Politics

Haven't posted in a while, especially about politics, so I felt I should make some comments that have been floating around in my brain:


First off, earlier this week, a friend of mine, who's a political consultant, informed me that the campaign he's working on still has a chunk of money and wanted to know if I wanted to work for them until the elections. I would have loved to do it, it would have been a blast, but the campaign is in Modesto and there's no way for me to get work off. Oh well.


Second off, has anyone heard about the Tea Party candidate Christine O'Donnell, running for US Senate in Delaware? Her big controversy is that a few years ago in an interview she admitted to trying out witchcraft. I don't know how far into it she got but apparently it was in High School. The liberal left is criticizing her for this, insinuating she's still a witch and probably she'll steel your babies for sacrifices. First off, as she said, it was in high school and a lot of kids do a lot of stupid things in high school. Are we supposed to hold that against them forever? Because, last I checked, Obama has admitted to doing drugs, starting in high school and ending in college, including trying cocaine. Does anyone seem to care about that? And Secondly, what ever happened to freedom of religion in this country? Don't elect her because she's Wiccan, don't elect him because he's Mormon?! I thought we, as a nation, were supposed to be beyond this immaturity.


Thirdly, anyone who knows me knows that I'm pretty conservative and don't have a lot of good things to say about Obama. If I mention his name, its usually to criticize something he's doing that I think he shouldn't or not doing something I think he should. So it pangs me to admit that he has recently done a couple things for which I have to give him mad props. The United States used to be leader in the fields of math, science, technology, and engineering. Recently, however, we have been starting to drop away, and its partially due to the decreasing numbers of students who are choosing to pursue these fields in higher education. To fight this downward trend an to try to encourage students to pursue these fields, Obama announced last November that he was going to launch what he called the STEM initiative (Science, Technology, Engineering, Match education). It is also known as his :Educate to Innovate" campaign. As part of this campaign, President Obama hosted on Monday the first annual White House Science Fair. I really love what he said about the event: "If you win the NCAA championship, you come to the White House. Well, if you’re a young person and you produce the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement, too.” This isn't about politics, its about education, (which I know can be a politically charged entity) but science fairs are great because these kids weren't spoon-fed information, they had to develop an experiment on their own and carry it out, teaching themselves what they needed to know to pull it off. So there you have it. I actually agree and am impressed by something Pres. Obama has done. No, the sky is not falling, nor is it the end of the world. And I can assure you this in no way is sending me down the path to liberalism. This is purely one geek putting aside political differences to admire an accomplishment to help inspire other could-be geeks to follow their dreams. Way to go Mr. President.