Youth Politics

As a lot of you might know, Valkyrie came out in theaters today. I loved watching the trailers for it on TV because of the fact that they didn’t stress that it came out on Christmas day, only saying that it will show on the 25th. Seems like bad timing to me, even if you’re trying to target non-Christmas celebrating audiences. I can’t think of a better thing to do to celebrate the holidays than to watch people try to assassinate Hitler, can you?

It has been brought to my attention that people think the Holocaust was caused by a bad German economy. I cannot stress enough how wrong this “fact” is. Hitler was really the only reason for the Holocaust. He took advantage of the terrible German economy to suit his political agenda and to more easily persuade his audience to follow his cause. Because let’s face it, when you’re desperate, you’ll listen to a lot more people who promise a way out of misery. That’s exactly how it happened. It wasn’t caused by a bad German economy, it was caused by a lunatic.

There’s a lot of power play in politics, and this fact should be blatantly obvious to anyone. Hitler took power with ease and then put himself in absolute control via manipulation. Could anyone really have stopped him? Yes, they could have, but they didn’t want to. Hitler claimed he needed to do what he did to save Germany from total economic collapse, so he was left to do whatever he deemed was necessary.

I’ll probably watch Valkyrie, but certainly not today. I’m in too festive a mood to watch a serious movie : >

Merry Christmas everyone!

I’d like to discuss marriage.

Now, I’ve never been married, nor have I ever considered it. I’m only 20, so this seems like a reasonable thing for me to say. When I think of marriage however, I think commitment. Marriage is a commitment to the one person that you love most, and signifies a promise of everlasting love and companionship with said person. That, to me, is what marriage is supposed to be. But is that what marriage is in the United States?

I get tired of people telling other people that they aren’t allowed to get married. Who gives you the right to decide who can and cannot get married? What I mean is this: there are plenty of people out there in the world who don’t want homosexuals to get married. My question is, why? Is it because it doesn’t fit into your definition of marriage?

Does getting married and then getting unmarried a few years later fit into your definition of marriage? Roughly 50 percent of Americans couples get divorced. That’s really high for a promise that’s supposed to last “til death do us part”. Straight folks don’t even want to stay married. There are lots of people who cringe at the mere fact of getting married. Who are divorced people to say who can and cannot get married, when they themselves can’t uphold to the values of marriage?

These are questions I ask myself and to others, because I think it’s extremely important to know why you’re fighting for a certain cause and why you believe you are absolutely 100 percent in the right. I understand the view point of those opposed to gay marriage. The arguments range anywhere from the definition of marriage to the whole slippery slope argument (people marrying their siblings, animals, inanimate objects?) I don’t think any of the arguments against gay marriage are any good nor are they valid, but that’s only my view on the matter.

My one true question for everyone is: How sacred is marriage, and is it important to you?

Oh, and a merry Christmas eve for those celebrating!

This is going to be a short post because I’m busy with some big changes to this blog.

First of all I’d like to mention a new blog I found called Youth Involved. The website is written by a 15-year-old who is interested in the world of politics, which is something I fully endorse and encourage. The blog itself is fairly new, however it is well written and is excellent as far as opinionated posts as well as getting some interesting current events coverage.

The website is www.YouthInvolved.com for those who are interested. I highly recommend at least checking it out. Subscribing is fairly easy to do as well, and I have already done so.

Okay so some updates:

1. I’m going to be getting a logo sometime next week I believe. I think it’ll look pretty cool and I look forward to being able to use it.

2. I want to redesign the site and am in the process of doing so. The current layout seems… boring. Plus, I can’t use widgets with WordPress which is kind of a shame. I noticed that Reconstitution 2.0 updated their design and I think it looks pretty awesome and a ton more modern. I also happen to like the 3-column theme, and may experiment with 3 columns. What do you guys think about this move? Would I redesign be beneficial?

3. I think it’s fairly difficult to subscribe to this site’s RSS feed the way it is done now. I’m working on making it a whole lot easier. Email subscriptions seem to be the easiest way for people to subscribe and I want to jump on that bandwagon.

4. I will not be attending Obama’s inauguration due to my being in college at the time. Although I will try to convince my family to attend as we’re about an hour away from D.C. Traffic is probably going to be the primary reason for opting not to go.

Stay tuned for more updates later on in the week and happy holidays!

Here’s my source in case that comes into question:

http://www.wtrg.com/daily/crudeoilprice.html

Long time readers of this blog may remember a post I made about the price of gasoline called Three Dollar Gas Is Good!?

I had said that I would never see gas prices under two dollars ever again. Boy was I wrong.

The truth of the matter is, there were a lot of economists predicting that the price of oil would fall significantly. And significantly they did. I can buy gas for $1.59 at the pump today. That’s incredible, and only a few cents short of the prices I grew up with. So yes, I was incorrect in assuming that oil would not fall to those levels again. It’s just a testament of the power of the American people to influence global gas prices. We cut our consumption, and prices fall drastically. This of course is also heavily influenced by the current economic recession.

So what happens when the recession is over? Will gas prices jump back up again? You bet. We absolutely have to make sure that we control our consumption and not let the price of oil get out of control again. This means investing in renewable energy sources such as solar, taking more public transportation, using more fuel-efficient vehicles, and making sure we drive only when absolutely necessary. As a bonus, these measures are good for the environment too.

Have you done anything to cut consumption or have otherwise changed your consumption habits, and do you think they’ll come back to how there were years ago when the recession is over?

I felt it was time to put up an update on how my stocks have been doing. For my earlier update check out Apple and Google Investments – 2 Weeks Later.

The market has been fluctuating pretty heavily on a day-to-day basis, but in the end it looks like the market is going nowhere fast. A lot of the recent fluctuations are due to the government’s decisions regarding the auto-maker’s bailout plan, which as of now has not gone through. However, the market fluctuations are not nearly as important as the fluctuations of the stocks I care about. I did however track how Google and Apple did with relation to the ups and downs of the market. Specifically I wanted to see if they generally went up when the market went up, if they went down when the market went down, or if there was no correlation.

You’ll notice there is a positive trend when looking at the Google stocks, however Apple’s stock has fallen since December 7. Here are further details as to how both stocks are doing:

GOOG has gone up 25.85 points since December 7th, and AAPL has fallen 4.3 points, for a net gain of 21.55 points. Not bad in a struggling market.

In general I found that yes, the stocks are largely influenced by how the market is doing on that day. Both stocks rise significantly on good market days, and they both drop significantly on bad days. When it comes to marginal gains in the market or marginal drops, both stocks react based on news given on that particular day for both companies.

Apple seems to be taking a bit of a hit given the recent lawsuit about false advertisement, and just recently MSN money’s StockScouter changed its rating on Apple from moderate buy to hold. I wasn’t really planning on making any moves, but it doesn’t seem like anyone should be buying any more Apple stock for now.

Currently, Google is trading at $310.17 a share, and Apple is at a flat $90 per share.

I expect a huge bounce in the market on inauguration day with Obama stepping into office. The market really only needs confidence, and Obama being sworn into office can provide just that. In the long run I don’t think it’ll make any difference, but I’m sure day traders are looking forward to that day. Of course we’ll have to see if the auto bailout passes, and then if it makes an impact on the market as well. I expect it to have about as much of an impact as the 700 billion dollar bailout (not much at all).

If you’d like to receive continued updates as to how I’m doing, make sure to sign up to my RSS feed!