Aimee Trujillo – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com Breaking news from the Farm since 1892 Wed, 10 Jun 2015 04:47:45 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://stanforddaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/cropped-DailyIcon-CardinalRed.png?w=32 Aimee Trujillo – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com 32 32 204779320 Something unpredictable https://stanforddaily.com/2015/06/09/something-unpredictable/ https://stanforddaily.com/2015/06/09/something-unpredictable/#respond Wed, 10 Jun 2015 04:47:45 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1102052 It is clear to me that I was once terrified of change. I am still scared—scared of budgeting, of house hunting and of losing some of the dearest friends I have found here. But my last two years at Stanford have shown me that the only way to find true peace with yourself is by embracing change.

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It’s easy to look back on my time at Stanford and believe it exceeded my expectations.

From watching the sunrise from the top of Half Dome, to meditating in the cactus garden at one in the morning, to living with the most kickass roommates on campus, I undoubtedly have friends and memories that will last a lifetime.

Looking back at my time at Stanford, it has been remarkable four years of my life, but it definitely has not come close to meeting high school Aimee’s expectations — I do not write this with any bitterness, only appreciation.

I came here in 2011 knowing that Stanford was my dream school. It was in California (I could wear my Rainbows every day!) and I was running for the track team (my high school fantasy). I had a plan for my identity. I expected to first and foremost be a student, then an athlete and then a friend.

This largely played out for the first two years despite everything that stood in my way. My stubbornness knew no bounds. There were multiple hospitalizations from athletics, fallouts with friends and often, feelings of powerlessness in my absolute need to stay with the life I had chosen for myself. I obstinately stuck with “the plan,” conflating my expectations of myself with the expectations I thought other people had for me.

But things started to change. Staffing in Larkin was thrown into the mix, as was writing for The Daily. While I tried to helplessly cling to my previous identity, the only one I really knew, I was being pulled in other directions towards things I also loved.

This happened all throughout junior year — the Larkin freshman class of 2017 and my co-staff truly changed me to my core. And to them I owe my vulnerability, my confidence, my ability to let loose and my understanding of the word “turnt.”

But the real moment of change in my Stanford life was when I left the track team and in the process, left behind 20 hours of practice a week, an unwavering routine and a critical part of my identity. But the things with which I have chosen to fill that gaping hole in my life are so much more special to me.

Taking on the role of managing editor of the opinions section easily filled those empty 20 hours a week and I do not regret sacrificing that newly earned free time for a second. Being behind the scenes, I have so deeply felt the ardor in every single person I have helped publish in The Daily. Throughout 2015, the opinions section has made it very clear that apathy is quickly diminishing on campus and I am forever grateful to have been a part of that. Working with all of the impassioned students, alumni and faculty to fill the newspaper with content every single night has been an honor.

This experience that is now the dearest to me was never in “the plan.” My freshman year, I would have shied away from it, and even this year, I have questioned my decision. But in my final work for The Daily, as I am about to graduate from my dream school, I know I made the right choice.

It is clear to me that I was once terrified of change. I am still scared — scared of budgeting, of house hunting and of losing some of the dearest friends I have found here. But my last two years at Stanford have shown me that the only way to find true peace with yourself is by embracing change.

So no, Stanford did not meet my expectations. I am not about to embark on a career of professional running, I am not a CS prodigy, and I no longer get nine hours of sleep every night. I’ve found that sometimes we need life to not go according to plan so that we can let go of control and see what life has to offer. And I am perfectly content with that.

Aimee Grace Fox Trujillo

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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State of the Union breakdown https://stanforddaily.com/2015/01/26/me-nka-state-of-the-union-breakdown/ https://stanforddaily.com/2015/01/26/me-nka-state-of-the-union-breakdown/#respond Mon, 26 Jan 2015 21:49:30 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1094387 Super Tuesday columnists Aimee Trujillo '15 and Johnathan Bowes '15 reflect on last week's State of the Union. Both columnists fault Obama, but from different perspectives. Trujillo suggests that while Obama has much to be proud of, race relations were notably missing from Tuesday's speech. Bowes, on the other hand, chides Obama for digging into his progressive agenda rather than focusing on working with the newly elected Republican majorities.

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President Obama’s last State of the Union address was a momentous one. His talk of a recovering economy was inspiring and his talk of returning soldiers was heartwarming. The vision he described for a future with a thriving middle class undoubtedly brought hope and confidence to many.

His tone mirrored these sentiments throughout the hour-long speech. He projected satisfaction and pride when talking about the United States as a world leader in oil and gas as well as wind power. He was humbled when telling Rebekah’s story of a “strong, tight-knit family who has made it through some very, very hard times.”

Most profound of all was when he elicited a tone of both frustration and defiance in the face of the gender inequalities that still pervade the country. Alluding to the inaction of Congress specifically, he stated outright that one of the biggest priorities is making sure a woman is paid the same as a man for doing the same work. “Really. It’s 2015. It’s time.”

Throughout his term, he has made strategic and necessary use of his power of executive action. From immigration to the minimum wage to climate change, he has been able to accomplish many of his biggest priorities in office despite the inaction and opposition in Congress. He boldly stood up to the newly Republican Congress in explicit declarations that he will not back down on the issues that matter most to the country. In regards to climate change, he announced, “I will not let Congress endanger the health of our children by turning back the clock on our efforts.”

President Obama’s rhetorical abilities are unquestionably astounding. As the head of the country, he certainly lived up to the image of a strong, proud (and witty) leader during his State of the Union speech.

However, one thing that was conspicuously absent from his address was any comment on the ongoing race issues in the United States.

#BlackLivesMatter is a national movement that began in 2012 after Trayvon Martin’s murder. It has only started to gain traction since the shooting of Michael Brown, the strangling of Eric Garner and the countless unnamed black men, women and children who have continued to die at the hands of the police force in the country. The recognition of Martin Luther King Jr. Day this past Monday brought about a renewed energy in the protests around the country in honor of MLK’s legacy of civil disobedience and nonviolent protest.

And yet, Obama’s State of the Union address last Tuesday evening had no mention of this. It had no mention of the movement that hundreds of thousands of people have joined forces with in staged protests, die-ins and demonstrations across the nation. It had no mention of the call for the demilitarization of police forces and a National Plan of Action for Racial Justice.

Why is it that the most publicly talked about issue currently is one of the few that went ignored in this State of the Union address? Why is it that Obama has not made any public comment on the protests or ongoing race issues in the nation since his statement on the Ferguson Grand Jury’s decision on Nov. 24, 2014?

This is more than just an oversight; it is a deliberate omission of a statement on an issue that affects everyone in the country — a tough issue, yes, but an imperative one nonetheless. While the State of the Union is a time to take pride in the progress that the United States has made in the past seven years, it is also a time to address the mistakes that the administration has made and proposals to remedy them moving forward. There is no easy fix to the systematic racism that is entrenched in the country, but as the President of the United States, Obama has the duty to work towards a more comprehensive plan of action. Regardless of our president’s race, we should expect him to address the important current issues. Race relations is certainly one of those.

Yes, the progress of the country is tremendous. Yes, our accomplishments are something to take pride in. But until the cries and protests of so many are acknowledged, we cannot celebrate the United States. Until something concrete is done about the systematic racism in the United States, we must remain steadfast in our protests and look to the government with a critical eye. And because of this, we should applaud President Obama on uplifting his speech, but we should not consider it a success. We should consider it an evasion of the issues at hand.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at ‘aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu. 

Last Tuesday, President Obama stepped up to the lectern in the House of Representatives chamber to address the Congress and the country for his penultimate State of the Union address. After he stepped down, the cameras focused in on the Senate Armed Services committee chamber, where Joni Ernst, the newly minted Senator from Iowa, delivered the official response from the party now in control of Capitol Hill.

On the surface, the speeches the two delivered have a lot in common. Both Obama and Ernst tried to humanize their messages with anecdotes of working-class life in the Midwest, for instance, and they even mentioned some of the same policy goals for this coming year, notably the idea of plugging the loopholes that exist in our behemoth of a tax code.

But under the surface, the two speeches reflect two incredibly divergent ideas about governing that will likely define the coming legislative year. Obama’s speech, in essence, tells the rest of us to come to him; Ernst’s speech, on the other hand, says that Congress is coming to the rest of us.

Obama’s address was as much about him as it was about his policy ideas for the year, if not more so. The ideas he erroneously called “middle-class economics” fit into the narrative of bigger, more paternalistic government that he’s espoused since first campaigning for the presidency in 2007, without regard to the slap in the face he and his policies got in this past election. Even his repeated assurances that our currently incredibly divided nation is a “strong, tight-knit family” implicitly tell the country that he’s that family’s pater familias, and, after all, father knows best.

Senator Ernst, conversely, started her speech with the goal of having a dialogue with the rest of the country about the our priorities and concerns that Washington has ignored. She spoke calmly and directly, and when she did talk about her own life experiences, she did in a way that connected her with the rest of us on an equal footing. And rather turning her response into a lecture from a bully pulpit or a direct political jab at Obama, she gave us a short heart-to-heart. Her focus always stayed on what the people of the United States want.

For Ernst and her fellow Republicans, that position is precisely the one they needed to take. Coming off the heels of their sweeping Congressional victory in November, they have the will of the people — our will — on their side in a lot of ways, and they’re going to have to maintain that will for the next two years in order to build coalitions with Congress’ remaining Democrats. With popular issues like Keystone XL already on the docket, and controversial issues like abortion already causing commotion in the House, making those coalitions will prove of utmost importance to Republicans trying to pass legislation that can withstand a veto from an intractable Obama.

If anything, the President’s State of the Union address showed how committed he is to that intractability. He has watched for years as his State of the Union proposals quietly die in Congress because of the antagonism that still exists between the Legislative and Executive Branches under Obama. Nonetheless, he still used his one guaranteed moment in the spotlight to take on his GOP opponents rather than take in their ideas. Despite a throw-away line near the end of his address about working across the aisle, he went as far as to threaten vetoes with two issues, economic regulation and Iran sanctions, adding to the veto he already threatened on the Keystone XL bill. And with no more elections on his horizon, he can afford to dig himself in even more.

As this year progresses, then, it looks like we will still face a divided government like the kind that has existed in Washington for most of Obama’s presidency. But instead of gridlock founded on differences in political ideology between parties, it looks like the difference in governing philosophies will take the fore.

The man who campaigned on change certainly won’t change how he governs in the next few months. So now, the onus lies on the Republican Party to make the federal government work — and work for us.

The GOP needs to take the spirit of Joni Ernst’s speech and infuse their every action with it this year. Obama has already blustered and threatened his vetoes, and he will continue to try and control the debate on every issue Congress takes up. As such, it’s up to Republican legislators to ignore him as much as they can, even with his high rhetoric directed exclusively towards their downfall. Instead, they must focus on bridging the gaps between them and the Democrats in Congress; assuming both parties come to the table willing to work together, then working together could yield great things. But to do so, they must remember what Senator Ernst did last week and listen to what the people of the United States actually want them to do.

Contact Johnathan Bowes at jbowes ‘at’ stanford.edu. 

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Socialism, rhetoric and American politics https://stanforddaily.com/2015/01/12/socialism-rhetoric-and-american-politics/ https://stanforddaily.com/2015/01/12/socialism-rhetoric-and-american-politics/#comments Tue, 13 Jan 2015 05:35:22 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1093713 Aimee Trujillo '15 and Johnathan Bowes '15 take on the rhetoric of socialism. Trujillo declares that socialism has become an insult in American politics but should be picked up by progressives as a labeling of their values, when conducted through a democracy. Bowes disagrees finding that socialism must be tied to tyranny. Yet he too concludes that the word is overuse, weakening its true power.

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How much political power does one word hold? We like to think of the media and politicians as messengers of unbiased facts. But the state of the political game today proves otherwise. Reporters play on the fears of their audience much like a jungle cat toys with its prey. One of the most powerful words in their arsenal is one that connotes images of dictators, of corruption and of oppression. It is a word that we have seen no shortage of in recent American political campaigns — the “S” word.

Socialism.

Political scientists Toff and Kim explain how calculated word usage (or the lack thereof) among politicians and the American media proves to be a meaningful insight into their partisan intentions. In the case of the “S” word, these intentions are generally negative and appearing with startling frequency in American politics. In Toff and Kim’s 2013 Twitter analysis of politicians and media personnel, they found 42 instances of the word “socialism,” with the large majority of usage coming from Republicans.

Why does this matter? Well, if we consider what “socialism” is, a doctrine that calls for public rather than private control of property and natural resources, it’s obvious that the United States’ gigantic private economic sector is anything but socialist. Ranked in the top ten countries worldwide for economic competitiveness, the United States’ success rests on high private investment and productivity.

Nonetheless, Obama has been accused of being a socialist, and strangely enough, even a more radical communist. However, in different rankings of political ideology based on congressional voting record, fundraising and public issue statements, Obama isn’t even on the farthest left on the spectrum, let alone venturing into socialist territory. Rather, other noteworthy politicians pride themselves on being much more extreme liberals. Elizabeth Warren is often referred to as a progressive icon with her strong anti-Wall Street rhetoric. Bernie Sanders is perhaps the most famous and successful American politician to call himself a socialist.

These more radical politicians are breaking from the typical party lines on the premise that the American public is disenchanted with the two-party dominated system. These beliefs are not unfounded, with public opinion polls showing that 58 percent of Democrats agree that political and economic systems are stacked against them, and 51 percent of Republicans feeling the same.

In an industrialized country that is still one of the top ten nations in the world with the highest income inequality, a country that still has yet to treat health care as a human right, and a country where the rich elite can still spend unlimited amounts of money on campaigns, this widespread dissatisfaction is not surprising. In fact, it is justified. With the United States still in this state of drastic inequality, it seems embracing some of the objectives of socialism may actually be a decent idea for our government.

If being a socialist means believing in a universal healthcare system or believing that the bottom 90 percent of society in the United States should have more opportunities and more than only 25 percent of the wealth of the nation, then yes, maybe I am a socialist.

By socialism I do not mean a regime modeled after Cuba or China. I do not believe in the eradication of private property or the suppression of free will that Republicans are quick to associate with socialism. I mean a belief in a type of democratic socialism that would decrease the influence of money in politics and foster government action to deal with the severe income inequalities — not to nationalize businesses or control the economy. I mean a new breed of politicians that break away from more traditional moderate party lines to address the controversial problems that plague the country. Bernie Sanders is just one example of someone who can challenge the status quo and address ways that the United States can help economic recovery reach all social classes.

Yes, America is the land of freedom, but free will and democratic socialism are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the right to believe in the ideals of socialism are part of this freedom. Republicans were the founders of the House Un-American Activities Committee, established to investigate alleged communist activities back in 1938, and they continue to publicly shame any hint of socialist ideas in politics. This ostracism of socialist ideas in American politics by the right wing is ironic, considering the fact that individual freedom is one of the foundations of their values.

The “S” word was once reserved only for descriptions of oppressive regimes. The ill-intentioned use of it in mainstream media to describe American politicians can be a turning point. What was once a pejorative label now has the opportunity to become a more progressive form of American liberalism. Not every aspect of socialism is radical or anti-democratic. Some of the ideals of working towards equality of economic opportunity and dealing with the excesses of money in politics would be beneficial to our country that has been entrenched in the two party lines for so long. It’s time to move beyond our old perceptions of the “S” word and embrace a new version of democratic socialism in American politics.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu. 

Politics is a heated business, as the debates on the floors of the U.S. House and Senate have proven time and again. Some debates in the 1850s even became heated enough to turn into all-out brawls between rival members or factions of Congress. In more-recent years, though, members of Congress have instead limited themselves to verbal attacks on one another, including a good deal of what can only be described as name-calling.

In fairness, we can find examples of political figures hurling epithets at their rivals even as far back as the days of our Founders. But in twenty-first century politics, one epithet seems to have dominance over all the others: “socialist.”

This phenomenon isn’t even limited to one ideological camp. Some on the left will call right-wingers “Nazis” (a shortened form of the phrase “National Socialists”) because of their stances on social issues, and some on the right will call left-wingers “socialists” more directly because of their stances on economic issues. Regardless of which party’s card they carry, many politicians try to paint their opponents as connected to socialism in some way as a political tactic.

But though doing so may make sense, overusing the tactic ultimately is not very helpful.

After spending half of the last century combating socialism in the forms of European fascism and Soviet communism, it isn’t surprising that the tactic has found so much use. A 2012 Rasmussen study suggests that about two of every three people in the United States see socialism as inherently negative, and it seems that those major forms of socialism have become imprinted on our national psyche as evil incarnate. After all, those ideologies have helped justify some of the most brutal, repressive and genocidal regimes in history, and at its core, socialism constitutes a direct threat to the ideas of freedom and democratic republicanism that have defined our nation since its inception. Trying to show opponents as in-league with those terrible forces could do a great deal to discredit their views, particularly as the continued moral bankruptcy of socialism means that the only place that should be left for it in the twenty-first century is the rubbish bin of history.

Even so, socialism has not found its way there yet. Even as you read this column, nations from Cuba to North Korea control what information reaches their populations through censorship, persecute those who strive for freedom and otherwise repress their people on a daily basis; without doing so, the tyrannical apparatus of socialism in those countries would collapse. And though the vast majority of people in our nation view socialism with disdain, the same Rasmussen study suggests that about one in four do not. Our current Congress even includes Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, an avowed socialist who caucuses with the Democrats.

And so, the specter of socialism still haunts the U.S., particularly in the form of social democracy, which strives as an ideology to gradually wear down capitalist systems from the inside over many years and use “progressive” reforms to gradually replace them with socialist systems. We rightly still fear how such an ideology could undermine the respect of basic freedoms and rights that our society is still working to perfect, and calling out any politician whose views even resemble socialist ones seems to have become our main approach to guard against it.

Often, there is a ring of truth to accusations of socialism against political figures in D.C. or state capitals, particularly after considering the policies and positions of big-government conservatives and progressives alike. Obama’s signature healthcare law, for example, falls into a wider spectrum of government actions trying to force more equitable access to healthcare and medicine that was first championed by social democrats and socialists in Europe. Even the seemingly innocuous blue laws still in effect across parts of the South have analogues in the government-mandated morality of many socialist regimes.

But ultimately, continuing to call opponents “Nazis,” “communists” or any other such epithet as frequently as we do only serves to weaken the importance and direness of those words. The fact that some cable news commentator is nearly guaranteed to call an opponent one of those words at some point each week is akin to the fabled boy who cried “Wolf!” — rather than actually warning us of real danger, that commentator is inuring us against warnings of danger altogether.

While the accusation of socialism still stings and may still even help decide elections, the voting public here in the United States has simply heard those same accusations too much for them to remain effective as political weapons for much longer. Once they cease to have that efficacy, even calling out an actual manifestation of unadulterated socialism would probably seem like little more than useless political grandstanding.

That’s a dangerous prospect facing us, since despite the fact that the Iron Curtain fell over two decades ago, the danger posed by socialism still exists. Should it ever come to our shores, I doubt we’ll listen to anyone who warns us it’s here.

Contact Johnathan Bowes at jbowes ‘at’ stanford.edu. 

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Net neutrality https://stanforddaily.com/2014/11/17/net-neutrality/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/11/17/net-neutrality/#comments Tue, 18 Nov 2014 04:36:35 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1092285 Super Tuesday columnists Johnathan Bowes '15 and Aimee Trujillo '15 take on net neutrality. While there is a broad consensus that the Internet must remain impartial, the two disagree on the political solution. Trujillo supports government regulations like those placed on telecommunications companies. Bowes, in contrast, argues that we should use our economic vote against the manipulative ISPs and turn instead to encouraging new ISP start ups.

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The Internet has become more than just a useful tool in America today — it has become an integral experience of daily life. In fact, Internet usage in America has been rapidly increasing since the year 2000 and now encompasses 87 percent of American adults, spanning income groups, education levels, race and age. With this astounding reach, it is crucial to safeguard everyone’s equal access to the knowledge and connectivity of the Web so that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) cannot discriminate the speed of service among users.

The sheer vastness makes it seem uncontrollable, but debates about the regulation of the Internet are now everywhere. The question of Internet control has even reached the government — just this past Monday, President Obama made a statement promoting net neutrality by urging the Federal Communications Commission to assure that Internet access will not discriminate against any user, content, site or platform.

As an independent agency, the FCC is not beholden to Obama’s words. However, there is a large contingent of support behind Obama’s message; in the last six months, almost four million people have sent comments to the FCC, mostly advocating for strong regulation. Emerging tech startups are also some of net neutrality’s most vocal proponents, with a huge investment in having the same speed of Internet access as large companies. That said, large and successful corporations such as Netflix, Etsy, Kickstarter, Vimeo, Ford, UPS and even Visa are also pushing the FCC for stronger regulation of Internet providers. Even Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web itself, is a strong proponent that his creation should remain free and open.

It is clear from this broad consensus that we need more oversight to ensure that Internet access is equal for everyone. Even now, with such widespread support for net neutrality, why is there still a debate? Who would oppose a “free and open Internet” or the principle that “an entrepreneur’s fledgling company should have the same chance to succeed as established corporations?”

Unsurprisingly, it is the out-of-control, monopolistic ISPs that form the biggest opposition. But equal access to the Internet cannot be sacrificed simply for more ISP profits. Under net neutrality, ISPs such as Comcast and Verizon will no longer be able to block or deliberately slow any legal Internet content anymore based on an individual’s or business’s ability to pay for theoretical “fast-lane” content.

Other opponents of net neutrality rest their claims on unfounded and insignificant theories. Aside from ISPs that simply want monopolistic price control of providing Internet access, others argue that more regulation would limit investment in the infrastructure and new services. This is entirely contradictory to the reality of what could happen. With unrestricted control of the market, ISPs would be incentivized to “restrict the best access or to pick winners and losers in the online marketplace for services and ideas,” effectively controlling the fate of Internet content and online companies.

Essentially, the debate over net neutrality is a debate over whether Internet access is intrinsically a telecommunication service or an information service. Since the mid-’90s, broadband service has been classified as simply an information service, leaving it exempt from most of the FCCs regulations. However, the Internet today is clearly much more than that. We are all undoubtedly dependent on the Internet in more aspects in our life than ever before, which means there needs to be protections in place to make sure everyone has guaranteed access. In fact, in 2011, the UN even declared Internet access as a human right.

Under Title II of the Communications Act, services like phone and radio are considered basic utilities, and as such are subject to more FCC regulations to ensure everyone has equal access. As the most accessible and crucial source of information, knowledge and communication today, the Internet is clearly more a standard utility than just another trivial service. Discrimination is no longer allowed in public education today, so why should it be allowed in the public’s access to the wealth of information on the Internet? In our constantly advancing, technology-centered society, it is time for the Internet held to the same standards as the phone and radio.

The question we must all ask ourselves is whether we want to regulate the Internet Service Providers or whether we want them to regulate us. We cannot have it both ways — if the FCC keeps its hands completely out of the ISPs’ business, then it is only a matter of time before they begin to prioritize companies that can pay the most and leave other startups and smaller companies resigned to the “slow lane.”

Obama’s call to action could not have occurred at a more critical time. Equal rights and opportunities don’t end at our schools or our jobs. We must constantly adapt our definition of equality to our evolving and innovating society. That means that in a society so reliant on the Internet today, we all deserve the right to equal access to the education and knowledge that lies right at our fingertips.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu.

Last Monday, President Obama entered the debate about net neutrality — the idea that, apart from trying to block spam or congestion, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) should treat all information they process equally. Despite the FCC (run by former telecom lobbyist Tom Wheeler) moving towards net non-neutrality, Obama wants the agency to start treating ISPs (e.g. Comcast) like they do telephone companies: as telecommunications services instead of information services. But, even between Obama urging him to change his ways and John Oliver causing his agency’s site to crash over the issue, Wheeler seems ready for a siege.

Net neutrality is an important topic for our Internet-age society. After all, it has proved important to the development of the Internet as we know it. But trying to regulate it any more aggressively than we have in the past, like through reclassifying ISPs, isn’t the answer. It’s a temporary fix to a long-term problem created by the Ma Bell-inspired, monopolistic culture of telecommunication companies. So rather than over-regulating in a way that assumes the ISP monopoly as a given, a better tactic would be encouraging as much competition as possible to collapse that monopoly.

Arguments supporting over-regulation for neutrality tend to forget or ignore that the Internet of today differs fundamentally from the Internet of 2003, when Tim Wu first coined the term “net neutrality.”  Many proponents of excessive neutrality regulation want to prevent ISPs from creating expensive “fast lanes” and cheap “slow lanes” on the Internet, assuming that all Internet data currently follow the same “lane” as in the past. By their logic, having “fast lanes” available only to those who can pay extra (i.e. larger companies like Google or Netflix) would kill competitors to YouTube’s or Netflix’s streaming services.

In reality, “fast lanes” already exist on the Internet, and they seem to cause no major harm to the market. Through peering and content-delivery networks (CDNs) pioneered by Google, many of the 30 companies whose services now take up half of the Internet’s overall traffic have managed to secure faster connections to the ISPs than other companies.

However, those methods haven’t destroyed the concept of net neutrality at all. Rather than fast lanes like over-regulation advocates warn about, they act more like lanes dedicated to extra wide loads. They are less about big companies getting special treatment and more about big companies getting their data out of the way of smaller ones — which could potentially help the proliferation of such smaller startups.

But things differ greatly on the ISPs’ side of the process, where competition has become stifled. It’s perhaps unsurprising (given that ISPs AT&T and Verizon descend from Ma Bell) that we have a de facto Ma Broadband. A culture of monopoly dominates our country’s ISPs — and above all else, that culture is the problem.

An oligarchic handful of ISPs hold an incredible amount of power over the entire market. Currently, the top five Internet companies control 86 percent of the market, and Comcast could soon become the dominant ISP in a majority of states if it merges with Time Warner. Additionally, nearly two-thirds of U.S. people have little to no choice in what company to get their Internet from thanks to the ISPs’ gentlemen’s agreement not to compete in certain areas. In other words, the free market between ISPs has all but died at their hands.

So instead of focusing solely on regulating for net neutrality, we need to focus more so on ways to encourage competition in the market and dissolve Ma Broadband.

Obama wants to use the easiest — and most dangerous — way to attempt that dissolution in reclassifying ISPs. Part of that reclassification would give the FCC the authority to mandate the sharing of physical Internet infrastructure as a way to force open the market. Without having to invest as much capital or time to build up a network, new companies could sprout up to challenge the Goliaths of the Ma Broadband ISPs. While some advocate for that “nuclear option” as the only one that will work, it really should be used only as a last resort; after all, trying to regulate the fast-paced world of the Internet using rules from 1934 would likely slow the process of innovation and cause further problems. Even trust-busting the ISPs, which should be done in a preventative sense with Comcast and Time Warner, would be a less-drastic option than reclassification.

Besides, others are still available to us. Specifically, rather than over-regulating current ISPs, we can instead do everything possible short of drastic regulation to encourage the growth of new ones, whether Google Fiber or otherwise. So far, Google Fiber’s efforts have focused on small-to-medium-sized areas where the cost of implementation fell below a prohibitive threshold; but, how low could that threshold itself fall if building new ISP infrastructure could, for instance, entitle companies to a tax break? Wherever we find barriers to the development and growth of such new companies, whether with taxes or burdensome regulations, we should lower them as much as possible. Such a process could even encourage the Ma Broadband companies to trade scratched backs for stabbed ones and start directly competing with one another in more markets.

The debate about the future of our country’s Internet needs to move forward, and it needs to move towards a freer Internet marketplace.

Contact Johnathan Bowes at jbowes ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Election Day and voter ID laws https://stanforddaily.com/2014/11/03/super-tuesday-election-day-and-voter-id-laws/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/11/03/super-tuesday-election-day-and-voter-id-laws/#comments Tue, 04 Nov 2014 05:25:29 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1091295 In an Election Day edition of Super Tuesday, Aimee Trujillo '15 and Johnathan Bowes '15 take on voter identification laws. Trujillo articulates that these laws unfairly prohibit low income and minority citizens from voting. Bowes disagrees and suggests that the real bigotry here is prejudice against the South.

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Today is a day of electoral accountability. It is a day where, for all United States citizens over the age of 18, it’s time to take advantage of exactly what makes democracies so admired. It’s time to send a message directly to the government about everything that we are pleased, disenchanted, angry, appreciative, impassioned and exasperated with. It’s time to fully capitalize on the struggles of the generations that came before us to establish universal suffrage.

It’s finally midterm Election Day.

During the remaining 729 days of this period, it seems that we have no dearth of things to complain about. However, in an astounding showing of hypocrisy, hundreds of thousands of eligible voters fail to do so, with consistently less than 50 percent of the voting population turning out for midterm elections for the past century.

This tragedy of apathy would be a terrible depiction of the passions and values of the American population if the blame rested entirely on those that do not vote. However, this would be a presumptuous and ignorant accusation to make against American electorate. Yes, it is true that many people make the explicit choice to abstain from voting, but for thousands more people, it is not a choice, but a sad reality of the country we live in today.

For so many eligible voters who are not actually able to vote when Election Day comes around, only the state governments are to blame because of the backwards voter identification laws that are in place. This comes as a result of the Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. Holder on June 25, 2013, that struck down a key part of the Voting Rights Act that once prohibited voter identification laws. Texas is just one of 34 states that now requires a strict form of identification at the polls in order to cast a ballot.

Chief Justice Roberts wrote in the majority opinion that nearly 50 years after huge racial disparities in voter registration and turnout, “things have changed dramatically.” The sad truth of matter is that things really have not changed that much. In fact, Justice Ginsburg’s prediction in her dissenting opinion is proving to be reality — voter ID laws, especially Texas’ SB14, are stopping people from voting. Nearly 600,000 registered voters in Texas will be unable to vote in this election because they cannot meet the photo-identification requirements.

If that is not disturbing enough, a study by political scientists Barreto, Nuñez, and Sanchez found that these sorts of laws disproportionately affect immigrant and minority voters, who are less likely to be able to provide multiple forms of identification. There is a socioeconomic bias associated with having a driver’s license — those with higher incomes and educations are more likely to have one — and both minorities and immigrants have much lower rates of access to checking and credit bank accounts for identification purposes. These differences all come back to the systemic barriers that prevent lower-income people and minorities from having access to the same opportunities as others.

Well, so what? Many argue, “If you are actually a citizen, what do you have to fear about showing your ID?” Countless others argue that voter identification laws are crucial for combating voter fraud at the polls.

First off, the reality is that voter fraud is not nearly as rampant as the conservative media would suggest. A study by the Brennan Center for Justice reports that these allegations simply do not pan out because voter impersonation is virtually nonexistent to the extent that it is “more rare than getting struck by lightning.”

Additionally, it is actually many citizens who are registered to vote that are getting turned away for lack of identification more so than those attempting voter fraud. For example, in Texas, concealed handgun licenses are an acceptable form of identification, but state schools’ student IDs are not, which means that some students without in-state driver’s licenses will not even be able to vote. Others who do not drive or do not have military IDs can obtain a special form of ID known as an election identification certificate (EIC), but only after jumping through all sorts of bureaucratic hurdles and proving their identification in several other methods such as bank statements, school records or immunization records. This effectually creates a road full of barriers to proving one’s identity that not only disincentivize voting, but also unjustifiably affect lower-income voters who do not have the time or resources to surpass all these obstacles.

Universal suffrage encompasses having both the right to vote and the opportunity to do so. While thankfully all adult citizens still have the right to vote in the United States, there are incredibly unequal opportunities to vote between racial and socioeconomic groups because of the restrictive voter ID laws. So much so that it is now questionable as to whether America can still claim to have “universal” suffrage. It is American citizens’ civic duty to vote, but it is the government’s moral duty to abolish these restrictive ID laws as the Voting Rights Act intended. Only then can we truly have a representative democracy.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu.

Voter fraud is one of the most insidious issues that can face a democratic republic like ours. Casting multiple ballots for one person or casting one as someone else flies directly in the face of democracy itself. And after seeing terrible cases of voter fraud in recent elections (including the election of Senator Al Franken in Minnesota in 2008 and True the Vote’s discoveries of systemic fraud in Houston in 2010), many states implemented laws requiring voters to show official photo identification before voting.

The four most rigorous of the first laws (in Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, and my home state of Tennessee) took effect for the 2012 general elections. As of now, 17 states have enacted voter ID laws, and importantly, 10 of those are Southern states, as defined by the Census Bureau.

It’s become a part of the left’s standard rhetoric since then that voter ID laws are the new versions of poll taxes — to the point that under-informed voters accept that notion as gospel truth. Progressives seem to think that those of us with minority identities (racial, socioeconomic, etc.) cannot understand the importance of having identification or that people who have changed their names (e.g. due to marriage) will neglect to update their voter registration information. Additionally, they think that Southerners just want to keep people with minority identities from voting.

Thinking rationally (instead of prejudicially), those assumptions are patently false. If people fail to obtain an ID or keep their information updated, that’s their own fault — independent of race, class, or marital status. But that fault isn’t permanent; there is nothing about not having an ID due to inaction that prevents someone from obtaining one—not even cost, since 22 states charge less than $10 for IDs, and all but three charge less than $25. As such, no inherent reason exists why a photo ID requirement would prevent specific groups of people from voting.

Beyond that, the simple fact of the matter is that the South in 2014 is incredibly different from the South in 1964. Though prejudice does still exist in Dixie (as it does everywhere in this country), the idea of disenfranchisement en masse no longer holds sway.

Instead, the prejudice in this debate comes from those arguing against voter ID laws. As noted above, some of that prejudice appears when leftists assume that people from minority backgrounds will be too lazy to either get an ID or vote if they need to show one. Of course, history has shown those assumptions to be the bigoted falsehoods they are.

In Texas, for instance — a state whose voter ID law has received an extreme amount of criticism — the implementation of its voter ID law didn’t yield any evidence of voter suppression. In their 2013 constitutional elections (the first subject to the law), 8 percent of registered voters actually voted, compared to 5 percent in 2011; since those off-year elections began in 1981, average turnout has been 12.31 percent with a standard deviation of 6.65 percent. The more crucial statistic from that election comes from the Latino/a communities: statewide turnout for Latino/a people increased, with some predominantly Latino/a districts showing an increase of 300 percent from 2011. If lawmakers had intended to suppress voters using voter ID laws, they are, as CNN’s Bryan Preston puts it, “failing as spectacularly as HealthCare.gov.”

But beyond racial prejudice, it seems that, more than anything, prejudice against the South guides the opposition response to voter ID laws.

Levels of anti-South sentiment, conscious or otherwise, are startling. A study conducted here in 2010 showed that a speaker’s Southern accent caused listeners to view them as innately less intelligent. Other studies have shown that many consider prejudice and discrimination against Southerners (and specifically rednecks) more appropriate than either based on race. Just look at how people on the left responded to the Supreme Court’s ruling on the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — with disbelief that Southern states could be trusted not to target voters from minority backgrounds. In seeing Section 4 of that law (rightfully) declared unconstitutional, those critics immediately assumed that Southern states would start bringing Jim Crow back from the dead. And when many Stanford students talk about race, the racism of Southerners comes as an unquestioned fact.

Unfortunately, since people already assumed that new voting laws from the South would be prejudiced, that pall fell over the voter ID law debate almost instantly. Since a majority of states with voter ID laws are Southern (and a majority of Southern states now have such laws), left-wingers feel comfortable in prejudging those common sense reforms as racist. The only evidence they need that the connection exists is that Southerners and Southern states want voter ID laws.

More unfortunately, by fixating so thoroughly on voter ID laws, progressives ignore actual issues with our election laws, like how valiant soldiers are systematically being disenfranchised.

So this election day, keep all this in mind when you hear people being ignorant about the South, people with minority identities, and about voter ID laws. After all, the entire debate rests on a different kind of bigotry.

Contact Johnathan Bowes at jbowes ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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An Islamophobic media https://stanforddaily.com/2014/10/20/an-islamophobic-media/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/10/20/an-islamophobic-media/#comments Tue, 21 Oct 2014 02:05:27 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1090167 It is abhorrent that such a large population of American citizens still lives in fear of what might result from the antagonistic profiling of their community at the hands of the drama-inciting mass media. The burden of this problem rests on the media to reform its distorted reporting, but it is also crucial for every American to take the sensationalized news with a healthy dose of skepticism.

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It is no longer as socially acceptable in American society to be explicitly racist as it once was. In regards to the racist history of the country, Bill O’Reilly argues, “that was then, this is now.” Even talk of a post-racial America pervades the national media from the New York Times to the Wall Street Journal. As people become more educated and aware of the systemic disadvantages that minorities face in the country, the U.S. is undoubtedly moving towards more equality.

However, we are a long ways from a “colorblind” nation.

This could not be any more apparent after watching the political debates rage through the media. More often than not, the typical scene portrays a liberal and a conservative pitted against each other on issues like affirmative action, the Ferguson riots or the Trayvon Martin case.

However, the conversation about Muslim-Americans in the media proves to be even more worrisome than these. The typical back-and-forth debate is more heavily skewed towards feelings of xenophobia than acceptance. In an uncharacteristic display of racism, even liberal talk show host Bill Maher called Islam the “mother lode of bad ideas” and compared Muslims to the Mafia. With Muslims under heat in America ever since 9/11 and now with the ISIS threat, the entire religion of Islam is being depicted as a radical anti-American force to be reckoned with.

Despite the very real terrorist concerns of a small group of Muslim extremists, it is not only problematic to generalize these feelings to an entire religious group, but it sets a very dangerous precedent. Sadly, anti-Muslim feelings are so common in today’s society that there is a whole term dedicated to describing the “exaggerated fear, hatred and hostility toward Islam and Muslims”: Islamophobia.

A phobia in itself is defined as “an exaggerated usually inexplicable and illogical fear.” This is not to say that fear of terrorism is illogical or inexplicable. However, being afraid of the nearly 2.75 million Muslim-Americans because of a group of extremists is very much irrational. It is also all too reminiscent of the days of government-enacted concentration camps for Japanese-Americans after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the national hysteria over the Red Scare during the Cold War. Yes, the country has corrected these wrongs of the past, but only after the suffering and subjugation of many.

As of this point in time, Muslims are the religious group most likely to have experienced racial or religious discrimination in America, with 48 percent of Muslims reporting being at the receiving end of prejudice. Even Muslim supporters who define themselves as anti-Islamophobic are being irrationally pegged as pro-ISIS.

It is not merely a matter of what the citizens of America should do anymore, but it is what we must do to prevent the perpetuation of another mass racial profiling.

The burden of this responsibility falls on those in the public eye with the power to shape the national conversations on race and Islamophobia. The very news outlets that thrive on controversy and drama of must take a good look at their intentions. The goal of journalism is not to increase page hits, but to inform. And with a 55 percent majority of Muslim-Americans who believe that coverage of Muslims and Islam by American news organizations is generally unfair, it is clear that change is needed.

The national image that the media paints of Islam is one of extremism. The least representative “fringe” groups of Islam are the ones that get the most attention in the media even though an overwhelming majority of Muslims (81 percent) say that suicide bombing and other forms of violence against civilians are never justified in order to defend Islam from its enemies. Even the noted Muslim scholar, Imam Suhaib Webb, has expressed worry of the fate of Muslim-Americans at the hand of the distorted American public opinion. “We are being measured and weighed and determined by events that are completely outside of our hands,” he says.

It is abhorrent that such a large population of American citizens still lives in fear of what might result from the antagonistic profiling of their community at the hands of the drama-inciting mass media. The burden of this problem rests on the media to reform its distorted reporting, but it is also crucial for every American to take the sensationalized news with a healthy dose of skepticism. Although we are not a post-racial society yet, we must continue to make steps towards this by refusing to slide down a path of Islamophobic escalation.

Contact Aimee Trujullo at aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Super Tuesday: Politics of the Drought https://stanforddaily.com/2014/10/06/super-tuesday-politics-of-the-drought/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/10/06/super-tuesday-politics-of-the-drought/#respond Mon, 06 Oct 2014 20:58:51 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1089093 Super Tuesday columnists Aimee Trujillo '15 and Johnathan Bowes '15 debate the politics of the drought. Trujillo demands compromise, while Bowes necessitates that the smelt accepts the brunt of that compromise.

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As residents of California are all very much aware, the drought we are in right now is nothing to scoff at. Most California cities are one to two full years behind the normal rainfall levels. The drought has cost the California economy almost $2.2 billion in lost crops and jobs. California Governor Jerry Brown even declared this a state of emergency on Jan. 17 of this year. Here at Stanford, we know it’s serious because water hasn’t touched the prized fountains since winter quarter of the 2013-2014 school year.

No one is questioning the existence of the drought, but there has been no end to the blame game of who is exacerbating the problem now, and what is the best way to deal with it. The drought is, by definition, a natural disaster, but it has become politicized to the extent of inaction, just as with other partisan issues like immigration and the budget. Since the drought started, scientists have been trying to understand all the factors causing it in order to combat it. The general consensus is that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats have caused the drought. In fact, Stanford scientists attribute the unnaturally dry weather to an atmospheric anomaly above the Pacific Ocean, which has been dubbed the “ridiculously resilient ridge” that is driving storms north and away from California.

Despite the scientific discoveries, politicians still have been using the drought as another political talking point for their own campaigns. Republicans are angry at what they refer to as “The Man-Made California Drought” in the agriculture-heavy Central Valley of California, whereas environmentalist Democrats are cautious of taking any action that could harm the endangered delta smelt fish that lives in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

However, this is not the type of situation that has an all-or-nothing answer. It is also not the type of situation that we can afford to wait on while both sides refuse to budge. Now more than ever, we need a commitment to getting something done through compromise.

It is not realistic or smart to continue to cut water allocations to farmers, as the Department of Agriculture has already predicted a 5-6 percent rise in fruit and vegetable prices due to the fact that farmers have had to leave almost 500,000 acres of usual crop land fallow this past year. President Obama pledged $183 million in federal funds to help with the drought management, but that is not a lasting solution. We also cannot continue to divert water from the Delta at the expense of the endangered delta smelt. What may seem like one small and insignificant species of fish contributes to the biodiversity of the whole ecosystem. It is irresponsible and foolish to knowingly contribute to the demise of a whole species in the food chain for our shortsighted goals of water waste and consumption.

Clearly, the drought necessitates moderation and saving. Stanford has taken good steps forward by putting into effect water efficiency standards on campus. However, a look at the breakdown of water consumption on campus shows that despite the emptying of the fountains and efforts to reduce student and faculty consumption, 43 percent of all lake water consumption still goes towards watering the athletic fields on campus. This is a striking mirror of water consumption throughout the whole state of California where irrigated agriculture uses about 41 percent of all water supplies in comparison to the 10 percent that goes to urban consumption.

If both the state and Stanford University do not do something to shift this dramatic and unnecessary imbalance, we will not make any progress towards creating sustainable habits during the drought and after (if) we get out of it. This is not to say that individual saving efforts like turning the tap off, only watering at night and reducing shower length are pointless — every bit helps. But these small changes still do not address the brunt of the problem.

These large changes can only happen with government action. Several groups have come together to create the Bay Delta Conservation Plan outlining steps for more high-tech environmental and water conservation methods. However, Congress is undermining this plan by refusing to compromise on the House Republicans’ proposed bill, H.R. 3964. If passed as is, the bill could potentially upend any progress with negotiations that have already been made to serve mainly the interests of the agricultural sector. Republicans must be willing to make more concessions for environmental protection and Democrats must also listen to the needs of the agricultural sector.

Every day that an agreement is not reached, water supplies continue to diminish. Without sacrifices on both sides of the aisle, California will stay mired in inaction — helpless to the fears of running out of water and the hopes for more rain to come.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet ‘at’ stanford.edu. It goes without saying that California’s current drought is terrible. Nearly 60 percent of the state (and in all Bay Area counties except Marin County) bears the highest classification of “exceptional drought,” and every corner of California is at least suffering from “moderate drought” according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Every animal here in California, including us humans, has to deal with the lack of water, and unless the tarantulas know something we don’t, we could have to deal with this for years to come.

In this water emergency, our demi-socialist state and local governments here in California have been working hard to find ways to cut water use across the state. After all, the amount of water used in California rose by 1 percent as compared to previous years, after Governor Jerry Brown begged Californians to cut their water use by 20 percent. New rules punish those who wash their cars using a bare hose or over-water their lawns using non-recycled water with $500 fines, and San Francisco has even set up a hotline for all of the Gladys Kravitzes in the City to turn in their neighbors for being water-unwise.

Ultimately, those efforts focus on the here and now of the drought in ways that operate on fear: The bureaucrats who put those punishments in place need the average Californian to fear neighbors and fear the potential of penalties more than he/she loves excessive water use. But for we Stanford students, who will never actually see a $500 fine from the water district regardless of how much water we (anonymously) waste, and for the infamous “average millionaires” in this corner of the bay, for whom fines of that level probably don’t matter much, that fear really can’t work.

As such, different approaches are needed to help the people who have been hit hardest by this drought: our intrepid farmers and farm hands in the Central Valley, who, in many ways, keep the rest of our country fed. Water is everything to the agriculture of the Valley, and without water, the livelihoods of the people there also dry up.

Republicans in the House of Representatives have come up with a temporary fix that could help to make sure that the drought doesn’t become a death knell for the Central Valley while more long-term solutions can be worked out. Representative David Valadao (from Hanford, in hard-hit Kings County) introduced a bill called H.R. 3964 back in February that would divert water from the San Joaquin River to farms in the Valley. But since one of the consequences would be to keep water from the endangered delta smelt and, in doing so, nullify some of the provisions in the Endangered Species Act specifically related to the San Francisco Bay, the bill has been languishing in the Democrat-controlled Senate ever since passing the House along partisan lines.

Left-wing environmentalists see this, surprisingly, as the federal government intervening too much in order to help the Central Valley and her people, many of whom are “undocumented” immigrants working as field hands whose lives depend on the fate of farming in the Central Valley. Ironically, in many cases, the same left-wing activists decrying the slight intervention inherent in H.R. 3964 also want government to intervene more forcefully when it comes to the welfare of those same immigrants. Then again, progressives do tend to forget that the best kind of welfare is a job.

During times of even moderate plenty, the idea of further straining an endangered species would be an incredibly selfish one. When we can, we human beings should do our best to take care of the Earth and the other species we share it with — whether they be 50-foot whales or 3-inch smelt. The moral impetus that drives us to give what we can to charity and care for our fellow humans, when taken to its logical conclusion, should also impel us to act the same towards other species and the planet.

But these aren’t times of plenty. California is becoming a desert again, and that spells doom for all Californians, fish and human alike.

In considering this drought, we need to put the needs of human beings first. Certainly, all of us should continue to be as water-conscious and eco-friendly as we can in our own small corners of the state — after all, the life of a smelt, and all of the biological benefits that come along with having a more diverse food chain, are worth so much more than an extra five minutes in the shower, a dark green lawn or a fountain to hop in. But the lives and livelihoods of every person in the Central Valley are worth more still, even before considering the positive effects those lives have on the rest of the country. When we have the resources to do so, let’s take care of the smelt. For now, let’s focus more on taking care of us.

Contact Johnathan Bowes at jbowes ‘at’ stanford.edu

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An “alien” invasion https://stanforddaily.com/2014/08/13/an-alien-invasion/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/08/13/an-alien-invasion/#comments Thu, 14 Aug 2014 01:26:42 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1087499 On June 2, 2014, President Obama released a memorandum declaring a “humanitarian situation” at the U.S.-Mexico border resulting from the large influx of unaccompanied children seeking refuge in the U.S. On July 8, Obama requested $3.7 billion from Congress to apprehend, expedite proceedings for and care for these “unaccompanied alien children,” also known as UACs. […]

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On June 2, 2014, President Obama released a memorandum declaring a “humanitarian situation” at the U.S.-Mexico border resulting from the large influx of unaccompanied children seeking refuge in the U.S. On July 8, Obama requested $3.7 billion from Congress to apprehend, expedite proceedings for and care for these “unaccompanied alien children,” also known as UACs.

While it is encouraging to see Obama finally take action on immigration in contrast to the inability of the House to pass any reforms, the problems at the border continue to grow.

This is unsurprising. The memorandum diminishes the humanity of the children by labeling them as the nebulous “UACs.” No longer immigrants nor refugees nor human beings, they have been branded as something more akin to horror movie invaders of a different species. When referred to in this context, it is hard to imagine justifying $3.7 billion to protect the “alien” immigrants that are “invading” the country.

In fact, this dehumanization of the immigrant children fleeing the unspeakable violence in their home countries in Central America has been exacerbated by violent protests and riots in border towns. Protesters have been lining up at border towns just to threaten and accost the incoming refugees. “It’s not my problem,” some say. Why should we have to pay anything?” others say. Even lawmakers such as Tom Wassa (Michigan) claim that the children “have known diseases and gang affiliations” that will infiltrate into and infect the United States — even going so far as to call Obama a “domestic terrorist” because he is creating an atmosphere of fear by letting new immigrants in. News reports over the past two months have shown the abounding not-so-subtle campaigns to evade the responsibility of taking in the children as refugees.

However, this inflow of immigrant children is nothing new. The numbers of unaccompanied children entering the U.S. from Central American countries has been dramatically increasing since 2011. Increased incentives from hopes of relief through DACA (Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals act) are not to blame because the growing number of child arrivals began long before DACA was even created. Nor can we blame a declining quality of border security, as the resources put into the border have only been increasing over time. The real issue is the extreme violence that these children and their families face in their home countries. The huge numbers of children are coming from the countries and towns that have the highest homicide rates in the world. It is not simply that children find it enticing to come to the U.S., but it is also still a better option to endure the incredible risks they face attempting to cross the border than to fall victim to the violence in their home countries.

So what can be done? Right now, there is a push for expedited proceedings for recent arrivals with the help of a significant increase in immigration judges and additional authority for the Department of Homeland Security to exercise discretion in processing the deportations of the newly arriving children.

More resources to help get through increasingly backlogged immigration courts all over the country are extremely necessary. But the Fourth and Fifth Amendments of the Constitution guarantee due process and equal protections to all persons — regardless of citizenship. The pressure to speed up the court cases is making the hearings hasty at best, and at worst, a complete mockery of our so-called “fair and just” court system. Yes, the quickened pace of deportation proceedings is placating some of the loudest critics of the current immigration predicament, but at what cost?

For one, cramming a court case into a two-week window after an immigrant’s arrival substantially hinders his or her ability to find representation in court. And navigating the labyrinth of the U.S. legal system as a refugee and through a language barrier without the guidance of an attorney to find the available relief options is almost inconceivable. Nonprofit immigration law organizations such as Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto have helped many people attain legal relief here, but resources are still very limited as more and more children are seeking help in a very restricted amount of time. The immigration courts should not settle for sacrificing accuracy for expediency, especially when someone’s life could be on the line.

What the country and the immigration system need now is a dose of humanity. This is a humanitarian crisis, not an immigration crisis, and we must treat it as such. Incoming children must be first provided the care and resources they need and deserve instead of being rushed into the tumultuous court system with the goal of being deported as quickly as possible to a place where the U.S. government no longer has responsibility over them. In order to embrace immigration reform, we must first redefine how we see, hear and communicate about the situation. These are children, not “aliens,” and they are seeking refuge, not an “invasion.” America must uphold its promise of liberty and freedom for those “tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free” and help provide relief, not more obstacles, for incoming refugees — no matter where they are from.

 

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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Two Steps Backwards for Reproductive Rights https://stanforddaily.com/2014/07/10/two-steps-backwards-for-reproductive-rights/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/07/10/two-steps-backwards-for-reproductive-rights/#comments Fri, 11 Jul 2014 00:15:41 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1086749 The Supreme Court has relegated reproductive rights to the back burner this past week. The unanimous decision in McCullen v. Coakley this past Thursday annulled the 35-foot protest-free buffer zones around abortion clinics in Massachusetts. The decision was made under the reasoning that the buffer zones “restrict access to public ways and sidewalks,” violating protestors’ […]

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The Supreme Court has relegated reproductive rights to the back burner this past week. The unanimous decision in McCullen v. Coakley this past Thursday annulled the 35-foot protest-free buffer zones around abortion clinics in Massachusetts. The decision was made under the reasoning that the buffer zones “restrict access to public ways and sidewalks,” violating protestors’ First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and protest.

Just this Monday, the majority in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby struck down the Affordable Care Act mandate requiring corporations to cover the cost of contraceptives for their female workers in order to protect the “religious freedom” of corporations that are against certain birth control methods.

These two cases strike down crucial protections for females seeking control over their reproductive lives. These two cases set a precedent of valuing freedom of expression over women’s rights and dignity. These two cases reflect backward progress for civil rights in the U.S.

While America has made incredible progress regarding the civil rights of women (the 19th Amendment), minority races (Brown v. Board of Education), disabled people (Americans with Disabilities Act) and the LGBTQ community (United States v. Windsor), all people are not yet treated equally. There are still glaring issues of discrimination and denigration that cannot continue to be swept under the rug and expected to go away on their own.

However, by claiming that freedom of speech should take precedent over patient protection, that is exactly what McCullen v. Coakley does.

The “buffer zone” law was enacted in 2007 in response to the troubling trend of violence at abortion clinics in Massachusetts. While protests and “free speech” may seem minor infractions to protect from, a shooting occurred in 1994 — over a decade before any protections were enacted to protect the clients of family planning services such as Planned Parenthood.

The majority opinion of the Supreme Court claims that the buffer zone prevented people from engaging in “personal, caring, consensual conversations with women about various alternatives” to abortion.

First off, if this were the most common type of interaction outside abortion clinics, the buffer zone would have never been necessary. Secondly, granting permission for these “conversations” so close to the entrance of abortion clinics incorrectly assumes that the right to free speech includes a right to be heard.

“Times have changed,” many say. Indeed, it is now 20 years after these shootings, but getting access to family planning services is still not a simple process. Despite the fact that only three percent of Planned Parenthood’s funding goes to abortion services, pro-life extremists have continued to target clinics with vandalism, trespassing, hate mail,anthrax letters, butyric acid attacks (a colorless liquid with a rancid odor that disrupts services), assault and death threats, according to data provided by the National Abortion Federation.

In no case could anyone consider these actions “caring” or “consensual” and in no case should women be put at any risk of this sort of harassment in the name of protecting the hate speech of pro-life extremists.

The Burwell v. Hobby Lobby decision is another example of the belittlement of women’s reproductive rights — in this case for the sake of another First Amendment right in religious freedom — of for-profit corporations. These corporations can now refuse to cover the healthcare costs of contraception for their female employees if doing so “substantially burdens the exercise of religion.”

In fact, under the logic of the decision of the court, corporations now have the opportunity to go to court to appeal the “health coverage of vaccines, or paying the minimum wage, or according women equal pay for substantially similar work.”

What the majority decision fails to take into account is the fact that women that will no longer have affordable access to contraceptives if they do not share the same beliefs as their employers.

Nothing — not employers nor money nor religion — has the right to dictate control over another woman’s body. If corporations refuse to cover the costs of some birth control methods, this effectively involves the company in women’s healthcare decisions. In a country that is so advanced in the protection of religious freedom and intellectual property, it is shocking that we are still having the debate over the physical and unbiased control of our own bodies. As an employee, as a female and as a human, I stand with women to keep corporate interests out of each woman’s own reproductive choices.

It would be easy to accept these two Supreme Court opinions as the final say on the matter. But instead of admitting defeat for women’s reproductive rights, let this be a call to action to employers, to feminists, to human rights activists and to everyone that has a female loved one to advocate for these rights back.

Volunteer at targeted family planning clinics to help patients pass the radical protestors. Protest the companies that are attempting to pick and choose what healthcare you receive. And if all else fails, just make your voice heard to make sure the government steps up and provide the adequate protections for women that have been stripped away this past week.

In the words of Hillary Clinton, “Human rights are women’s rights, and women’s rights are human rights.” That is why we must stand together to fight for reproductive justice. That is why I stand with women.

 

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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Looking forward to 2016: Combating the knowledge gap https://stanforddaily.com/2014/05/20/looking-forward-to-2016-combating-the-knowledge-gap/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/05/20/looking-forward-to-2016-combating-the-knowledge-gap/#respond Tue, 20 May 2014 09:09:37 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1085775 the 2016 election is not riding on something as simple as the general approval rating of the president. What matters most is the misinformation that forms this public opinion. The challenge to the Democratic Party in the ad wars does not come from the fact of opposition, but rather from the amount of money being spent. The founder of the Center for Public Integrity, a nonpartisan watchdog group, is concerned about the “pattern of law-breaking, political manipulation and obfuscation” that is on a “whole different level” than anyone else. The Kochs “are the Standard Oil of our times,” he said. While the Democratic Party may not have the means to match the money being spent on the opposition campaigns, they must be able to spend enough to combat growing misconceptions in order to make 2016 a successful year for their candidates.

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The “second term curse” is no secret. For almost every president who has served two terms, their presidential approval rating has dropped in the second term. President Obama has not been insulated from this particular trend and is now faced with currently declining levels of support from the U.S. public.

Many people claim that Obama’s ratings spell trouble for the Democrats in both the 2014 midterm elections and the 2016 presidential election. Historical studies indicate that every 5 percent increase in a president’s net approval rating increases his party’s candidate’s margin by 1 percent in the following presidential election, with the trend also holding in the opposite direction.

Considering that fact, it’s true that what is happening now in the government will undoubtedly shape public approval of the two parties. However, the 2016 election is not riding on something as simple as the general approval rating of the president. What matters most is the misinformation that forms this public opinion.

One setback that Obama has faced in his second term is the rollout of the Affordable Care Act, more commonly dubbed Obamacare. The law itself passed, fulfilling Obama’s promise of sweeping healthcare reform to get all Americans healthcare coverage. However, according to the latest Kaiser Health Tracking Poll, 48 percent of people still have a negative view of the reform. The chaotic technological launch of HealthCare.gov in October 2013 has left people associating dysfunctional technology with the quality of the whole law.

Because of this, 57 percent of people still believe the administration fell short of its enrollment goal, despite the fact that healthcare plan enrollment under the ACA has far surpassed the administration’s projection of 7 million additions. Combatting this entrenched lack of understanding will be crucial for the Democratic candidate in 2016 to gain more support from moderates and independents.

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How can Democrats eliminate this knowledge gap? Advertisement is an important tool that can be used for shaping public opinion. While it is difficult to pin down the exact effect that advertising has on election outcomes, Ken Goldstein, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, explains that “advertising very, very much matters at the margin,” especially as Election Day approaches. The swing votes at the margin are what could make or break the next presidential election.

That is why the Democratic Party faces a huge challenge dealing with the Koch brothers as the 2016 election approaches. The Koch brothers have spent tens of millions of the $41 billion attributed to their name to push forward their libertarian views in politics. They are notorious for their anonymous political giving – a method that circumvents standing campaign finance laws by funding “groups that are not required to disclose donors – groups that work to determine the outcome of federal, state and even municipal elections.”

This money is spent on opposition campaigns directly against Obama administration policies. It is funding advertising by groups touting the need for drastically lower personal and corporate taxes, minimal social services for the needy and much less oversight of industry – especially environmental regulation. The challenge to the Democratic Party in the ad wars does not come from the fact of opposition, but rather from the amount of money being spent. The founder of the Center for Public Integrity, a nonpartisan watchdog group, is concerned about the “pattern of law-breaking, political manipulation and obfuscation” that is on a “whole different level” than anyone else. The Kochs “are the Standard Oil of our times,” he said.

The Democrats must be prepared to face and combat the obscene amounts of money pouring into opposition advertising in the 2016 election. Money is not the only thing that matters in elections, but it makes a crucial difference. It tilts the balance of what ideological messages the public will see and exacerbates the effects of income inequality, increasing the potential for vote buying through political donations. While the Democratic Party may not have the means to match the money being spent on the opposition campaigns, they must be able to spend enough to combat growing misconceptions in order to make 2016 a successful year for their candidates.

 

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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Color-blind politics? https://stanforddaily.com/2014/05/06/color-blind-politics/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/05/06/color-blind-politics/#comments Tue, 06 May 2014 10:00:55 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1085325 The U.S. is not color-blind, nor does it need to be. What we need is frank awareness of the true racial disparities that still exist and action to eliminate them. The Supreme Court’s decision on the Michigan case now simply perpetuates the lie that races are “equal enough” in the country. It allows majority rule to overtake minority rights – something that the republican process was never meant to uphold.

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The Supreme Court has just set a dangerous precedent by upholding Michigan’s ban on affirmative action policies in public universities. In the Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action case, the Court voted 6-2 in favor of the ban.

The danger of the decision does not involve any infringement of state rights, real or perceived. The danger is not in any judgment on the constitutionality of race-conscious admissions policies in higher education or the possibility of a federal ban thereof. The danger comes from the fear of addressing race head-on.

In reality, the Court did not make any decision on affirmative action; instead, it turned the decision over to the hands of the Michigan voters. As Justice Kennedy stated, “The courts may not disempower the voters from choosing which path to follow.” Thus, now each state may (or may not) vote on a referendum to allow race as a consideration in college admissions.

However, what is the role of the judicial branch if not to protect the citizens of the country from discrimination – or the outcomes of a history of discrimination? The Supreme Court has confronted race directly in the past in cases when minorities were left behind such as Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education.

However, the recent decisions of the Court have shown a move in the opposite direction. “Our country has changed,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote in the majority opinion in the decision to strike down crucial parts of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. But this is not a good enough reason to take up a faulty “color-blind” logic today – in admissions procedures or voting rights.

As much as we would like to believe it, the country has not changed. While overt racism may no longer be as socially acceptable as it used to be in years past, there are still striking racial wealth disparities in our country that are continuing to widen. Minorities are disproportionately affected by unemployment. There are still widespread achievement gaps between races across the country. And in states where affirmative action has been banned, public universities have tended to enroll fewer black and Hispanic freshmen. Enrollment of black students at UCLA has dropped to three percent of the student body, sparking large social media action and the viral Black Bruins spoken word project to initiate discussion on the matter.

These systemic problems will not be fixed if we refuse to acknowledge their reality or the history of discrimination in this country. As Justice Sotomayor stated in her dissent, “the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to speak openly and candidly on the subject of race, and to apply the Constitution with eyes open to the unfortunate effects of centuries of racial discrimination.”

Here at Stanford, a private university where admissions procedures are not dictated by the state, we are fortunate enough to achieve much more racial diversity than UCLA and other California public schools. This is can only be attained by taking race into account. Even income-based affirmative action would fail to help close the achievement gap between races because there are six times as many low-SES white students as black students to whom income-based affirmative action would also give preference.

The Supreme Court’s decision on the Michigan case now simply perpetuates the lie that races are “equal enough” in the country. It allows majority rule to overtake minority rights – something that the republican process was never meant to uphold. The Supreme Court must exert its authority in order to reduce the de facto discrimination that still pervades society today.

The U.S. is not color-blind, nor does it need to be. What we need is frank awareness of the true racial disparities that still exist and action to eliminate them.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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The real cost of inaction on immigration https://stanforddaily.com/2014/04/21/the-real-cost-of-inaction-on-immigration/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/04/21/the-real-cost-of-inaction-on-immigration/#comments Tue, 22 Apr 2014 06:03:42 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1084723 While economic concerns are at the forefront of debate over immigration and the statistics undoubtedly show that the U.S. benefits greatly from immigration, these facts should not be the only reasons driving immigration reform. The question being asked so often is “What can immigrants do for the country?” However, the real question we should be asking ourselves is “What is the right thing to do?” What America needs now is action. There are political, economic and personal costs to everyone for every day that immigration reform remains merely an idea rather than a reality. 297 days is enough already.

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As time keeps passing, Congress remains at a standstill. Amidst the ever-increasing problems with the broken U.S. immigration system, the House of Representatives has yet to put the Senate’s immigration reform bill, S.744, on the floor for a vote. The House has essentially resigned the bill to a limbo for the past ten months, neither passing nor reforming the bill since the Senate passed it in 2013. Republican House Speaker John Boehner leads the Republican sentiment that the GOP will not accept a comprehensive immigration reform bill passed by the Democratic-controlled Senate – even though it has strong bipartisan support.

The House has been under heat for its extreme inefficiency and its refusal to put immigration reform on its calendar. Since June 27, 2013, there are over 1 million newly eligible immigrant voters, now part of the overwhelming majority of 75 percent of Americans who believe the nation’s immigration policy is in need of sweeping changes. This is bad news for the House Republicans who continue to block immigration reform. People are voicing their opinions, and yet they continue to be ignored on Capitol Hill.

The political costs of inaction could drastically impact the outcomes of the 2014 election. Economic costs, likewise, are already building up. Analysis has shown that the U.S. economy is falling behind every day that immigration reform is not passed. Under S.744, streamlined pathways to legal immigration would expand the economy and boost tax revenues. America’s GDP could increase up to $150 billion per year from increased earnings due to legalizing immigrants.

Additionally, a failure to pass any sort of immigration reform means that the U.S. would be losing the benefits that could come with a larger labor force, higher productivity and investment and the innovation and entrepreneurship of skilled immigrants. Under S.744, the visa cap would increase for H-1B workers with at least a bachelor’s degree who come to work temporarily in a specialty occupation. S.744 would also exempt foreign students who graduate with advanced degrees and job offers in a STEM field from numerical immigration limits.

Overall, these reforms would help streamline the process for highly-skilled and highly-educated workers to come to the U.S. Immigrants are driving entrepreneurship and job creation in America, contrary to claims that immigrants are stealing American jobs – which conflates immigration and outsourcing. In fact, a look at the numbers show that immigrants are more likely to open local businesses and create local jobs. Immigrants started 28 percent of all new U.S. businesses in 2011 and account for 24 percent of patents – twice their share of the population.

Not only does immigration boost American job creation, but it also increases the productivity of the American workforce. Economists show that immigration helps stimulate investment and promote specialization, resulting in higher U.S. GDP and higher wages for all workers in the country.

While economic concerns are at the forefront of debate over immigration and the statistics undoubtedly show that the U.S. benefits greatly from immigration, these facts should not be the only reasons driving immigration reform. The question being asked so often is “What can immigrants do for the country?” However, the real question we should be asking ourselves is “What is the right thing to do?”

In the past 297 days since the Senate passed their reforms, there have been over 330,000 deportations of immigrants that could have benefited from the new reforms. These deportations are tearing families apart across the border. The recent increase in deportation of undocumented immigrants has left thousands of children in foster care. But being an immigrant, documented or not, doesn’t make someone any less of a person. We cannot reduce immigrants down to dollar signs.

What America needs now is action. There are political, economic and personal costs to everyone for every day that immigration reform remains merely an idea rather than a reality. 297 days is enough already. The time is now for Congress to pass the immigration reform that this country so desperately needs.

 

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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Are drones democratic? https://stanforddaily.com/2014/04/08/are-drones-democratic/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/04/08/are-drones-democratic/#respond Tue, 08 Apr 2014 07:51:43 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1084198 The availability of hard data is critical in order to legitimize American military actions for other countries and to ensure that no one branch of government monopolizes military decision making on drones. Drones themselves are not undemocratic, but the current system of secrecy and opaque decision-making is questionable. Drones have the potential to do great harm, which is why separate branches of the U.S. government must carefully monitor their use.

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It’s clear that throughout the Obama administration, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, more commonly known as drones, have been at the forefront of debate on America’s national security and foreign policies.

I will first note that drone technology is not new. While Obama has faced this debate head-on, drones have been around since long before he was elected into office in 2008. The CIA had been flying unarmed surveillance drones since 2000, and armed drones since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Unmanned drones are “piloted” by a crew at a military base that analyzes the photographic images sent back from the drones to decide on an action to take. Essentially, drones are controlled remotely, enabling killing of individual targets that is almost risk-free militarily and potentially automatable. The military can send a remote-controlled drone to perform dangerous maneuvers that would place an American life at risk if attempted with more conventional methods. President Obama defended his use of drones in his 2013 speech on counterterrorism by claiming that the alternatives – special operations, conventional airpower or missiles – are much less precise and lead to many more casualties than drone strikes.

With machines doing the dangerous and dirty work of war for us, what could go wrong? Analysts continually debate the efficacy and precision of drones, but the real area in question should be the (lack of) checks and balances on the use of drones. The ease with which drones can be fired creates a system lacking in emotional attachment, accountability and oversight. This is a dangerous situation that undermines the democratic institutions of checks and balances in the United States.

Just this past week on April 3, the House introduced a bipartisan bill entitled the “Targeted Lethal Force Transparency Act” to address the gaps in oversight of the current U.S. drone policy. This legislation would increase the transparency of drone use by requiring a report on the number of combatants and civilians killed or injured in drone strikes each year since 2008 and annual reporting going forward.

This bill is the first step in the right direction for U.S. military policy. It is a large improvement upon the Department of Justice’s white paper on drones. This paper provided a legal justification for potential future drone strikes on an individual, even an U.S. citizen, if the situation meets three criteria: the individual is an imminent threat of violent attack, capture is not possible and U.S. action is consistent with the law of war.

However, what qualifies as an imminent threat? Who determines the feasibility of capture? Who makes these subjective decisions? The white paper clearly argues that the President has the inherent right to “respond accordingly” to situations in any manner for the self-defense of the nation. The document even further notes that “there exists no appropriate judicial forum to evaluate these constitutional consideration,” because in the view of the DOJ, national security is a matter to be dealt with by the legislative and executive branches. While effective drone strikes must have the advantage of surprise, the accountability of the government cannot be sacrificed simply for the speed of response.

The ideas in this paper compromise the system of checks and balances that the U.S. is founded upon. Separation of power is crucial for preventing the corruption that so often results with unlimited or unchecked power. The new House bill, the “Targeted Lethal Force Transparency Act,” has the beginnings of a better system of accountability. Requiring the government to report the number of casualties resulting from drone strikes helps “narrow the perception gap” between what is reported or assumed, one of the creators of the bill claims.

Up until now, there have been only estimates of deaths from drone strikes from organizations such as Human Rights Watch and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. The lack of accurate data means that the public cannot form fully informed views on the costs and benefits of American drone policy. The availability of hard data is critical in order to legitimize American military actions for other countries and to ensure that no one branch of government monopolizes military decision making on drones.

Drones themselves are not undemocratic, but the current system of secrecy and opaque decision-making is questionable. Drones have the potential to do great harm, which is why separate branches of the U.S. government must carefully monitor their use. There are undeniable benefits of using unmanned aircraft, but the government, especially President Obama, must stay vigilant to ensure that the ends really do justify the means.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet “at” stanford.edu.

 

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Chelsea’s Law: A Light to Shine On https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/25/chelseas-law-a-light-to-shine-on/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/25/chelseas-law-a-light-to-shine-on/#comments Tue, 25 Feb 2014 08:09:24 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1082664 Today — February 25, 2014 — I want to take a moment to remember the legacy of a girl named Chelsea King. Chelsea was an activist, a runner, a student, a friend, a daughter, and a spunky, charismatic, jovial bubble of joy. This Tuesday marks the fourth anniversary of Chelsea’s disappearance from Poway, Calif., and […]

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Today — February 25, 2014 — I want to take a moment to remember the legacy of a girl named Chelsea King.

Chelsea was an activist, a runner, a student, a friend, a daughter, and a spunky, charismatic, jovial bubble of joy. This Tuesday marks the fourth anniversary of Chelsea’s disappearance from Poway, Calif., and eventual murder. While she no can longer light up rooms with her smile or belt out a tune on her French horn, her legacy carries on today in the form of Chelsea’s Law.

Chelsea’s Law protects California’s children today with increased penalties, parole provisions and oversight for violent sexual offenders of children. This law is specifically targeted at criminals that our society cannot risk letting loose again: Certain offenses carry a one-strike punishment, meaning that especially vicious crimes would automatically merit life imprisonment without parole.

The rationale for such harsh sentences is clear: The Bureau of Justice Statistics shows that child molesters and statutory rapists released from prison have a 5.1% recidivism rate — 5.1% of these criminals were rearrested for a new sex crime within three years of their release. While that number does not seem very high, over the course of many years, not adopting a one-strike law would risk the safety of many children. Chelsea’s Law is now in place in California, and variants of it are being pushed forward in other states to prevent these avoidable tragedies.

This law protects society by cracking down on crime. The California Three Strikes Law, enacted in 1994 in response to the murders of Kimber Reynolds and Polly Klass, has similar motivations. It requires that any criminal offender with two prior convictions for crimes deemed serious or violent by the California Penal Code be sentenced to a minimum of 25 years to life in prison.

While valiant in purpose, the Three Strikes Law has done more harm than good.

Unlike Chelsea’s Law, the 1994 law does not specifically target any type of crime. Instead, it uses unclear, overly broad terms such as “serious” and “violent” to condemn any third-time offenders to life in prison. Legally, the term “serious” can include anything from murder to kidnapping, extortion or arson, a definition that, during sentencing, essentially disregards the huge differences in these crimes.

The California State Auditor found that in 2009, 25% of inmates in California institutions had been sentenced under the Three Strikes Law and that the increased costs of the law totaled $19.2 billion. But when safety is on the line, it can be argued that any cost is justified. In fact, the Legislative Analyst’s Office found that crime rates fell by 43% between 1994 and 1999. Is that proof enough to warrant the billions being spent on this law?

No, it is not — for several reasons. First off, the crime rate has been declining since 1991, even before the passage of the Three Strikes Law, so the law has not necessarily reduced crime in any major way. Secondly, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, over half (56%) of those convicted for a third strike were convicted because of a non-serious or nonviolent offense. Lastly, this law has proven to be racially biased to an unacceptable degree, with 37% of second and third strikers being African American. (Only 6.6% of California residents are African American.)

In 2012 California made huge progress by passing Proposition 36, the Three Strikes Reform Act. This legislation aims to shorten the sentences of those that are serving life terms for non-serious, non-violent crimes and who no longer pose a threat to society. The reason for this distinction is that, as a clinical psychologist from the Probation Service of England and Wales points out, this rehabilitation is not equally possible for serious violent offenders, like rapists.

So far, the legislation has been targeted correctly: A Progress Report of this revision shows that those released since the implementation of this Proposition have only a 2% recidivism rate. This is good evidence that the Proposition is only serving to help those that are among the safest to release from custody.

Proposition 36 is a crucial step forward, but it cannot solve everything. The Three Strikes Law is still straining society today. It has placed an unnecessary burden on the California prison system that cannot be so easily reversed. In the meantime, the lengthy petition process for resentencing is now clogging California courts. While papers are being processed and cases are being reviewed, people unfairly sentenced still remain in prison, continuing to raise prison costs and fill space that is needed for more serious criminals.

The Three Strikes Law is a lesson to legislators and voters that policies must be narrowly tailored to society’s most important ends. Chelsea’s Law is a reform that is doing just that.

Although the 25th of February is always an emotional day, this year we can also celebrate the legacy that Chelsea is leaving through her namesake law. Chelsea’s Law continues to protect California’s children from violent sexual predators as well as carry out the due process of law by avoiding the pitfalls of overgeneralization that the Three Strikes Law still suffers from. Today is a day of renewed hope for a better future. Today is a day to remember that Chelsea’s light continues to shine on.

 

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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Just Say No to Racial Drug Policies https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/11/just-say-no-to-racial-drug-policies/ https://stanforddaily.com/2014/02/11/just-say-no-to-racial-drug-policies/#respond Tue, 11 Feb 2014 10:40:36 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1082256 This past Sunday, the nation mourned another life lost to drugs. While autopsy results of Phillip Seymour Hoffman remain inconclusive, the circumstances of the actor’s death all point to a drug overdose. And when news of this came out, it was all too reminiscent of June 2009 when Michael Jackson’s death was the top story. […]

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This past Sunday, the nation mourned another life lost to drugs. While autopsy results of Phillip Seymour Hoffman remain inconclusive, the circumstances of the actor’s death all point to a drug overdose. And when news of this came out, it was all too reminiscent of June 2009 when Michael Jackson’s death was the top story.

These are the tragic stories that tend to reignite the debate on drug policy, but according to the Centers for Disease Control, there are over 100 such drug overdose deaths per day. Why are drug overdose rates consistently increasing, and what can the government do about it?

These are the questions that the Obama administration has been attempting to answer in the construction of a drug policy strategy for the past four years. On April 24, the 2013 National Drug Control Strategy was released with plans to reduce drug use and “protect public health in America.” This comprehensive strategy first emphasizes prevention, but also includes efforts to create better access to treatment.

Obama’s policy is a far cry from a realization of Nixon’s envisioned “war on drugs” that criminalized drug use, increased sentencing penalties and inflated the size of federal drug control agencies. Public outrage and an extreme fear of drugs continued even through the ’80s and ’90s, with incarceration levels for nonviolent drug offenses increasing from 50,000 people to 400,000.

Despite conveying a valiant image of cracking down on crime, it is often forgotten that these historical drug prohibitions are rooted in racial sentiments. Since the nineteenth century, drug restrictions have largely been set in response to different waves of immigration. American legislators began to make linkages between drugs and the feared or rejected groups in society. Historically, anti-opium laws were associated with a large influx of Chinese immigrants, anti-cocaine laws were seen as a reaction towards the black population and anti-marijuana laws were linked with Mexican immigrant communities.

What is most troublesome, though, is that these prejudicial undertones are still a large part of the nation’s drug policy today. A journal article in Criminology states that prisons are full of “minority drug offenders…who in essence are being punished for the ‘crime’ of not accepting poverty or of being addicted to cocaine.” This is especially prominent in the 100-1 disparity in possession penalties for crack cocaine versus powder cocaine – someone with five grams of crack has the same five-year minimum sentence as a powder cocaine defendant with 100 times that amount.

Moreover, it is hard to dissociate these policy differences from the fact that 80 percent of those incarcerated for crack offenses are African Americans, while powder cocaine use is generally a drug of choice for the white upper-class.

Obama finally addressed this striking dichotomy in 2010 by signing in the Fair Sentencing Act, which reduced the crack-powder cocaine sentencing disparities to 18-1. While the schism has been reduced significantly, it is still a difference that is much too large to be overlooked.

The 2013 National Drug Control Strategy proclaims that “drug policy reform should be rooted in neuroscience – not political science.” So why are racially-driven drug policies of the past still influencing drug policies of the 21st century? The National Institute on Drug Abuse found that the effects of cocaine on the brain are identical in crack or powder form. If the principles that underlie the new drug policy are true, shouldn’t it be clear evidence that there is no logical basis for the policy differences?

Drug overdose deaths now surpass homicides and car accident fatalities in America. Every one of these deaths from drug overdoses – no matter the level of celebrity or media attention – is a tragic one. Most tragic of all is how preventable these deaths could be with adequate resources for treatment provided by the government.

The death of Phillip Seymour Hoffman is a deeply saddening event and also a reminder that drugs do not discriminate between race, social class, gender or sexuality. So why should drug policy? A history of drug policy implemented with racial biases should not continue to have an influence on the drug policy today. These historical practices of criminalizing drug use and legislating harsh penalties that have carried through into policy today will not help people with their drug addictions. There is no better time than now to fix the systematic racism and lack of treatment options within our drug policy.

The 2013 Strategy was a step in the right direction, but the government must now live up to its promises by providing better treatment for everyone for drug addiction as a scientific substance abuse disorder, rather than criminalizing it differently based on the demographic that abuses it. Instead of blindly fighting a war on drugs, we must fight for government action on policy reform to combat the real problem – the influence of past racism on policies today.

Contact Aimee Trujillo at aimeet@stanford.edu.

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