Lee McKinnis (57)
Kristina Marynczak (37)
Killian Noonan (36)
Melissa Castillo (32)
NikoVelazquez (27)
Shannon Ratzel (23)
Michelle Reyes (22)
Kyle Barczak (21)
Maura Bilek (21)
Susan Bayaa (21)
RJE – Last Thursday, we had an Act Out Fair that turned out to be pretty interesting. Individuals from the organizations my classmates volunteered in came in to inform ad speak to others about their organization. The fair also had face painting. That turned out to be a little interesting.
The class schedule before us had a lot of people attend and it looked like all the chairs set up for the fair where filled when the speaker was talking. During our class time, it didn’t get as big of an audience but was still fun. We had individuals from the Little Red School House, Orland township Food Pantry, and people from a non for profit organization that repairs bikes and sends them to different parts of the world. Our guest speaker was Mona Purdy, from Share Your Soles. She was very interesting and very energetic. It’s interesting how she started this organization from a simple trip to a 3rd world country.
My favorite individual at the Act Out fair, was a lady representing The Little Red School House. She wasfull of energy and had a great sense of humor. While talking to her with a group of my friends, she asked us questions about the area we live in. The interesting thing is, she used a puppet T-Rex to do, which made us laugh, yet the information stuck. What we learned is that the midwest has the largest source of fresh water in the world due to the Great Lakes. One question she asked directed towards me was how Moraine Valley got its name. She asked me using the T-Rex and, of course without thinking, I looked at the dinosaur and answered “I have no idea.” A couple seconds later, I started laughing hysterically. I put one hand on the dinosaur, looked at my friends while pointing to the puppet with the other hand, and while laughing said “I’m talking to a dinosaur.” But we learned that Moraine was a huge glacier that pushed its way from Canada through to the US and made a “valley” when it passed. We are located in that valley, and that is how Moraine Valley got its name.
History lesson taught at the Act Out Fair that was directed towards educating people in volunteering for organizations. Priceless.
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Klem Bachleda
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Klem Bachleda
The short poem / video we saw in class by Mali was epic. In a sarcastic, yet serious, way, we see how our culture is growing less and less confident in our opinions, thoughts and comments. I do see it happening often with the people I speak to or ask opinions from. Some times, I can get a confident response when asking others questions. Most of the time I see somebody doubting their opinion or point of view is if I give somebody else my opinion first. I don’t know if they get uncomfortable with their own answers because mine is different, or if they aren’t educated enough in the topic we discuss. One of the phrases that doesn’t really make sense and defeats the whole purpose of somebody’s opinion is “I guess what I’m trying to say is…” Well, if your guessing at what your trying to say, how will I know what your talking about.
We should try to stay away from doubting what we say. This also applies to what we write. Some examples that Mr. McGuire used was when people write “In my opinion” or “What I think is…” I never really thought that this showed doubt in what you write, but I can see it now. I can see how saying something like that can weaken a point. Also, with the examples we went over in class concerning sentence structure, I never paid attention to how wording can change the meaning of what somebody is trying to say.Mali. Taylor. “Totally like whatever, you know?.” What Learning Leaves. Newtown, CT: Hanover Press, 2002. Print. Viewed on Powerpoint.
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Klem Bachleda
Service Project: 5a
Activism; the whole theme in this semesters COM 102 class. Taking action to help others in need or less fortunate is important. Wether it’s helping pass out food at a soup kitchen or packaging food and clothing to send to other parts of the country, it is important. In the begining of the semester, we were more of a volunteer rather than activists. Proffesor McGuire set up dates and collaborated with different organizations to get the class participating in helping those in need. Now the time has come to shift gears and take control of helping others. We shift from volunteers to activists and plan where we want to go and who we want to help.
The project started out, like every project, with picking members of the group. I was late getting to class from a service I ws doing at the time and I see everybody paired and sitting across from each other. I couldn’t figure out what was going on until the process was explained to me. The process was a little different than in previous years. This time, we picked our partners based on a set of questions and answers in the form of speed dating. Now, of course, whith my sarcastic character, I started out saying “I like long walks on the beach and vanilla ice cream. Not so much strawberry; it’s too sweet.” That broke the ice pretty well . The answers allowed the students to find out their classmates strentghs and weakenesses.
Once the members where chosen, it got alot harder to get anything coordinated and done. The main reason it was difficult was because our schedules did not match up. Whether it be school, work, or events other than that, we could not get a time set up where we can all choose a day and attend an event and help out. Trying to contact an organization that would cater to our schedules was also hard. When I tried to call one of the organizations, they were booked until the end of May. There was no time slots available. I was really surprised that so many people took time out of their day to help volunteer. I originally thought that getting this project done would be a breeze; call an organization, tell them I’m from MVCC doing a project with three of my group members and would like to volunteer. The answer I was expecting was “Oh, we greatly appreciate all the help we can get. We would love for you and your group to come in any time we are open and help out.” But instead, from one organization was “The next available time we have will be towards the end of May.” And my hopes went down just a little. The next organization we looked into had an online calendar. It showed different events for different days, but when clicking on the link to sign up, all time slots were booked until about June. “Holy Sh*t! I can’t beleive that there are so many people volunteering.”
A couple days later, we meet with Professor McGuire. We go over a couple of organizations and decide to contact Orland Township Food Pantry. I end up calling them on a Thursday morning, and am told that Mondays and Wedn’esdays are all booked, Tuesdays and Thurdays they have a couple time slots open, and Friday, they need volunteers. Problem. The thought of failing this project run through my head. Why? Well, “Monday and Wednesdays there is no change to volunteer. Tuesdays and Thursdays I have class. Friday? Yes, available, but not until next week, and the paper is due Tuesday.” I can see yet another slip on the splatter website, and my heart sinks just ever so slightly. I think of the options to quickly try to contact other organizations and volunteer for them, but then it wouldn’t be considered a group project if we already decided on this organization and I veer off to utilize another.
I email the professor and my classmates. No response back. I get to class and speak with my group and give them the bad?, maybe, news. We talk about it and complain, and it gets us nowhere. We try to come up with a plan, but with all of us having different schedules, we are all on our own, that is, until it’s time for our final product. We plan on setting up two visits, one physically helping out and the other a question and answer session. Now, at this point, “That is all.” I plan on attending and volunteering this upcoming Friday, and have no choice as to attending any earlier, but as life always has it, there are hurdles and obstacles and everybody has to go through them. Consistency and perseverance; keep going until the job is done.
While attending the Orland Township Food Pantry, I noticed that it was located at the Orland Township Town Hall. I originally thought food pantries would be part of a church or a stand alone organization. But I was wrong. I got inside and the senior volunteer, John, introduced himself warmly and had me start working right away. He showed me how to bag canned foods, eight cans to a bag, which they would distribute as part of their family grocery list for the less fortunate. While bagging the canned foods, I started to ask him questions, which he answered easily. Not only has he been volunteering at the food pantry for little under five years, but he’s knowledgeable about the facts of how much food comes in and how many families they help. John told me that over 10 pallets of food come in every two weeks. At 2000 pounds per palette, that’s well over 20,000 pounds of food. Amazing. He also told me the food pantry helps feed about 350 families, 970 individuals, and a little over 100 pets. Yes, they have a pet food pantry also.
After getting a little more acquainted with John, he told me how he first started. He retired a while back and since the economy got bad, his daughter and her children moved in with John. He had rooms built in his basement to accommodate his Daughter and grand kids and helped raise them. John and his wife attended a “Grandparents raising grandchildren” event and the offer for him to volunteer came up. At first, John rejected the idea, but his wife later talked him into it saying “How bad can it be.” Well, John volunteered once, and has been volunteering ever since. He now volunteers two to three times a week at the food pantry with his brother in law, Jim, and his son in law.
After I packed fifty one bags of canned food, I went into the actual pantry where the food was shelved. John says that the Orland Food Pantry is not that big, but there’s just about the same amount of food there as at a smaller ‘Quickie-Mart’. I was impressed that there was so much food. Even though the room wasn’t that big, the utilized the space by stacking up onto racks. Everything was organized on the shelves and there was a “Method to the Madness” when it came to organization of the foods. John explained to me how the whole process of packing food works. “In bag number one you put …” Then in bag two goes…” John memorized exactly how many items of what food go into each bag. I was impressed.
The whole time I was there, I couldn’t help but notice how energetic and happy John was volunteering. It made him happy to help others. Isn’t that rare. He even told me that when the pantry was short on rice, he went out and bought some to give to the less fortunate. There were even random people coming in and dropping off food for the pantry. It wasn’t just a box of cereal or two ramen noodles soups, it was bags upon bags of groceries. I was amazed at the amount of food there was and how people cared to help the less fortunate.
Overall, impressed doesn’t even come close to how I felt when volunteering my time at the Orland Township Food Pantry. Just the idea of individuals helping get food out to those who need it made me realize how lucky I am to have all I need, but to know that there are people that care for people they don’t know also moves me. Also, the positive and energetic attitudes of everybody involved makes the experience that much better.
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Klem Bachleda
RJE 11: While reading “Raptura: Acknowledging the Lost Subjects of the Service Learning Story” by Carrick, Himley and Jacobi, I’ve realized that more assumptions are made than I thought. Just based on my own experience, assumptions are based more on a personal reaction than empirical observations of what we see. We, as humans, tend to create stories when we see certain people in different situations or places. I don’t know if we create these stories based on our past or because we see a certain ethnic population or culture portrayed a certain way in movies and stories. Or is it because we want our live to feel superior to the person we are judging? When paying close attention to the different stories that are written or passed along, we can see that personal reactions sway the meaning or image of the story. In our class lecture, we differentiated between empirical observation and personal reaction, and I can see the direct relation to a section of the story I read titled above. One of the questions that were asked to the students was why they hug children or show affection towards them when volunteering. The students began to answer that the children didn’t get enough affection at home, they didn’t get attention. That shows personal reaction. The students assume the children don’t get the affection they need, but don’t know that for a fact.
Another example of personal reaction that relates to the reading is when Margery Wolf wanted to write about her experience while living in Taiwan. She went back and read over the notes she took when she was in Taiwan and states that the way she had written it was different than what she remembered. This shows how personal reaction can change the history or outcome of a story or an experience. A perfect example is when stories are passed by word of mouth. If one story starts out “Ben stood by a red building” it might end up as “Ben, an englishmen, stood by a huge wooden barn, on the countryside, in an open field on a summer day.” And why is that? I think because as we think of Ben, it’s a common english name, and a red building, we associate with a barn, and barns are usually pretty big located in an open field. Most of the images portrayed on TV show a barn on a bright day, never a stormy night. This just shows how personal reactions can change an actual event. -
Klem Bachleda
Invisible Children; what an incredible organization. Attending the Invisible Children display and watching the video really made me think about how disadvantaged these people are. Im glad to see we in the US do not have problems as horrible as the issue with Kony, but it’s sad that these global issues exist. It’s hard to imagine that a single individual had an idea as serious as trying to stop a rebel with thousands of children obeying him and killing mass number of people. Hats off to the founder of invisible Children for taking action and proceeding with this cause for over nine years. If you think about how many people are in this world and how many organizations there are that help others in need from different countries, it can be compared to the amount of rain in a desert. If more people would take action, we can possibly find Kony and stop his destruction. Im glad to see that young people are taking action and standing up for a cause, but how consistent will these individuals be? Will they stay and fight for the cause for a while? Or is it just a fad?
I’m just glad I got to see what is happening in other countries, and even if I don’t participate in the cause (not saying I won’t), I can appreciate the luxuries and freedom from fear and dictatorship we have.Invisible Children. 2012, April 2012. KONY 2012.
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Klem Bachleda
RR9 – While participating in the service of Sunrise, i’ve noticed a couple things that i didn’t think I would encounter while speaking to somebody, especially about history. We’ve all seen videos or documentaries of individuals being interviewed and asked about their experience concerning certain events, but to sit down and actually see the emotions put into recalling the events a person lived through, is moving. We spoke to Florence, a principle in her working years, and the stories she told us were, well, real. While reading history books and articles, we read it without emotion or without meaning. The thought process is similar to “Why do I have to read this?” then “How many pages are there?” followed by “How many pages do I have left to read?” leading to “What did I just read?” ending with “I hope the teacher don’t ask me any questions about this” or “I hope this is not on the test.” But while sitting and listening to what a person experienced in their lifetime went like this: “I wonder what conspiracies they know about?” to “How do I start this off?” quickly followed by “What questions do I ask?” or “What if we run out of things to talk about?” and about ten minutes into the conversation, questions just start coming out of nowhere, you listen attentively and want to find out more, but time runs out. Opportunities like this don’t come by very often, and if they do, we just pass them up. Time will never stop and people along with their memories will eventually pass, unless we capture it ahead of time. I would strongly recommend people take this route in doing any community service.
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Prof McGuire
Klem, thanks so much for your comments, but remember the RJE assignments need to use and cite a source with MLA. Thanks.
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Klem Bachleda
History; moments of the past, memories of what was
History; Moments of the past, memories of what was, and yet, only two ways to learn about it. One, being the more approached and easily available, yet viable to being skewed by miscommunications or biased reactions, is picking up a text book and reading about it. The other, requiring more work and time, and the effort to find out how history actually played out, is through the eyes of individuals living in those time periods. Now, of course we can’t get information from people during the Civil War, but events during the Great Depression and forward can be obtained. Luckily, we had an opportunity to speak to an individual that lived through a number of historical events.
We visited and community of elderly individuals called Sunrise Assisted Living here in Palos Park, IL and had the opportunity to speak to an individual concerning history in their lifetime. We were lucky enough to sit down with Florence, a principle that lead two schools and was head of libraries at seven different institutions. We spoke to Florence over a period of two days, and the information we received of what life was like for one person, was interesting.
Florence is the youngest girl in a family of eleven siblings. She grew up in a southern suburb of Chicago, and attended West Pullman School. She was always interested in sports and activities with the boys since she was primarily raised with her older brothers. She liked all types of sports, fan of the White Sox, and would rather tackle a guy than dance ballet. While she was in 5th grade, she met Ronald, who she didn’t know would become her husband later on in life.
While young, she attended events like fairs, sports games and traveled to the city by train car. She remembered taking her younger brother to a fair in the city. She wanted to go on a ride, but her brother was too afraid, so she told him to stay seated on the bench while she went on the ride. When she got off, he was nowhere to be found. She searched and searched, but no luck. Florence remembers calling her mother and saying she lost something important, her brother. Florence’s’ mother, to her surprise, was calm and not frightened. She calmly asked, “What do you mean?” Florence explained to her mother what happened, and after Florence calmed down, her mother advised her not to worry, and her brother was at home. What Florence didn’t know is that her cousin was at the fair and took her brother home.
Another interesting fact is that Florence has been to forty eight states. She traveled to Alaska twice, and even flew to Tanzania to teach kids. She only stayed there for two weeks, but even an experience like that, to help kids in other countries, is monumental. She later became a principal of a school with only four rooms, but soon enough, became the principal of another school, and simultaneously ran both the schools. She also was the head of seven libraries at different institutions.
While speaking to Florence, she states that events such as World War I and II didn’t have much of a visible impact on the everyday lives of people in Chicago. She didn’t travel to the city very often, and was young at the time of WWI. Other events like the Valentine’s Day massacre and Al Capone’s hand on the city did not affect her life either. When asked about the JFK assassination, she states she doesn’t remember it all that well because she was only interested in school, not politics. We also wanted to find out if the Cuban Missile crisis had any effect on her life, but there was none. Florence primarily stayed in the suburbs her whole life, and if there was an event that happened in the city, it didn’t matter much as long as it didn’t impact her schools.
While speaking to Florence, I’ve noticed one thing is true, one thing that Hollywood did get right in their films, is that Florence, while telling us about her life, what she did, where she visited, quite often, looked out the window, took time to sequence her words, and spoke with a subtle voice. What she was telling us through her stories, she was reliving. Going back deep into her memories, her childhood, her teenage years, her travels; she recalled it all.
After the visits with Florence, we had a chance to quickly ask our classmates about their experience speaking to individuals at Sunrise Assisted Living, and all were positive. One classmates stated their speaker was a bomber in World War II, other had marines with exciting stories. And yet, not one negative thing was said about their experience at Sunrise.
Reading over the notes we took while speaking with Florence, I can see how different a story can be from the eye of a beholder as opposed to a journalist. Individual events cannot be captured with such emotions by reading a book, or watching a movie; it can only be captured by reading the body language of the story teller, the way the words are spoken, the subtle voice, the long pauses. We cannot capture the emotion unless we actually hear the story of the individuals history, the moments of the past, their memories of what was.
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Klem Bachleda
RWJ 8:
This past week, I had to write a paper on the delegates of the Constitutional Convention and how a certain delegate impacted the United States today. This paper made me think about the video “Yes We Can.” In the video, President Obama is giving a positive speech with the message “Yes We Can.” This mindset was present back over 235 years ago when the founding fathers came together over a period of a couple months. They worked on creating a new set of laws with the positive attitude of creating a nation. That action is a perfect example of the theme of the video we watched because it shows the determination and outcome of something that can happen if we try to work at it. That message is true today as it was back then, maybe on a smaller scale compared to actually “creating” a government, but nonetheless, the message carries the same meaning. It just seems that in today’s world, people are getting a little too lazy because everything they need, or want, is at arms reach. People don’t want to exceed expectation, just live day to day. If we got the message out there more often, the phrase “Yes We Can” would have a more positive affect.Wil.i.am. Yes We Can.Youtube. Youtube. 2008. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.
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Prof McGuire
citation?
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Klem Bachleda
My journal this week will focus on an excerpt from Why White Rice titled “Models, Templates, And Creativity, Oh My!” by Tom Dow. While reading the excerpt, I have found that what he says is true. The fact that a lot students that come into college straight out of high school do not know that the boundaries have significantly increased. We can write more freely about our opinion to a certain matter.
From what I can see in certain papers written by fellow students, there is alot of background information and facts, but not much of a strong opinion. Maybe it is the fact that the younger students didn’t expand their boundaries or don’t know how to form a strong opinion, but with time, as Tom Dow states in the excerpt, “By time, I mean maturity” (pg 148), better papers and stronger opinions will form. The view and opinions on certain subjects will increase and strengthen. But until then, the building blocks, or “Templates” (Dow, “Models, Templates, And Creativity, Oh My!”) referred to will help expand the minds and views of not only the younger crowd, but others that have not had the opportunities to form and opinion.Dow, Tom. “Models, Templates, And Creativity, Oh My!” Why White Rice. Michael S. McGuire. Dubuque: Kendall Hunt, 2010. 148-149. Print.
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Klem Bachleda
About $15,600,000,000,000 dollars worth of American debt, and only $1.09 trillion dollars in circulation in the U.S. today; How did that happen? Is it mathematically possible to pay of our nations’ debt?
Not many people realize what kind of debt the United States is in. Out of those individuals that do know, many of them don’t know how we got into that debt. We were on track to being debt free under the Clinton Administration, then Bush came in and cut taxes for the rich and waged war against Afghanistan.
Until today, Obama has not reversed Bush’s Tax Cut Policy as promised and we are still at war. This, along with many other factors, has caused our national debt.
We have to be more aware of our national debt and deficit created because it affects all individuals. The more in debt we go, the higher prices and taxes will get. Now we can’t eliminate or lower taxes, but we can help out and voice our opinions and take actions through different organizations like http://www.defeatourdebt.com or http://www.wecantpaythattab.org.
Another approach we can take towards voicing our concern would be to write letters to our local and state legislature. We can also establish and lead an event like a writing committee to get a mass number of people to write letters.
Let’s take action. We are only doing this for the future of our Children.-
Nick Kleopa
Hey Klem, I am definitely glad someone wrote about this issue. I think you are rite on target with your sentence saying that the bush administration cut taxes for the rich and the war in Afghanistan. My whole thinking is the more you make, the more taxes you should pay, is someone can’t live off of 3-500k a year and complains that their taxes are too much, they have a thing or two to learn about life. They and they have serious problems with the way they think. In my opinion, the war in Afghanistan was needed but I feel we used far too much money and too many resources to fund the war. From a soldiers stand point that I heard on the news, their is no reason for the soldiers to be eating steak and lobster when their body armor is in need of a serious upgrade. Priorities, priorities. That and I know it is extremely nice to help out other countries, it really is but when we give supplies and resources to other countries that we couldn’t come up with in the first place, the money that we are initially handing out or paying for these resources is money that we don’t have. We shouldn’t give out money we don’t have and I think that is one of the main problems with the way the Us does business. I honestly think that the us has dug a whole so deep that I doubt we will be able to come back and pick ourselves up out of it. I once read, it might have even been in a previous piece by you, that every person in the us needs to pay 50k for this country to get out of debt. That example gives people a better understand of how deep we really are. Another thing as bad as it sounds is paying for people to live in house, extensions of unemployment, housing,medical etc… I know this really helps out a lot of people but that is also taking up a lot of money and resources to fund things like that. Back to your paper, I couldn’t agree more what you say about the Clinton administration, once bush took office things took a tumble. As far as Obama is concerned, I don’t think he is a bad person or corrupt individual, I just think he makes a lot of poor decisions and was basically handed all the bad stuff by Bush when he left office. In conclusion, I liked your letter and was happy that someone wrote about this topic. I was also happy that we can agree on almost all the areas discussed in your paper. All in all great letter to the editor and keep up the good work. I look forward to reading your next letter/essay in the future.
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Nick Kleopa
Klem, I also wanted to add something that I feel extremely strong about as far as debt and where the country is going. I think that one of the main reasons we are in this deep is because of political corruption. I know for a fact that many of these politicians are making millions and billions of dollars and leaving the poor to suffer. For instance, take gas prices for example, we pay $4.50 cents while the gas companies are making an absolute killing off of us. That and the fact that everything has gone up substantially in the past couple of years. Ps. Its good to see that someone is interested in a topic that has to do with government.
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Killian Noonan
Klem, you did a great topic. Firstly, I don’t pretend to know exactly what the whole situation is with our financial crisis in this country. You ask some really key questions here that really made a strong focal point in your argument. However, I must say there are some things you could have just elaborated on just a bit. One thing is if you could have just given a brief explanation of Bush’s Tax Cut Policy. Like I stated earlier, some individuals me including, do not have the correct knowledge as to what some of this administrations are doing. So if you touched up on that it would have furthered your letter. Also the websites you linked in were very interesting. Which as a reader, is something that is a huge plus. Seeing as I am an audience that knows very little of the national debt crisis, to see places where I can find out more is great. I would like to know more of our nations debt crisis. However, we have global debt crisis in many countries around the world. It would have been extremely courageous of you to touch up on that subject. However, for the paper and letter you did, it is a tremendous job. You handled it very well. Which when people see a topic like this, they like to avoid it because it is so easy to get lost and confused. To put it simply it is a giant mess. What I also noticed, is how you included a small statement bout the war in the Middle East continuing to go. I’m not a 100% right of the statistic, but I heard at the height of the military operation in Iraq we were peddling out a billion dollars a week. Don’t quote me on it, but it was an obscene amount. This was a hard technical topic to write about, but like I said you handled it well. Just as I stated earlier tiny things could have been elaborated on. Great job mo chara.
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Killian Noonan
Sorry Klem, I am writing to further add on to my peer review. Unfortunately, I have been slipping due to mine begin under five hundred words. I guess it is a curse of being able to just tell it like it is and not to beat around the bush! There is really not else more I can say in review of your paper. I have always enjoyed your writing. Most people do not see themselves as writers. I for one, think I am far off from a good writer. However, you writing works always interest me. You pick such unorthodox topics which really interests me. Even though we have not met in person, what I gauge from your work and commentary, you are an intelligent person and very good speaker. I could be wrong, however, this is just what I speculate. I always appreciate any feedback you give me, likewise everyone else. I am lucky to have such a high calibre group. I’ve read other people posts on Splatter who are not in our group and I wont name names, but it is sad. We are blessed to have been paired up. I want to be with good writers to become a better one! Slan go foill
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Klem Bachleda
One thing that I found interesting, while opening up yahoo.com to check my emails, there was an article about the Banker in California that supposedly left a $1.33 tip, 1%, of a $133.00 bill. On it, was circled the word “TIP” with an arrow pointing to “Get a real Job” written on the receipt. It was originally believed that somebody would write something like this, especially a banker that could lose his job over a stint like this. It was revealed later on that this was all a hoax. The original receipt was altered electronically and posted on a blog. This was done by the person having lunch with the Banker. From what is written in the article, it has started an uprising of the 99% (middle and lower class population) against the 1% (millionaires). First of all, while this action is unethical, it might help out the 99% because it shows how stingy the 1% can be at times. It forces people to open up their eyes. Second, as it relates to class, it only takes one person to start a revolution. How far this will get anybody, I don’t know, but to get media attention is a good start. Citation Knowles, Melissa. “Banker’s Insulting Waitress Tip Incites Class Warfare Between The 1% And The 99%.” Trending Now. Yahoo.com, 27 Feb. 2012. Web. 29 Feb. 2012.
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Klem Bachleda
For The next Journal entry, I thought I would write about the new things I learned with our nations debt. For one, I did not know exactly how we got into debt. At first, I though it was more because of the war and us importing goods, but now taking a look deeper into the problem, I see that some of the plans or stimulus’ that were passed by congress really got us into a hole. It’s also noticble how we are getting into debt by providing more of a luxury for people.
Another interesting thing is that matheatically, we cannot pay of the debt we owe. We owe $over 15 trillion (http://crfb.org/stabilizethedebt/). On average, the national debt increases about $4.0 billion per day. There is only $1.9 trillion dollars in circulation in the US (http://useconomy.about.com/od/fiscalpolicy/p/US_Debt_Deficit.htm). Even if every citizen of the US wanted to pay with their own money, we physically can’t.
On the other hand, theoretically, we can. We have to provide more products and services for export to make the funds. Just increasing taxes wont help. We could back out of the war in Afghanistan, but who wants to do that; life would be too boring if we weren’t involved in bullying other countries.Amadeo, Kimberly. “How The U.S. Federal Debt And Deficit Differ And How They Affect Each Other.” US Economy. About.com, 2 Jan. 2012. Web. 21 Feb. 2012.
“Stabilize The Debt.” The Committee For A Responsible Federal Budget. 2010. Web. 21 Feb. 2012. http://crfb.org/stabilizethedebt/
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Klem Bachleda
Nation’s Debt   Debt vs Deficit Why are…
Nation’s Debt
- Debt vs Deficit
- Why are we in debt?
- How it affects citizens
- Mortgage rates increase
- Directly related to Federal Reserve
- Mortgage rates increase
- Taxes increase
- Product prices increase
- Corporate taxes increase
- Stock value decreases
- Greater risk, less funding
Amount of national Debt
- As of today: $15,426,752,385,910 in debt
- Increases at average rate $3.99 billion per day
- In 2000, debt was $5.6 trillion
Breakdown:
Income taxes increase > people retain less money > corporate taxes increase > product prices increase > demand decreases > less money in circulation > corporations default/ bankrupt > no funding for government > collapse of US government and economy….. Not such a bright future, is it?
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Klem Bachleda
Debt; Unbelievably Disgusting
Debt. Doesn’t it make you cringe to hear that word? It has a negative connotation. Even the word death isn’t as bad as debt. Hell, with death, the person that dies doesn’t leave a negative feeling for long, but debt, it lingers everywhere and you just can’t get rid of it; well, at least for the average American. Ever since the establishment of the colonies and the start of the American Revolution, we, the U.S., have begun to accumulate debt and every time we came into a surplus, the next president and his office dug another hole for the economy to try to crawl out of. That debt is evidently passed to us taxpayers in the form of, of course, taxes. Taxes increase because that is the main form of income the government has, and still, cannot control our nation’s debt; and I cringe.
Our debt started off from borrowing money during the American Revolution from France. We borrowed money to produce goods and weapons to fight England for our freedom. It wasn’t a large problem until Woodrow Wilson started borrowing money from everybody to finance World War I¹. Our national debt was used primarily to fund wars until Franklin Roosevelt came into office. Until today, we have increased our national debt and is increasing at an alarming rate of on average $4,000,000,000 per day². If we wanted to get rid of the U.S. National Debt, based upon the population, each individual would have to pay just over $49,000 dollars.
What got us into this national debt? One of the events that played a huge role in the past ten years was the Bush Tax Cuts³. That put us an additional three trillion dollars into debt. Bush allowed the larger corporations and higher paid individuals to slide on taxes which caused the us a lack of funds. Another factor is the war in Afghanistan which threw the U.S. $1,400,000,000,000 into debt. The U.S. was on track to pay off the national debt by 2011 under the Clinton Administration, but the Bush and Obama policies tossed us back into the never ending hole we just keep digging out underneath ourselves.
Even Obama tried to help the middle class by reducing taxes, it hurt us more than it helped. Some of the debt we accrued is what we can call positive or beneficial debt, such as spending more on education and Medicare or Medicaid.
Under the Clinton administration, a budget plan was established to reduce the nations deficit and turn it into a surplus. This doesn’t mean that we were going to pay off our national debt over night, what this meant is that the Clinton administration created plans that allowed the US government to make more money than it spends in a fiscal year. The Clinton administration created more jobs, average income increased by $6,000 per family. There were less people living in poverty than there is now. We were en route to pay off this debt by 2012, but like a mentioned before, another presidential election passed, a new president was elected, and a bad name was left in terms of fiscal policies and procedures.
Today, the national debt is constantly increasing, and pinpointing the exact amount is very difficult. But at the time of writing this paper, February 20, 2011 at 11:01 pm, the U.S. national debt is about $15,430,192,801,317⁴. This number has doubled since the 2000 national debt. At this rate, we will never pay off our debt.
Solving this issue of a national debt is very complicated. The U.S. Government cannot decrease the financial aid towards one direct cause or area without affecting another. For example, one way that we can decrease our national debt is by increasing retirement age. That would cause a lot of problems amongst the elderly citizens, or baby boomers. Another example is we can reduce farm subsidies⁵. The issue we run into with this is that less food is produced by our farmers, which leads to less exports o farm produce and more money spent on importing food. The last example is increasing tax on gas. That will lead to less people driving, causing less automotive sales and a decrease car production causing a higher rate of unemployment. As stated before, trying to create a plan to decrease our national debt by changing where our funding goes is very complicated.
Currently, Obama wants to pass a stimulus to “delay action to reduce the national debt in favor of fresh spending on Democratic priorities aimed at rebuilding the American middle class.⁶” The reason behind this is that Obama wants to address and “fix the nation’s crumbling infrastructure.⁶” One problem I see with this is that Obama is requesting $3.8 trillion budget towards this stimulus. How can we redirect these kinds of funds towards a stimulus like this from another fund if we can’t find a way to take that amount of money to pay off a portion of our debt? With every positive action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Reminds me of Newton’s Law of Physics; equal and opposite reaction.
A plan that Obama wants to pass, that I do agree with, is known as the “Buffett Rule.” This rule was originally brought up by the famous investor Warren Buffett that states the rich should be paying higher taxes since they have the funds. I completely agree with this plan for a couple of reasons. First, it will only affect about 1% of the American population⁷. Second, It won’t affect the middle and lower class. Third, we don’t have to cut funds from area like Social Security or Medicare.
Another good strategy to take into consideration and reviewing and analyzing what the Clinton Administration did that made the economy better. Why did it work? What did we, as a nation, give up back then that would create a surplus? What we should do is hire somebody like Bill Clinton and some of his former cabinet to restructure our economic budgets.
What we should start off with is taking a look at where our debt actually came from. On the website, http://www.whitehouse.gov, there is a link that shows a graph explaining where our debt came from within the past decade. This is interesting because it shows that most of the plans that were approved only set us further back with debt. The prescription plan aid for senior citizens and the tax cuts set us back quite a bit. Another large expense is the war in Afghanistan. If we can reduce the number of troops overseas to 30,000 by 2013, we save about $1.03 trillion dollars. There is a website I found, another website I found, http://crfb.org/stabilizethedebt/, where it explains what kind of cuts we can make financially and what outcome it will have on our national debt. It also shows the outcome of changes other than financial, like changing the age of retirement, or reducing the number of troops in Afghanistan before a certain time period. Now each of these changes can be negative towards the citizens even though it is a positive change towards our debt crisis. Another way we can learn about what is planned to reduce this debt is to watch the presidential debate and speeches on TV. Even though we have been fooled into believing what nominated persons might promise to reduce debt, we should still try to analyze the lesser of the two evils. (yes, I just said that).
There is not much we as individuals can do to change the minds of the cabinet, but one thing that can affect the outcome as a whole is to vote. Some people don’t vote at all, and other vote blindly. We should try to pay attention more to these presidential debates and take them seriously. Even though we know the nation won’t be perfect overnight, we can try to alter the outcome as a nation, not as individuals. Another process we might want to consider, is writing letter or petitions with signatures to congress. Even though this is a long shot, it won’t hurt to try. Every movement starts with an individuals ideas or beliefs, and as long as somebody starts a spark, the fire will grow.
One thing I have found quite interesting is that we are a a bit more trouble with the national debt than people may realize. What people don’t understand or can’t comprehend is that the debt increases our taxes. Now increase in taxes is fine. Nobody likes it and I am against increasing taxes, but for the sake of making my point, I will say I’m ok with tax increase. Now say that every individual had the intention to pay congress the$40,000. That would be a great patriotic movement and show how strong we are as a nation, but there is only one major problem. According to the Federal Reserve, there is only $1.09 trillion dollars physically in circulation in the US. Our debt as a nation is $14 trillion. How do we pay it off? Well, mathematically, we can’t. It’s not possible. Did your jaw drop? Are you trying to figure out how we can get out of this? Are we as a nation doomed? Well, don’t fret; theoretically, we can pay it off, over a long period of time. All we have to do is export more product and decrease imports. But then that poses a problem globally. We have to find equilibrium in trade and offering services and goods to where our income surpasses our expenses. Until we do that, congress and the President won’t come to an easy agreement over financial cuts.
http://useconomy.about.com/od/fiscalpolicy/p/US_Debt_Deficit.htm
Amadeo, Kimberly. “How the U.S. Federal Debt and Deficit Differ and How They Affect Each Other.” About.com US Economy. The New York Times Company, 2 Jan. 2012. Web. 21 Feb. 2012.
⁵http://crfb.org/stabilizethedebt/
United States. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. US Treasury. Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. Web. 21 Feb. 2012
³http://www.whitehouse.gov/infographics/us-national-debt
“Infographic: U.S. National Debt.” The White House. WhiteHouse.gov, 26 June 2011. Web. 21 Feb. 2012
¹ http://rdwolff.com/content/when-did-large-scale-debt-begin-united-states
²,⁴http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
Hall, Ed. “U.S. National Debt Clock.” Ed Hall’s Home Page. 16 Feb. 2012. US department of treasury. 21 Feb. 2012
Montgomery, Lori. “Obama Budget: National Debt Will Be $1 Trillion Higher in a Decade than Forecast.” Editorial. Washingtin Post [The Washington Post]. Washington Post. The Washington Post, 14 Feb. 2012. Web. 21 Feb. 2012.
⁷http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html
Domhoff, William. “Who Rules America: Wealth, Income, and Power.” UC Santa Cruz. Nov. 2011. University of Santa Cruz. 21 Feb. 2012
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/07/26/infographic-where-does-our-national-debt-come
Phillips, Macon. “The White House Blog.” INFOGRAPHIC: Where Does our National Debt Come From? 26 June 2011. Thewhitehouse.gov. 21 Feb. 2012
http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/19/news/economy/obama_debt_plan/index.htm
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) – “Obama debt plan: President unveils $3 trillion in cuts.” CNNMoney. 19 Sept. 2011. Cable News Network. 21 Feb. 2012
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Nick Kleopa
1st and foremost, I am truly happy that you are aware of where this country is going. When I talk to most people they have no clue or just don’t care what is happening with our economy. To read your essay made me feel like this country can be brought back. I really liked the facts and statistics you posted in the form of people and money. It helped me paint a picture which in turn helped me understand what is going where and who is paying what. As far as the taxes are concerned, as much as I hate taxes I feel that raising them has to be done to help our economy. But in turn the money taken from the taxes has to be used for something that will help us not only now but in the future aswell. I also wouldn’t mind a plan to raise taxes up for the people who make gobs of money in this country. To me raising their taxes by a couple %’s would make or break that person. They would end up living just fine. In my mind if someone can’t live a perfect life making over 100k clean a year than that person has mental issues. Rewind to the 1st paragraph where you said that we can get out of debt but every american has to give up 49k, I thought that was really intersting. As far as the stimulus plan, I stand with you on that. People can’t spend money that they don’t have. Putting stuff on credit cards and such are just making things worse for people. As far as the goverment is concerned, I think that when they draft something on paper it sounds good but they don’t think things through and when an acts passes etc.. Were in deeper than we were before it was introduced. As for the paragraph 9, I think that cutting social security and medicare, medi…. is a huge mistake and is only trying to cut corners. This will in turn leave alot of people with a lot more poblems. I don’t think messing with those area’s will be good at all. Going to your final paragraph, I do feel that more people should try and better understand where this country stands as far as the economy and debt. They should be more involved at least knowing what is going on in their own countries. If they don’t care now, they will when things really start falling. All in all you essay was excellent. I think that everything states was placed in good order. Everything flowed well and made sence. Like I said I really enjoyed reading the $$ facts and statistics with the examples you listed because that helps me learn the most. Raw numbers. So good paper and keep up the good work.
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Kevin Jaderberg
I feel that you chose a very unconventional topic to write about. While it’s certainly a major issue we face as Americans, it’s a surprise to see it discussed in this setting. It seems like a mature choice for a topic.
While I am aware of our current debt crisis, I must admit I have no idea what the best solution is. I like that you addressed many of our current options as well as previous successful policies like those established under the Clinton administration. I also agree with both you and Warren Buffet on raising the taxes on the richest percentage of Americans. I feel like it just goes without saying. Those with a surplus of money should really pay their fair share. Poor people can’t afford to pay higher taxes. Raising the taxes on those who can afford it just seems like a no-brainer.
The economy and our current unemployment crisis are certainly going to be the driving force behind our votes this November, as well they should be. America as well as the rest of the world is under unprecedented financial stress. I think you picked a very topical yet difficult topic to tackle. The numbers alone are just incomprehensible. It’s enough to scare people away from politics but you’re right when you say that we can make a difference. Every vote most certainly does count.
2011 has been described as the Year of Protest. I think aside from the obvious examples i.e. Occupy Wall Street and the Arab Spring, there were several examples of people organizing together and creating a real democratic impact. The halting of SOPA and PIPA was a result of an overwhelming negative reaction on the part of we, the constituents. The fact that those two bills lost support really gives me hope. It shows that if enough people focus their efforts on the same goal, democratic change is possible.
I agree that taxes are sort of a necessary evil. I understand that people don’t like paying them, why would you? But our government needs funding. If you cut the government off from its number one source of income, what’s to keep our nation from falling into ruin?
War is the largest money pit America has been sitting on. We currently owe money on not one, but two pointless wars. Now, I was already avidly anti-war; I personally think it’s wrong to shoot people, but add to that the fact that both of these campaigns are driving us further and further into an already deep trench of debt. It’s inexcusable. If Ron Paul weren’t crazy in every other sense, he would have my vote simply because he’s completely against our current and potential involvement in the Middle East.
Your paper presents a lot of daunting statistics and asks some very important questions. Kudos to you for picking such an esoteric issue. Your approach was dynamic in that you looked at possible future solutions as well as ideas that have worked in the past.
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Kevin Flores
First off Im going to say that these statistics are really shocking. Its unbeleivable that we are in debt this much and how much money we literally waste being in Afganastan. I think you chose a very important topic because alot of people know we are in debt but they may not realise how much. But I think this is a problem that as individuals we really cannot do too much about it besides whatching closely to the people we vote for, for president. But even then alot of people know that politicans lie and even if they do say something that can bring down your nations debt how can we be able to trust him or her because correct me if im wrong but dont alot of politicans say that they will lower taxes, and help decrease our debt, ect.
I honestly donot think there is a solution right away for this topic but I feel that if there is an honest politican who can find ways to decrease our debts that we can eventually but it will take sometime.
I really liked your paper, it had a good flow throughout and I liked how you brought up alot of reasons why we are in debt because alot of people dont know the reasons why we own so much money to other contries. I liked how you gave the example that every person would have to give about 49,000 so that we can get out of debt. This really gives the reader an image of just about how much we are in debt. I also liked how you explained how bush got us in debt because I know from experience that alot of people just like to blame all of our debts on Bush but dont even know why. I really liked how you brought up the buffett rule. Because alot of people (my self included) never knew that there was a name for the rich should pay more taxes. I really agree with this 100% because there are families that both adults make a ridiculus amount of money and live super nice and they are paying the same amount of money as a family that doesnt make alot of money and are hardworking and go through struggles to get by and put their children through school. I feel that they should make people who make alot of money pay more taxes and give people who are hard workers a tax break.
I really feel that your topic is a good one because it really draws the reader when you bring up the buffett rule well it got me into it. This is a good paper and I really didnt find anything wrong with it and its obviously a topic that everyone should be conserned with this issue because if we continue to play it off it will come back and put us in a way worse situation than we are in now. -
Killian Noonan
First off I want to compliment you Klem on a great job you did on this paper. It’s interesting because there was a lot of detail in the paper. What else was really striking, is that you included core background information. Even things up to the Revolutionary War! First off I try not making sense of the American economy, nor do I like to divulge into wrapping my head around our nations debt at the current time. Another thing I noticed was captivating facts and statistics in the paper. Which help your issue greatly as it is indeed hard to argue the facts. What is so compelling about a topic like this, is because this greatly affects us. This is the business market and working world we are going into. From what I’ve read it does not look like we are headed in the right direction. My only experience with the nations debt and the collapse of the economy is the housing industry. My family are all contractors and they all got hit very badly with the recession. My only quarrel with your paper is you did not really include anything like that. That in itself is interesting in regards to the banks with mortgages on homes. What else is really interesting is we are not the only country in the world whose economy collapsed. Greece and Italy to name a few. That in itself is a topic but as far as the nations debt quite jaw dropping. All in all great paper. Keep up the good work I look forward into reading your next paper. I can tell that the nation and what its status will be when you enter the corporate world is important to you. That is if you do go into that. Only tiem can tell mo chara.
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Klem Bachleda
Since we are focused in class about organizations that help the needy, poor, or different situations of the world, I thought i’d share my thoughts on the new tax that might be charged; the “Skin Tax.” Although the money will be going towards counseling for rape victims, I don’t think that will be a good idea. First and foremost, that specific industry will decrease. Times are tough now economically and nobody wants to pay extra money to get into a strip club. People will be put out of jobs due to the decrease of attendance at these clubs. Another thing is that we all know that not all of the money will be going towards this “counseling.” It’s probably just another way for the government to collect money legally (not ethically) for their own purposes and accounting.
This is another way the government is indirectly (or maybe directly) targeting the middle class. From what I think, most of the income strip clubs get is from the middle class (did not look up statistics, just my personal opinion).
There are many different ways you can argue from both sides of the possible new skin tax, but from what I think, the skin tax wont benefit anybody but the government. Please fight the skin tax, ***support our local strip clubs and find a way to tax the upper corporate class.
( *** = sarcasm)Long, Ray and Groeninger, Alissa. “Illinois Strip Club Could Face $5 ‘Skin Tax’.” Chicago Tribune. Chicago Tribune, 16 February 2012. Web. 16 Feb. 2012.
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Klem Bachleda
Since I forgot to do my Journal Entry two, I thought I would still chime in and share my thoughts.
While reading “What it means in when a crowd in a far away nation takes a soldier representing your own nation, shoots him, drags him from his vehicle and then mutilates him in the dust” by Dave Eggers, I couldn’t but feel helpless for the character in the story. From seeing what our countrymen die for in other countries, we can see from the characters perspective that he is disturbed by it. Instead of staying here in the states and protecting our nation, people are fighting other countries wars.
While reading “Your mother and I” by Eggers, I felt like I was reading a tale similiar to “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.” The story was exaggerated greatly butg in positive ways. It showed how change starts with an idea from one individual and then gets built upon. Of course, in this story most of what they portrayed will not change, but just to know that change can happen give people hope and maybe motivation to make changes.
After reading these two stories, we can see that in the first story with the long title, a person can feel helpless because he cannot help others, or chooses not to. We become paralyzed by fear and what we see. We fear the consequences of our actions so we stay quite. In “Your Mother and I”, we see that change can happen, it just takes a little motivation and some action to get started. Once somebody speaks up, other are bound to agree and take action as well.
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Klem Bachleda
WOW. Reading through the “Village Voice” by Hessler was inspiring. I actually wanted to keep reading through the article. It is amazing how one person can fight for something for the benefit of others. It’s not often (hardly ever) you see somebody give up their time for organizations like this. It’s good to see how Rajeev spent his time helping others and the approach he took to get the funds. Too many people nowadays are too afraid or proud to go asking for money like Rajeev did. He did it in an unconventional way and it worked. Many people were bothered by his direct approach, but success isn’t measured by how you got there, it’s measured by how far you got. What I also admired is that Rajeev not only raised the money to get projects started, he actually lead them. He came up with the ideas to ease life in Namje and gave people objectives and jobs to complete. Even after they completed the water lines, he came back with the idea to build schools. The only thing that bothered me was the fact that towards the end, he sort of gave up. He realized that he concentrated on the short term goals and neglected to see the long term outcome.
Overall, what he did is extraordinary and individuals like him are one in a million. If there were more people like Rajeev, third world countries would be on their way to better living. -
Klem Bachleda
Working through the “Who Should Survive” project was tough. It was hard to analyze why one person should live while the others die. To start off, I chose the people that would benefit each other more than hinder the group. I think the easiest person in that project to chose would not stay alive was Dr. Garcia. He has health issues and is the oldest in the group. He would probably have more complications and a lesser chance to live anyways. Bobby Lang is the second one that would have to go. He would become more of an issue with attention focused on him rather than survival of the group. Mrs Lang would also be “let loose.” She can’t offer any good services that would be better than the services of the other individuals. Mr. Newton would be the last one to leave. Even though he studied in medical school, he has racial concerns. That would cause more problems amongst the group. The rest stayed due to the fact that they either had a B.S. in mechanics, were and electronic engineer, or where healthy and athletic.
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Klem Bachleda
Walking down the street one evening you pass…
Walking down the street one evening, you pass and restaurant with an outside patio, dimly lit, with violins playing. You see it’s full of couples and it’s one of the most romantic restaurants in town. You notice a man getting down on one knee. You stop. You stare. A moment passes and she says “Yes”. You continue walking in wonder, “Wow, he looked young. I’m definitely older and not ready for a wife.” Then you begin to wonder, “What made him decide to ask her? How did he decide to do it tonight?” You think to yourself, “When will I do it? First I got to get serious. And then what? Where do I go from there? What career do I choose?” The thoughts roll through your head and then a question arises, “What do I live for?”
You proceed down the road and see a child run into the street. A car is approaching and you see the father run into the street and grab the child when a car barely stopped in time. You think to yourself, “Wow, what a brave guy.” Then the thought crosses “Would I do that for anybody?” Would I risk my life for anything?” What would I die for?”
Continuing down the street, you run into a robbery in progress. You notice an older guy is getting mugged. Just as that’s happening, you see an elderly woman walk up behind the mugger and swing her purse. And she kept swinging, trying to hurt him. The mugger runs away. You wonder what made her do what she did. She stood up for the random guy. You begin to wonder if you would do the same thing. Would you try to scare the mugger? Hurt him? Kill him? “Would I actually kill somebody?” “What would I kill for?”
Three questions asked in one night. How does one answer these kinds of questions? Is there a right answer? Would It be wrong to answer these differently from other people? Answering questions like these really needs some thought put into them. One would have to consider their morals, ethics and the consequences of certain actions. “Would anybody be offended by my answers?” “Would anybody think I’m a bad person?” What would I personally do?
To answer the first question, “What do I live for,” there are plenty of answers. What I live for is to make my parents proud. That is probably first and foremost. They raised me in what I think is the right manner with morals and ethics exceeding those of most people. I apply those morals in everyday life in making decisions and am glad to see my parents approve of them. I would like to pass these morals onto my kids and that is one thing I live for.
Another thing I live for, which is obvious and most people won’t admit it, is to make money and enjoy life. Some people say money isn’t everything; that’s because they either don’t have it or they have too much of it. Even though money is not everything, it is a factor of life. Money is the reason the United States was established. People from Spain, England and Portugal came to the new found land to make money. Money is the reason the United States has the most immigrants. Immigrants don’t come here and stay just to visit our historical sites, they come here for a better life where making more money is somewhat easier. Now I’m not greedy or a fiend for money. I would just like to travel to places that I only see on television and in books. I would like to take some of my friends and fund them for traveling with me which leads me to my next reason of what I live for. I would like to donate money to different organizations. If I could make money, I would find different and creative ways to get money to those who need it.
What I also aim for in life is to achieve a higher social status to help others in need. I help others all I can now by offering my automotive technical skills to students in college and families that can’t afford huge car repair bills. I also help my friends in any way I can without asking for help in return. I still live at home with my parents so it’s easier for me to get by and help others. There is a feeling of accomplishment when I can help somebody.
The last important thing I live for is to make others laugh. I like to see people enjoy themselves, even if it’s at my expense or the joke is on me. It makes everybody else feel more comfortable in each others presence if they have something to laugh about. It also helps others remember you if your name is hard to pronounce; like mine is.
A question that is harder to answer than the first is what I would die for. One reason is because there aren’t many things that would be more beneficial if I sacrificed my life. My parents would be devastated, or so I think. It would be hard for them since I am the last child in the house and help them with bills and up keeping. One thing I would die for, later in my future, is for my kids (if I’ll have any). My parents always sacrificed their time and money to raise me and keep me and my sisters safe and I would do the same with my children. I would rather give them a chance at life and cut mine short. Also, DEPENDING on what kind of wife I have, maybe, possible, would think about giving my life up for her. (I’m just kidding about this last statement. Of course, if I were to marry, I would definitely sacrifice my life for her. If not, I would just divorce her.) Again, another sarcastic statement. Another reason I would give my life up is if my parents or immediate siblings were in trouble. I would factor in the benefits and disadvantages of the outcome, but if it was my sister, for example, in a situation where I could trade my life for hers, I would. She has a husband and three children. So in this case, sacrificing my life would be a positive trade off.
A couple things I would definitely not die for is my country, friends, money, or over stupidity. For one, if I were serving and were to die in combat, how would that benefit my family? Would money, if any, be a just trade off for losing a loved one? Friends and money is something I would definitely not die for. I will help them all I can, but I prefer to live and try to make a difference. Stupidity is another thing I wouldn’t die over. A bad decision could cause death, like running a red light, talking back to a Mixed Martial Arts fighter, or playing chicken on the highway to a suicidal maniac that just cut you off.
The last question that requires more in depth thinking would be what I would kill for. The reason that it took more time to actually answer is because the answer is obvious. I don’t think I would kill for anything. I mean somebody could argue that they would kill another person if that other person hurt or killed one of their family members, but that argument would be hard to uphold. A civilian cannot kill anybody without there being major consequences. One reason is, again, the trade off. Would it benefit a person to go to jail for killing somebody to get equal, or to get back any feelings that were lost for a loved one? Would it be beneficial to the people that you left behind to get even? How would the family of the person you just murdered react? How would they feel? There are a lot.
A justification for killing somebody would be for national security. If I worked for the CIA or FBI and it was my job to assassinate a potential threat, then of course I would do it. It would be hard at first to justify killing somebody, but then again, that’s why individuals join these governmental organizations.
Something that I would kill for is food; of course, hunting. But that’s not the point of these questions.
There are questions we ask ourselves and others on a day to day basis, but Socratic questions like “What do I live for”, What would I die for” and “What I would kill for” are questions that are hard to answer without sitting down and really thinking about it. There are factors that one has to take into account to justify their answers. Questions like these seem like they are easy to answer at first, but then when asked why we would die for something or kill for something, the thinking comes into play.
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Kevin Flores
I liked the way you wrote your paper and how u added some humor into it, it realley helps to attract the reader instead of being serious all the time. I liked how you were real about the questions in your paper. What I mean is that you put things that you would really kill or die for and your reason for living you didnt lie about it and say you would die for something big when you know you probabaly wouldnt. I liked the part you put about working for the fbi or cia i thought that was funny and how you put that you would think about giving up your life for her these are examples of some of the humor that make the paper alot more attractive to the reader. And I liked how you started off the paper about mentioning that you saw examples of all three things in one night. I liked the way you wrote your papaer and you explained the answers to the questions very well.
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Kevin Jaderberg
I appreciated the unconventional approach you took in your introduction. Having the questions come about naturally in your hypothetical scenario is effective in engaging the reader. I liked that you had a plethora of answers for the question “What do you live for?” but struggled to find answers for the other two. That’s a good thing in my opinion. Your paper has a genuine tone that suggests you really took your time to answer the questions honestly. Honest writing is always refreshing to read.
Laughter is such a huge part of my life as well. There’s nothing quite like having a laughing fit with a group of friends. Time seems to freeze. There is eternity in those moments. They are definitely worth living for.
I think this line was my favorite: “A couple things I would definitely not die for is my country, friends, money, or over stupidity.” I am vehemently opposed to blind nationalism or “patriotism.” I have more than once nearly been beaten up by marines for talking with them openly about my opposition to killing or dying for country. When a young kid is blown to nothing by a roadside bomb, does our nation benefit from they’re sacrifice? In what specific way does the death of a teenager protect the freedom of Americans?
It’s a good thing you had difficulty answering the second two questions. The thought of taking a life or losing your own should certainly cause you to think deeply. The questions are designed to reveal things about yourself you might otherwise have not discovered. If you can answer these questions without a thought, it infers you’re not wiling to think with an open mind. There is nothing so dangerous as a closed mind.
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Killian Noonan
This paper really caught my eye. The introduction was very well done. Kept me interested in the following sequence of events. Great way to start it off. I also really liked your explanation of money. You looked at both arguments regarding money and really defended your point. It’s nice you want to travel and see far away lands with your money not just horde it all and then buy a huge mansion or expensive car. I like to hear how you enjoy to make people laugh and making sure they are having a good time. I myself consider myself the funny guy (or at least kinda funny guy), in my group of friends. Despite your opinions in this paper greatly differing then mine, I respect your opinion and mind set. All in all I thought your paper was great. A nice unconventional way of breaking down the questions. Providing an interesting stor and support to back up your opinions. Well done.
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Klem Bachleda
Practice Post…. :- )
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Klem Bachleda
Ecological Literacy; a term that is self explanatory and easy to understand, but hard to follow or execute. In today’s world, making money is what matters to most people. Big businesses, factories, huge machinery; it’s what keeps our economy running. With free time becoming rare and people rushing to do everything, we miss out on the important things, and that’s the environment in the future. Most people only think about today. We don’t give much thought about the environment and how the actions today will affect not only our immediate future, but the future of our children and grandchildren. Some companies are “going green” but it’s not enough. It’s a good thing to see auto manufacturers putting out electric cars, but then again, to make those same cars, the batteries inside can harm the environment even more. A lot of people are eco-illiterate and don’t care much for pollution and how it greatly affects the earth. Becoming more ecologically literate would greatly benefit the earth. If more people understand how to get along day by day without hurting the environment and our atmosphere, we could live a healthier life. We’ve become so dependent on machinery and so lazy, we don’t think twice how it affects the different life forms around us. Instead of walking two blocks to the store, we hop in the car and drive. Ecological literacy should be a greater concern of our economy, but who’s got time for that today; we’ll think about that tomorrow.
Fritjof Capra.”From The Web of Life.” learning.writing101.net. Web. 26 Jan. 2012 -
Klem Bachleda
The grading contract is fair. Too many courses nowadays are excepting less work and handing out better grades. That is what’s causing the US to slack in education. Prof. McGuire is on the right track: do your work and you’ll get a “B”. This is how more instructors should set their grading standards. Exceed what is expected and get an “A”.
Killian Noonan, 
Nick Kleopa, and 
Kevin Flores are discussing. 
Kevin Jaderberg and one other person are discussing. 
Kevin Flores 4:14 pm on April 22, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
First off Klem I totally agree with you when you say that you couldn’t believe how many people are volunteering. It’s pretty crazy that those places you checked out were booked till May and June which is a real problem because I think that affected a lot of other groups also because we only had literally a couple weeks to decide on who was going to be in our groups and what we were going to do our project on. Then we also had to find times where everyone in the group would be able to volunteer and get together. And then we also had to factor that a lot of the groups that even though we would want to volunteer for would probably be booked, or at least take a while to get the date and time set up. The main problem that my group faced was that not everyone in the group had the same schedule for school and almost everyone in the group also had a job and that really limited us to which days we were going to be able to volunteer.
But in the end we were able to get it together and finally set the date we were going to go to the animal welfare league and all the waiting paid off because I was able to learn a lot about the organization and the issue of animal cruelty, and also how someone would go about adopting an animal which was the overall focus of our group doing this project.
That’s good though that you were finally able to find a place to do the service part of the project and that you have a date set up when you’re going to do take part in the volunteering part of it. So far you paper has described what struggles you and some people in your group have gone through in trying to do this project which makes the paper overall more interesting especially because a lot of people can probably relate to the issues that came up in your group. I also like how you told the reader about all the steps that your group took and even about how you got the whole group set up, this gives the reader a more in detail description about what went into this project. Now that I think about it I should probably include this in my paper. I should put what went into choosing the group and more about the struggles we went trough in deciding on which day we were going to end up doing the volunteer part of the project.
Overall this is a pretty good draft because obviously you cant talk about the volunteer experience when you haven’t volunteered yet. This I can guarantee you was a problem with a lot of people because the draft of this paper due date is probably before the day that people complete their service. I think once you complete this project you will learn more and maybe have some fun but I think that you got the right mind set to take something from this experience.
Nick Kleopa 11:11 am on April 23, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Klem great post. I am feeling as if I wrote part of the piece. I can relate to many of the things that you posted in this piece. I ran into the same exact thing when we first started doing our service opportunities. I thought it was gonna be really easy but it was not at all. We contacted over 10 agencies and only 2 contacted us back. With one of them wanting us to go through the application process with references and background checks which would have taken way to long. We however did get in contact with the Orland food pantry, I don’t know if it was the same one your group is serving too but the one we had was off of 80th Ave and 151st. The faith Church, across the street from the Orland Fire Dept. I def like how you posted that you were getting very antsy because you didn’t know when everything was gonna be taken care off. I also can relate to the group members schedules not mating up. Friday’s were our only free days and most of the service events took place earlier in the week. My group mates also had a lot of other things going on as far as work before and or after school. One of my group members didn’t have a car which posed somewhat of a barrier but fortunately he found a local service opportunity close to his house. I took notice to your comment on the slip on the splatter site and your heart sunk. I felt my heart sink as I read it cause of my few slips that I have gotten. I also wanted to mention that if the Orland Service opp is the same as the one I did, make sure to be as specific as you can when talking to the director. I was under the assumption that we would have been packing food or something but we ended up cleaning the wood walls of the main hall. Putting chairs down at tables and vacuuming the whole area which consisted of about 6,000 sq ft. There really wasn’t much to do but since their was a wedding later on that day we just cleaned up the main room a little bit along with the hallways. I really don’t know how we are going to associate this with my third members trip to the Greater Chicago Food Depository. Anyway, I hope everything works out for you and your group. Back to your paper. Your paper showed, good emotion, and frustration which I liked because I can relate to that when we were trying to figure out what to do. It has feelings and when you posted about the scheduling conflict, like I said I felt as if I were saying it. I think it was an all around good paper because you posted many things that me and my group went through that I can relate to. I look forward to reading your next piece and hope that the service opportunity is everything you thought it would be. Great job
Killian Noonan 9:26 pm on April 23, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Well I must say my solidarity goes out to you Klem. Reading your paper about your group is nearly parallel to my group. So I was totally able to understand your situation. You did a good job of portraying your groups plight within your work. Thats why I could also understand the level of stress and frustration. Believe me, my group was in quite a jam. We still have not crawled out, but at least we found an organization to work with. Like you said in your paper, I never knew how hard this would be. At first we had underage drinking. So the organizations we got in contact with, we were all unable to work with because obviously it is a serious matter. We had to be certified to even volunteer. Which as you know is a long process. I never knew the challenges. I guess I’m so used to doing service for the Irish Republican Movement, that I don’t realize the actual difficulty level there is to volunteer. Especially given our short time period. However, my best wishes and solidarity to you and your group. It is indeed a great cause you have decided to volunteer for. It is astounding how the simple acts such as volunteering at one of those establishments can make the biggest difference. Thats is probably one the the things I enjoyed most about this class, McGuire required us to volunteer places. Chalk it up to me being old fashioned, but I’m glad I see the youth of today contributing back. Maybe our generation isn’t doomed after all! Once again though it is nearly comedic of how our groups both suffered the same frustration. There we times hen the mere thought of this project and how we were back to square one had me going to my garage for a cigarette! I speculate that for all the COM102 sections McGuire teaches, if they haven’t taken up smoking they certainly will have during this project! One thing I am in anticipation for is, the fair where we get to see all the organizations. It will indeed be some spectacle. My group finally settled on doing our volunteer work for this bike organization. That assemble picks for those in deed of them. Which is pretty cool. I never knew there were such things. Which I can’t wait till we do. I’m quite good with my hands so it will be fun. That why I can’t wait till the fair and see all the other unique organizations people chose to work with. Indeed this is one of those times throughout the school year that make summer that much more enjoyable! I’ve been under stress a lot with school. Not to mention this project. I just like you would not want any more slips on my splatter.I’m already pissed enough that my writing doesn’t matter a damn and we have to be in fear of these “slips”. Anyway great paper mo chara. I wish the best to you and your group once again!