This is not a hypothetical question.

   Its been awhile since I have ran to the Internet to rant my woes about our current governmental hell hole. But the event over the past couple months have finally cracked me. Let me sum up: Republicans are up at arms because the bill they so lovingly called "Obama-care" is up and running, with permission from the Supreme Court; not only is the bill up, but this bill also pays for women's health, specifically women's preventive healthcare, meaning breast exams, STD testing, breast feeding help and classes, pregnancy screens and contraceptives are now free for women with insurance (this being past has the Republicans spitting angry. Don't believe me? Watch this clip of Mike Kelly, Pennsylvania representative, comparing it to Pearl Harbor Day, and 9/11. You can ignore the Rachel Maddow show clip that follows if you want, but I wouldn't, she is brilliant); Mitt Romney, who may be our next president went overseas to our strongest ally and insulted them several times, making himself and his party look stupid, and convincing every Brit who already thinks that Americans are stupid that their  right to think that; our whole country got involved in a fight over gay rights prompted by a chicken fast food joint, and then made it national news, forcing us to join in the argument that should have never been started in the first place; the Olympic Games started in London, and because of the coverage being shown to Americans, we now believe we are best at everything and never fail, because NBC is not offering to show us any sport that we are not winning in; a crazy man entered a midnight premiere of Batman and shot 70 people, killing 12 and wounding 58 with a huge supply of illegal guns; and most recently, another crazy man attacked a Sikh Temple in Wisconsin and killed 7 people. That was today. Why? There are theories is was because he believed them to be Muslim, based on their turbans.
   Excuse my rather violent French, but what the fuck is happening in my country right now? We have men in Congress comparing women getting birth control and breast exams to 9/11. We have a total lying idiot running for president, and having some success. The news wants to talk more about the fact that this total idiot happens to own a dressage horse more than they want to talk about his failure to explain past tax returns, or explain how he could talk about job creation when we know for a fact that he has outsourced jobs most of his career. A temple gets raided by a man with a gun, and people don't know. They are too busy watching the Americans win on the Olympics, and they won't be interrupting that to hear about a home grown terror attack, because of that religion it attacked. A true tragedy happens in our country, and people join together to support those who lost someone in the Colorado shooting, and what does the internet do? It starts a sites for memes using a picture of the shooters face.
   What happened to us? What happened to our country? Why are we no longer interested in being civilized, in being a healthy society? What happened to our humanity?
                                                                           -teenageliberal

Lets talk about the internet!

   Right now, there are millions of songs you can listen to for free, shows that aired in the 1990s available to watch now, and books, articles, and blogs that are clicks away anytime of the day. This endless entertainment talk about products, shows other's ideas, other's work, and after this leads you to other links that lead to more and more of this never ending waste of time. This is people's lives, their source of income, their way to relieve stress, to vent about opinions on blogs that waste the reader's time but are fun to write (cough. cough.), to play stupid games and escape for a couple hours.
   So what right does Congress have to take away this stupidity? We love this. This is a huge part of the 21st century, a huge part of the revolution of technology that has made this world crazy. I myself am typing this on my brand new MacBook Air, the thinnest laptop ever made, which I got on Monday and had to brag about a little bit. Its amazing!! Its so thin!! Its so small!! Its sexy (it might sound weird, but it is)!! I am writing this while watching 30 Rock, which is an amazing show, btw, and I have several tabs open: Pandora Online Radio, Wikipedia, Webster dictionary, Huffington Post, and of course, Blogger. These are all amazing sites that I visit very often, and love. So why is there a bill threatening all of these sites?
  There is a simple answer to this: copyright infringement. Jackasses like myself and my friends who download our music illegally, who watch old shows all the time on our computers, and who... Well, I don't know anyone who is lame enough to blog. We repost other's words, and share photos that have been reshared so many times that no one knows where they originally started, post videos of people we don't know doing stupid things to social networking sites, showing it to "friends" we have never met and will probably never meet. And according to the leaders of this country, this should be illegal. Why? Why are they messing with something that is such a small issue compared to the economic crisis, the wars we are involved in, the rate of homelessness, or the fact that our education system is an embarrassment?
   You can read the facts on Wikipedia, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act), but the short version is this: every time we download a song for free, we cheat a musician out of 99 cents (which is a huge problem, seeing how musicians such as Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber, the top downloaded  artists,  are broke on the streets). Every time we post a video of a small child singing the song of one the those poor, starving Top 40 artists, we are infringing on creative rights. And every time we start a tiny start up business online selling a homemade product, we are infringing on a huge corporations right to sell their own product that they mass produce overseas.
   Wait, what? Corporations? How do corporations figure into a bill that is supposed to be about creative rights and stopping online pirating? Well... Surprise!!! This bill was paid for by corporations, who paid lobbyists to fight for this to get to Congress. Why are corporations that worried about the rights of musicians, artists, actors and YouTube idiots? Well, second surprise of the night: this bill would allow corporations to shut down websites and domain names that might compete with them, before proving that this site had broken any law. You know what happens when a high traffic website closes? Even for a couple days? The traffic moves somewhere else. A couple days offline could destroy a site, and corporations know this. They also sell online. They know how to keep a customer, and how to take more from other people struggling to get by.
   Welcome to America, ladies and gentlemen!! Where corporations decide what bills Congress passes, and redefines what "free speech" means so that nothing will affect their business. I am upset to learn that L'Oreal supports this bill, when I know for a fact that I have several tubes of their lipstick, which I like and planned to buy more of before finding out they are also willing to rewrite the first amendment to stop sales of online makeup, which might put a dent in their sales. I'm not huge for boycotting businesses (except Dominos, the CEO of that place is evil, and I don't care how good their pizza is, I'm keeping my money out of that right-wing asshole's pocket), but I don't like supporting a company that would support this bill. Its the annoying liberal part of me.
   -teenageliberal

We wish he was the best. Actually, hes all we got.

  Herman Cain harassed women he worked with, Newt Gingrich has a sex scandal famous in the political world, Ron Paul is disliked by much of the country, Michelle Bachmann did us all a favor and dropped out, Rick Perry went even more crazy and lost the ability to speak in public without shooting himself in the foot, and Santorum...well, just Google him. That will tell you everything you need to know about him. The debates are mocked by everyone (the best jokes are from SNL, of course), and the unpredictable polls have been noticed by everyone. First its Romney, then its Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Gingrich, even Hunter and Paul got a couple seconds in the limelight. Yet each of them has something very wrong, a scandal, or belief that gets them in trouble, makes them unpopular. All of them. Except Mitt Romney, the man so boring that he has managed to avoid bad press. Yes, there is new media outrage over some of his business decisions in the past ten years, namely the employees that he has fired, but think about it. It isn't bad enough to knock him off the top of the polls. He didn't sexually harass anyone. He didn't divorce his wife on her death bed so he could marry his mistress. He didn't say he would get rid of the EPA. To put it simply, he hasn't made that one big mistake, the one that everyone one else who had a little bit of a shot has. He has not changed his stance hugely, and his followers have not made headlines for violent actions in his name.
  This does not mean that he is the favorite candidate, the one that everyone wanted. Not even close. The truth is, Mitt Romney is just the only option in their eyes. They can't elect a man with a huge sex scandal behind him, not after the way they attacked Clinton (not that they-and by "they" I mean the die hard right wingers-worry that much about being hypocritical. Gingrich was one of the politicians who led the attack against Clinton in the '90s, while he was having an affair himself. See what I mean?). They can't elect another man from Texas who can't speak in public and would rather be on a farm. So they turn to Mitt, because, lets face it, to them, a Mormon is better than the black man who has been in charge for the past four years (more on that later. Rant about racist older political figures coming up!) Mitt is the last option, unless Sarah Palin suddenly decides at the eleven hour that she does want to be president, which she might. She doesn't seem to think that rules apply to her. Especially rules about grammer and fact checking. Those I don't think she even knows exists.
  I don't know what will happen if the boring rich man gets elected. I know what would happen if Rick Perry gets elected: I move out of the country and pretend to be Canadian for four years. Mitt is a different story, though. Hes stupid, rich and conservative, but he isn't nearly as crazy as some of those morons who think they have a chance. The way Obama has been bending over for the Republicans, things may actually stay the same if one of those same Republicans gets elected. Then again, things right now suck. In fact, the past 12 years of politics have really truly sucked. Bush, the wars, the market crashing, Obama wimping out, this has been an awful time for politics. Its been 12 years since Bush was elected, yet we are still stuck in this hellish period of politics. Two men are running for president, and both sides are voting for them purely because they are the best out of the worst. Hows that for democracy and the American dream?
   -a little depressed, teenageliberal

Certain mixes just don't work.

 There are certain things in this world that just need to be combined. I think purple and orange are an awesome color combo, and my best friend thinks that blueberries and peanut butter were made to be together. Go figure. There are also certain things that should never be put together. Ugg boots and shorts, for example. The perfect example of what should never be mixed, in my mind at least, is religion and politics. 

 Dear World,

Religion is like a penis. It's fine to have one and it's fine to be proud of it, but please don't whip it out in public and start waving it around... and PLEASE don't try to shove it down my child's throat.

Sincerely, tired of hearing your religious guff

  
   The fake letter above from a site called Dear Blank Please Blank. If you haven't been, don't. Its as bad as Facebook when it comes to being a time suck. That being said, I love the quote, and agree with it completely. 
  I am what you would call a sceptic. About everything. Almost. I do believe in a great high heel, Hitchcock and mint chocolate chip ice cream. But about religion, I have my serious doubts. This is not to say that I think religion is a bad thing. I think during the Middle Ages, it saved peoples sanity, and still is a great community thing to have. I also think some people really need religion and faith to live their lives. I am just not one of those people. I am not sure there is a God, but I'm also not sure there isn't, so I'm not going to spend my life praying to him, but I'm also not going to be a terrible person. Its actually pretty easy. I also don't mind religious people. There is just a couple things that truly drives me crazy. 
  When they try and shove it down my throat. I have my own life, own beliefs. I don't believe yours, so don't try and force me with with threats of something I don't believe it. For all you who don't understand me: threatening an atheist with hell will not make them convert. They don't believe in hell, so this is a really lame threat. 
  When they use it as a political talking point. Lets make this clear. When someone is running for a political position, such as president, I look at their views on economics, human rights, foreign policy, and whether they have the balls to actually lead our country. I don't care if they have religion, until they use it as a reason to be elected. As soon as someone says they should be elected because America need a true Christian president, I lose interest. America needs a president that can fix our screwed up country, a country which actually has a law that states that we need to honor the separation of Church and State, something Republicans seem to be ignoring lately. I don't care if you are Christian, I bet it makes you happy and helps your life. I do, however, worry about your sanity if you think, say, that holding a two day prayer circle will bring rain. That is not someone I want leading the country. 
  Out of all the idiots running for president in the Republican party, three of them have said things that have made me seriously worry about them and their religious beliefs, and how it would affect their presidency. First: Michelle Bachmann telling Rolling Stone magazine that she became a tax attorney because her husband told her too, and she did even though she didn't want to because the Bible tells her "submit, wives, submit". I think that if she sticks to that idea, the first female president would be a huge blow to women's rights. Oh the irony. Also her believe that gay people are in "personal bondage" that we need to save them from themselves in her "pray the gay away" program. Second: Ron Paul and his creationism. Creationists worry me to the core, and there is a logical reason for that, I promise. Believing the creation story means that you are forcing yourself to ignore heaps and heaps of scientific evidence in the name of your religion, religion that has been disproved before (Galileo, anyone?). It makes me wonder what else that person would be willing to ignore because it challenges his beliefs, in a world where science is constantly challenging beliefs. Third: everything about Rick Perry scares me, actually. He is a ridiculous person on a whole new level. As if his political ideas weren't bad enough, his born again attitude and obsession is on the verge of terrifying. The idea that the man might be president gives me nightmares. 
  Maybe I am putting to much blame on these people, though. A lot of America wants a person with religion in charge. As long as its their religion though. If its a slightly different belief, there are problems. Even Obama, who I like and respect (mostly), plays up the religion card with a couple "God bless America"s, or thanking God. This doesn't bug me, because he keeps it to that. Religion is his private thing, like it should be, like his smoking is. He does it, but he doesn't force others to as well. As soon as he uses the Bible to stop a bill though, I'm getting annoyed. 
  -teenageliberal

I'm busy. Live with it.

   My original plan was that junior year is a bitch, so I would write during summer. I didn't. This was noticed. So. Its not that there wasn't anything interesting to write about this summer. There were sooo many things I could talk about, but I was totally uninspired to actually write about it, although I have no idea why. Normally ranting to the world wide internet about everything that bugs me in the political world today is my idea of fun. Obviously the huge amount of free time I had to actually write made me not want to, because as soon as my packed, scary senior year started I could not wait to run back to the internet and continue my obsession of being a political troll. So lets begin!
   Just an overview: Right now President Barack Obama is "in charge" of the United States. I put "in charge" in quotations because I am one of the liberals who believe that he is playing pet to the Republicans. President Obama, in my opinion, is a good man, and a good president, or he would be if he wasn't so desperate to make everyone like him. Which is never going to happen. No matter how much he rolls over for the Republicans, they will dislike him. I think Bill Maher put it best, "Hes the wrong age, the wrong party, the wrong color." Bill Maher, who I don't always agree with, because I think he can be a bit of a douche-bag, and even to liberal for me, I really agree with on this, and with another comment he made, when he was talking about Republicans not supporting the bills they wrote up after Obama began to support them. He said, "The entree isn't the problem, they just don't like the waiter." That, in my eyes, is all too true. 
   I do have hope for Obama, though. I will be voting for him again, come November, because I will be 18 by then and able to vote, and also because I believe in him as a president. In his recent campaign he has been mentioning all the stuff he has given the Republicans in exchange for their agreement on something he wants to do, and how they always change their minds right before they have to help him, but after they have been served. Eg, he has deported more people than any other president in history. He has tightened border patrol. He has cut budgets, given grants, and sold out to a major corporation, all at the urging of the Republicans, and yet they screw him every chance they get, even if its on passing bills they themselves came up with and supported. I hope, if he gets re-elected, he will behave as a president in the country that needs help, and not as a politician hoping to win a popularity contest. 
   Speaking of popularity contests... There are currently 16 Republican candidates running for president for 2012, each one more ridiculous than the last. Here are my favorites: Michelle Bachmann, who I seriously hope is running for a joke, as she makes Sarah Palin look good at fact checking; Ron Paul, who is running as a Republican, claims he is a Libertarian, and who has ideas about privatizing businesses and making the government smaller that honestly makes me worry; Mitt Romney, who is either a total idiot, or very good at pretending to be; Rick Santorum, the most homophobic asshole to hold the spotlight, which was received well by the gay community (Google "Santorum", I dare you); and then of course, Sarah Palin, who isn't actually running, but she has a bus with her name on it and is visiting all the red states, so at this point we're all waiting for the day she announces so we can pretend to be surprised, then get Tina Fey back to mock her again. I'm not even going to MENTION Rick Perry, as that will get me  into a rant I don't have the time or energy for, so all I will say on him is this: All the other Republican candidates look normal next to Rick Perry. 
   While the Republicans scrambling for a job none of them can handle is funny, there have been a lot of very serious things happening in the world today. My heart goes out to everyone still suffering today in Haiti and Japan, just because its not headline news anymore doesn't mean its rainbows and unicorns over there. More later on the Republican candidates, though.
   -teenageliberal

10 years

   10 years ago today, I was seven, just starting second grade. I had long blond hair and refused to wear anything but dresses. And ten years ago today my country was attacked in the biggest terrorist attack on our soil to date. I had no idea.
  Some may criticize my parents choice not to tell me and my brother, who was four at the time. One woman actually told my mom it was "child abuse" to not make us aware of what was happening around us. Now that I am older, though, and know what happened ten years ago, and all of the horrors that followed, I am very grateful to my parents from protecting me that day. As an empathetic child, it would scare, upset and confuse me. That being said, they couldn't complete hide it. I lived in San Francisco. While my school had decided to hide it from the younger students, it was hard to miss the fear and sadness around me. When we tried to go out to dinner, everything was closed. The city mourned with flags and black clothing.
   I was loosely told at the age of 11 what happened, and by loosely I mean I was told that bad men had crashed planes into important buildings in New York City. I was not told the death count, or about the wars that followed it. After that, I slowly got details from various people. By the time I was 13, visiting New York for the first time, I was able to visit Ground Zero and know what happened there. Seeing the area, the people crying there, effected me more than I ever thought it would.
   When earlier this year, President Obama announced that Osama bin Laden, the man responsible for the horrors we as a country faced ten years ago, was dead, I admit, I was happy. Bin Laden being dead wouldn't bring back the people he had killed that day, but we hadn't given up on finding him. The people celebrating with parties I found a little disturbing, and really disrespectful, but I got it. Not only had he killed so many September 11, 2001, but he had made us feel us unsafe in our own homes. He had also taught young children in America new terms no kids should know, but way too many do, such as "terrorist attack" "Al Quada" and "Taliban", while teaching them that people do terrible things in the name of hate, power and religion.
  However, today I would prefer to forget all that. Today, it's been ten years. Yes, we are still at war, but today isn't about that. While the heroes and the dead from the wars should be honored, today is about the people who were not involved in war, its about the people who were at the wrong place at the wrong time. It's not about the politics, not about what this attack started. It's not even about the attack. It's about the people who are living without a spouse, parents who lost a child, and children who grew up without a parent. There are way too many, and in the rage and blame, they tend to be forgotten. These forgotten people are the real heroes in my eyes, and deserve more respect than we can ever give them.
    -teenageliberal

Really, Obama?

We put the president of Egypt in power, supporting his way to a dictatorship. We bought the Taliban their weapons, then were shocked when they went power crazy.
In the early days of our country, we fought an important civil war, that changed the course of our country and it's politics. We asked for help, and didn't get any. That was for the better. We needed that war, and we still reference it when talking about the strength of our country. Obama has mentioned it in his speeches. So why, President Obama, are you trying to get involved in Libya's civil war? They need that war.
They need that war. That war is the rebellion of the people, a much needed rebellion to change the course of their fucked politics. This is the people getting what they need. We did that, and we needed that. It sucks that the last resort they could think of was war. What sucks more is that Obama doesn't leave them alone. When we invaded Iraq, we had to stick around for a long time to help them rebuild their government, and retrain their military. The country and the people were a mess, and we felt obligated to help, which was only right. But after what happened in Egypt, do we have the arrogance to believe we can rebuild another country's government?
President Obama, I get that you want to help, you want to make the world better. Lets focus on America. Namely, Wallstreet. Rebuilding the economy in the US is going to help. I hate it, but the modern world runs on money. That's what you need to focus on. Not invading yet another country that is not technically our concern.
-teenliberal