Outgrown

America is supposed to a country of economic growth and opportunity, yet the "developed world" is now being outgrown by the developing nations. There are many things you can blame: lack of political efficiency, economic crises and trouble recovering, distribution of natural resources/oil, the ownership of said natural resources, oppressive but effective regimes in the developing world, industrialization constantly occurring in the developing nations, et cetera. But the bottom line is this: the economies of the East are out-growing the economies of the West. A list of the top economies in 2050 released by HSBC shows that America, Germany, England, France, and Canada will be 5 of the 10 biggest economies in the world; however, the other five (aside from Japan) are considered "developing nations." 12-14 of the top 20 are "developing nations" (depending on who you consider "developing.") While America, Canada, and a few select European nations will still have strong economies, the trend is for "developing nations" to become more powerful, "Western" ones less powerful.

They're Everywhere!

As you may or may not know, I don't exactly like pop music. Yet I have nothing against pop artists as people, simply because they are pop artists. But Christian groups in South Korea (and, well, the world over) hate pop artists like Lady GaGa, because they support gay rights.

Lady GaGa is doing a show in South Korea, yet South Korean Christian groups have managed to get the government to ban anyone under 18 from seeing it. These people put forced religious conviction above freedom of speech—sound familiar? They also are willing to boycott Hyundai and its sub-companies because they sponsor the tour. Hating gays seems rather antiquated and stupid, yet these "devout Christians" still follow backward principles, given that the only reason to is because of a "great holy spiritual book." It appears that crazy religious people are everywhere.

EDIT: I am not talking about all South Koreans. Just the crazily religious ones.

"These guys don't get it!"

The interest rates on student loans are set to go up on July 1 if Congress does not act. Republicans, of course, are saying that students just need to deal with it, because the national debt needs to be lowered. Yet they won't even THINK of raising taxes on the rich. They claim that the national debt is hurting the economy, yet as President Obama pointed out, so does making it harder to get education, and less education only makes the economy even worse. Of course, there is always a political motivation, and Obama is of course attempting to gain the youth vote. The total amount of student loans in America now total $1,000,000,000,000; that is a HUGE source of debt, about 6.25% of the debt owed by the government, who has many, many more expenses. 40% of adults over 35 who took student loans still haven't payed them off, yet Republicans STILL insist that student debt is not that big of an issue.

And now that this is becoming such a huge negative issue for the Republicans, they are proposing to pay for these subsidies by taking money out of the Affordable Care Act; raising taxes on millionaires and billionaires just isn't an option. I mean, why should people who have more money than they know what to do with find a way to actually use SOME OF that money?

And here's a funny (and worrying) bit on this issue from Jimmy Fallon, President Obama, and the Roots.

Farewell to Facts

This is not something that I wrote. It is, however, quite true, and somewhat worrying.

Facts, 360 B.C.-A.D. 2012

Let's Not Actually Fix It

Tennessee uses an abstinence-only sex education program. Of course, states that use abstinence-only sex education programs have higher teen pregnancy rates than states that use a more comprehensive method. Teen pregnancy rates are, however, going down overall. "This good shift is largely the result of an increase in teenagers' use of birth control — a fact that Congressional Republicans ignore as they seek to dismantle reproductive health programs" (The New York Times). This is worrying, yet not surprising: Republicans are once again ignoring reality and making another bullshit argument. So instead of using education that involves simply saying, "look, there are these things called condoms. You use those correctly, and you've basically eliminated any chance of becoming pregnant," Tennessee Republicans are amending the law so that they teach against "gateway sexual activities." Of course, they don't take the time to even DEFINE that term in the law. For all we know, teachers may now be required to tell their students, "Don't hold hands, you might end up having sex and getting pregnant!" Instead of fixing the problem, they are creating a "solution" that, unlike tried and tested solutions that actually work, fixes nothing.


Stephen Colbert has a brilliant bit on this "new approach" to sex education.

Einstein was an Atheist

For those of you who have facebook accounts (or if this can be seen without one, I don't know):
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150730485329578&set=p.10150730485329578&type=1&theater

Anyways, it claims that Einstein was a Christian (false), that cold does not exist (because it's technically just the absence of heat), that darkness doesn't exist (because it's technically just the absence of light), that brains don't exist (because you haven't seen them, felt them, right?), and that all this somehow proves that God exists.

Every argument made to "prove" God is false (why is that not surprising?). Cold=absence of heat. Ok, congrats, which means cold does exist, as a way to express the absence of heat. By the "student's" own argument. Cause I'd rather say "it's cold outside" over "it is lacking heat in the exterior terrain." And you can go on and do basically the same thing with every other argument made.

"Guns N' Roses"

Turns out that Wal-Mart sells guns. And not just paintball guns and Airsoft guns; real rifles. You can go into to Wal-Mart and get guns and roses! There's even a pink rifle, and they sell shotguns too. I think that this might be a sign that gun laws are a little too lax.