and literal Christianity, many people started to question it. The whole debate of religion during this video focused on traditional vs. modern religion. Challenging the traditional, fundamentalist religion created a whole new way of thinking, causing many people to adapt to these ideas. This created change, and lots of people were able to publicly support this change. This could pave the way to being more open about change and challenging tradition and the old ways of doing things try and create positive change, or reforms.

However, with any change there will always be those who oppose it. Many fundamentalists were very angry, and a conflict arose. So, the entire country was not in favor of modernizing and reforming. What are your thoughts on the video we watched today in class? How do you think religion helped lead to democratic reforms?

Religion v.s Science Intro

We've recently started watching "God in America". The movie starts by  exploring the conflict between science and religion that started to fully bloom after the theory of evolution began.  Charles A.B was one of the firsts to do a thorough investigation of the Bible and state that there were inconsistencies throughout the book, this did not sit well with many as in he time who believed the bible was to be taken literally and not interpreted. The Bible was the truth to many and questioning anything in it was not taken well. Briggs argued the bible was to be interpreted and the meaning to evolve as time did. Briggs gave a speech to protestants about his new discoveries and feelings towards the Bible. He truly thought people would find the reason in his message as he was suggesting that both science and religion needed to coexists to make sense of each other. He was arguing that the Bible was divinely inspired and not meant to be taken literally as many of the events that occurred in the stories were just not possible according to science. To better understand the Bible and God's lessons science and the new realities had to be used to clearly understand the messages. This speech was not well-received and Briggs was taken out of the church, but he did start a new movement that would change how religion would exists in America. The strict Christians feared that these new messages would change the unique role religion had in American culture and feared the change that would come with accepting science over religion. However, many Christians also felt believed in the fact that they could accept both and did not have to leave reason behind the church doors. This balance was what many people wanted, but change would not be welcomed by all.  How would you say religion fits in with American culture today? In the same way or has there been a significant shift?

Sacco and Vanzetti: The legacy and Injustice

Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were Italian immigrants who became anarchists later in life while working in their respective industries. The two meet in 1917 and participated in many anarchist actives, which included the bombings of political leaders and other important opposers. Historically, many Americans had negative views of both immigrants and anarchists so when the two were accused of severe crimes, the bias present in the jury and the judge must have had a heavily weight on their sentencing. The anarchists supported communism according to the economic theories of the German philosopher Karl Marx. His believes promoted a classless society were wealth was shared equally and so was the task of producing and labor. This system was believed to be only possible through the revolt of the working class. The two anarchists were accused of crimes in both the Bridgewater crime and S. Brainwater. The first of the two seemed to be the work of amateurs and was a failed attempted robbery. The S. Brainwater crime seemed to be the work of professionals and included the murders of two individuals handling the payroll. This crime did not fit the usual crimes of anarchists as they often were not looking for money and did not believe in killing innocent people. The crimes of anarchists were targeted towards government officials and moving their movement forward, but the jury did not take this into account. There was significantly more evidence pointing towards the pair's innocence including eye witnesses, sating that Sacco was not at the Brigewater crime and stating that Vanzetti was not at the S. Brainwater crime. There was a group of people that could conclude they were not at either crime and the evidence tying the who to the crime like the bullet shells and the hat at the scene were inconsistent to the two. Evidence in this case was heavily fabricated and much of it pointed towards innocence rather than guilt, but the prosecutor kept that from the jury. Two two were convicted of the crimes and were later executed, a very extreme charge in light of the fact that they were likely innocent. During the trails, there was even a confession from Celestino Madeiros that he and the Morelli gang had committed the crime and that the two were innocent. However, all attempts to appeal on the grounds of an unfair trial and the  new evidence were denied by the bias and unfit judge. Their deaths created a huge roar in the community and a large crowd gathered for their funeral. Sacco and Vanzetti left a legacy in terms of creating a world of equality for all, in each unfortunate events spurred on by hate and fear do not exist. Do we have any modern versions of this case? What in our society is similar to the idea of a lack of equality?

Sacco and Vanzetti Case Reflection

I stand on the strongest belief that the justice system in the Sacco-Vanzetti case did not function properly, all reasons which stem from the judge and jury's bias towards the two men. First of all, before the trial even began, the jury already had a predisposed bias towards Sacco and Vanzetti’s beliefs and immigrant backgrounds. Both of them were Italian immigrants as well as supporters of anarchy, which did not help their case. Secondly, even after the two men found out that the true culprit of the murder, who confessed to the crime in a written note, was a member of a Portuguese gang, the judge did not allow a second trial. It was also believed that Sacco and Vanzetti displayed "consciousness of guilt" the night before the trial. Finally, the evidence in this case was flimsy; though both Sacco and Vanzetti had solid alibis from witnesses, nobody believed them since they were all friends with the two accused men. Ballistics even proved that the bullets from the weapon found at the crime scene did not match the actual bullets that were used in the murder. Overall, there was no solid evidence to prove that both Sacco and Vanzetti committed the crime. Despite that, they were convicted guilty of first-degree murder. This case was completely unjust and was the fault of the justice system.

Innocent!

It is my belief, after watching the documentary, that Sacco and Vanzetti were wrongly convicted. Sacco and Vanzetti were Italian immigrants. They were also anarchists during a time when both of these traits were frowned upon by the general public. I think they are innocent for all of the following reasons:

1. A hat found at the scene of the crime was said to be Sacco's but the hat didn't fit him.
2. The crime seemed to have been done by professionals and Sacco and Vanzetti were not robbers up until that incident. Also, they said because they were anarchists they would be tied with crime however, anarchists were not known for murdering specific people and stealing money. 
3. At the Bridgewater crime, eyewitnesses didn't see anyone who looked like Sacco.
4. The Judge and the Jury were very biased. They were against anarchists especially because this case took place during the Red Scare. The jury foreman was even quoted before the case as saying that there was no way they were innocent.
5. Vanzetti had strong alibis for the Bridgewater case. Because those witnesses were Italian immigrants, the jury discredited them. He had twice as many witnesses for his innocence than for his guilt. 
6. The night they were arrested they lied about their political beliefs. While the prosecutors used this as evidence that they had consciousness of guilt, this was during a time when a lot of immigrants were being deported for views similar to theirs. 
7. The prosecution said that the gun found on Vanzetti had been stolen from the guard, but the gun had a different serial number and was a different type of gun. Also, the bullet found in the body of the guard that was "consistent" with the guns Sacco and Vanzetti had was fired after the guard's death. It's possible that the police or the prosecution team had tampered with the evidence to make them seem more guilty. Bullet cartridges found at the scene of the crime did not match the bullets that they said were fired from Sacco's and Vanzetti's guns. 
8. The appeals that might have proved them innocent were turned down because the same judge that did their case was in charge of allowing appeals. This same judge told a friend of his, a professor, about how proud he was that he got them in jail. The Lowell committee, who was appointed to test the legitimacy of the trial, had started drafting their statement before they had even begun investigating. 
9. Celestino Madeiros admitted that he was there and pointed to others that had been at the crime. He said that the crime was done by the notorious Morelli gang and that Sacco and Vanzetti hadn't been there at all.
10. In Sacco's letter to Vanzetti's son, he told him that his father was an innocent man. 

The significance of this case was great. First of all, it opened many people's eyes to the faults of America. It showed the biases of the American people clearly both to Americans and people all over the world. Many people sympathized with them, which may have impacted later feelings toward anarchists and immigrants later. Lastly, they became a symbol, worldwide, because of their dignity and quotes. Do you believe that they were guilty or innocent? And besides that, was the trial a fair trial? How would this trial have been different today?

American and Global Religion

I believe that many of the ways we saw religion affecting the United States, and how Americans thought and acted, in the documentary still apply today. In fact, some of the same conflicts between older religion and science still exist today. There are still politicians who don't believe the theory of evolution, or who believe many of the things in the Bible that are contradictory to one another. People also continue to believe that their religion is right and that others are wrong, and are willing to have wars and conflicts over this. Religious conflicts, sometimes involving the United States, continue to exist today, including all of the various conflicts between Israel and other Arabic countries, conflicts between Buddhist and Hindu groups in Asia, and conflicts between Western countries and radical Islamist groups.
There are also many people who cling to their viewpoints mainly because of religion, often seen in topics such as sexual education, gender and sexuality, and even movies and entertainment. As such, people who refuse to accept change in their religion, and who feel that all Americans should follow the same religious practices as they do, still cause many issues in modern society. The best way forwards from here would be if people learned to accept divides between their personal religion and other aspects of society, and understand that what they believe should be kept in their personal lives.

Woodrow Wilson - Progressive?

Woodrow Wilson is regarded by many as a leader of the progressive movement, due to how he "Made the world safe for democracy."

And this is for good reason. Wilson committed to a massive variety of actions that certainly show that he was unique compared to other world leaders during his time.

For starters, Wilson was able to pass pieces of legislation that were extremely important through congress. These include a graduated income tax, elastic money, and of course the revolutionary Federal Trade Commission.

Before the Federal Trade Commission, business had almost no regulation, and thus business owners could practice a variety of unethical decisions without any punishment. After, business owners could no longer scam others like they could previously.

Perhaps even more important would be the reforms he made in 1916, where he prevented child labor and shortened the work day.

Despite all these changes, it is arguable that Wilson was not a progressive.

After all, he had very antiquated southern views when it came to minorities, and did not do much at all to increase rights and representation for these individuals.

However, Wilson overall did make enough contributions to society such that he should be considered at least somewhat progressive.

Vanzetti and Sacco

"Vanzetti and Sacco" is a weird way of phrasing the title; "Sacco and Vanzetti" sounds more natural, but I figured it would be fun to do "Vanzetti and Sacco."  Nobody reads these anyways, so it's okay.

We looked at a lot of evidence in the Sacco and Vanzetti case, and I'd like to analyze it and look at other things. It is clear that the trial was unfairly done, as the judge was clearly biased against Sacco and Vanzetti, and the police lied and did illegal things during the prosecution. The case should be considered a mistrial, and Sacco and Vanzetti should have had a chance for another trial. If you look at more outside evidence, however, it is unclear if Sacco and Vanzetti were entirely innocent, if only Sacco did the crime, or if both Sacco and Vanzetti were guilty of murder, as mobsters and other anarchists have claimed all of these theories.

I'd also like to look at some good news that came well after this case. This case led to reform in Massachusetts trials, and about 10 years after the executions, Massachusetts made changes so that all death penalty cases had to be reviewed by a separate council. Also, in 1977, the Massachusetts governor said that the trial was unfairly conducted, and that they shouldn't be negatively remembered for this crime.

Sacco and Vanzetti

Guilty or not? Sacco and Vanzetti were Italian and anarchists so the government had a natural bias about them. They didn't listen to alibis that claimed that Sacco was selling eel that day due to the fact that the alibis were Italian and decided to go with the eye-witnesses. Eye-witnesses can easily be wrong because they see what they want to see, not necessarily what happened. Additionally, the policemen hid information about the guns being different just to 'solve' the case. Yes, they both acted nervous the night of the arrest and they also lied to the police, not making their case any better, but that doesn't make them guilty.
How would you feel if this was you or your family member being convicted for something that wasn't their fault? How would you feel if it was obviously discriminatory? Could we relate this to the idea of Black Lives Matter movement? Could we relate this to stereotypical ideas?
In English, we read a novel called '50 Essays' and one of the essays talked about how people were scared of a certain man only because he was black. Could we relate these ideas here? That these men were only convicted because they weren't American?

Sacco & Vanzetti Case

In class, we watched a documentary on the case of Sacco and Vanzetti. However, while watching, I became increasingly confused on how the case was allowed to happen the way that it did. It seems quite apparent that the justice system definitely did not function properly in this specific case study. A few examples of this include the corruption that occurred throughout the trial, especially in the case of Judge Thayer. His statement to the history professor against the two men was quite concerning as well as his numerous refusals for appeals. This is a case of prejudice in which the jury had a predisposed bias even before the case was conducted. Also, Vanzetti’s alibi was pretty much completely ignored due to the fact that a majority of them were also Italian. Perhaps the worst problem was the fact that the police had buried information that they had uncovered in order for them to be convicted. Had the trial taken place in present day, I think that Sacco and Vanzetti would have been found to be innocent.