Barack Obama – We The People

The Fight for Net Neutrality

Image: CNBC

Do you have an idea that you want to develop? Do you fancy yourself an entrepreneur? Good for you! Your future is bright! Here in the Land of the Free, we are fortunate to be able to access information with ease. Just think of the treasure trove of help you can find with your budding business on the internet! But wait! Maybe not! Have you heard of Net Neutrality? Sounds boring? Well, stop snoring and take notice! The business you save may be your own!

The Facts

Net Neutrality is the idea that internet service providers (ISPs)—think of companies like Verizon, Spectrum, AT&T, and more—will provide the same access to an open internet, no matter the status of an individual. So when you question the almighty Google from your phone, you get the same results as some big shot company executive from her corner office. That sounds like a good idea for a variety of reasons. For example, if you really are trying to start your own business, the internet is a great place to advertise and sell your products or services. If you are a social activist, the internet gives you a platform to organize and communicate. These notions are dependent on a vital and open internet.

We currently have strong net neutrality protections here in the United States. In 2015, thanks to the strong support of millions of net neutrality activists, the Obama administration was able to draft net neutrality regulations, getting the ISPs classified as “common carriers” under Title II of the Communications Act. This allowed the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) the authority to draft strong regulations protecting access to the internet. Now, however, these regulations are under attack, led by the current administrations FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. A vote by the FCC to rescind these regulations are currently scheduled for December 14. The Democrats have asked for a delay in the vote, but the FCC has denied that request.

What would happen if these protections are rescinded? Your internet access may begin to look more and more like your cable TV access. That means you may have different packages from which to choose, with each package providing you a different level of access to the internet. Additionally, an ISP may determine the speed at which the content is delivered. For example, the more you pay, the faster you play.

It is also critical to remember that in many areas of the US, ISP providers may not even exist. According to Dr. Brian Whitacre of Oklahoma State University, just over ½ (55%) of people living in rural areas of the United States can access internet speeds considered to be broadband! This percentage suggests there aren’t a heck of a lot of ISPs out there in rural America. If net neutrality goes out the window, and ISPs can dictate access, who is the competition in rural America? These folks will have to simply take what they are offered.

Proponents of rescinding the net neutrality regulations, AT&T being one of the most notable, indicate the current regulations hinders ISPs investments in innovation. Yet the evidence we see around us each day is that technology is improving. This argument seems to be lame when compared to the stifling effect rescinding can have on budding entrepreneurs, start-up businesses, activists, and others in dorm rooms and garages, dreaming big dreams and making great strides, thanks to our open internet.

What You Can Do

There is a wide variety of options for people like you—people who want to save net neutrality and save our internet—the first being signing this petition: Save the Internet. Save the Internet is an online petition with one simple goal: protecting our rights and providing every person that browses the internet equal access to every site that they browse. You can also even donate to their cause here.

You can call your senator by using this simple tool: Call My Congress. It will help you find all of the contact information of all of your elected officials. You must use it to urge your representatives and senators to vote net neutrality.

The truth is, we have almost no time left. The vote in the FCC is today, so we must act now. Now is our time to be heard before it’s too late.

Barack Obama: “We were the change”

Image: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Last night, President Obama gave his farewell address in Chicago to a crowd of over 20,000 people. President Obama will leave office in nine days, and that change will be positive for some, and negative for others. Obama has stated, last night and at multiple other times, that the transfer of power to the next President can, and will, be a peaceful one. This election was seen as ‘different’ because you either ‘loved’ or ‘hated’ a candidate. The election turned out to be in Trump’s favor, and we all need to respect that, whether or not our views matched his because this election was a representation of our democracy.

“America is a better, stronger place than it was when we started.”

“Focus on the state of our democracy” was the main idea of Obama’s farewell address. Obama’s first topic was that we need to realize that “everyone has economic opportunity”. When he gave his first point, he was basically outlining the idea that no matter what race, gender, or sexuality you are, there is basically nothing stopping you from opening a business, presenting an idea, or putting yourself out there. Only we can remove the barriers that are preventing us from doing what we love to do, and sometimes we ourselves are the ones creating the barriers in the first place. In order to get the future we want, we must take risks in the process. As Obama said last night, for every two steps we take forward, we take one back. For women’s rights, this is extremely true because we are now able to vote and do many other things that men are able to do, we still have a very large gap in pay between men and women. The only way we can fix the problems we have is to go above our potential and make the changes ourselves and not wait for others to do so. Although we may have come very far within the past eight years, the “progress we’ve made is not enough.” We don’t have the right to complain about people being ‘lazy’ or an ‘ineffective citizen’ if we don’t give them the opportunities that they need in order to get back on their feet.

Obama’s second topic of the night was that we will never have a post-racial America. We have come farther than people back in the 1950’s would have ever thought we could come, but we’re not even close to where we need to be. Something Obama mentioned last night that interested me was that, in order to have large parts of the future workforce be able to do their job, we need to train them in order to do so. The racial diversity in the United States is noticeably growing, and by the time today’s kids are working, the people we consider ‘minorities’ now will be a majority of the population, therefore we need to look past race and give them the same opportunities that everybody else has. It may surprise many, but many people still want to have segregation be part of everyday life, including having separate housing and schools. A point that Obama brought up was that we need to keep the laws banning segregation and discrimination upheld, no matter the cost because there are people out there who are willing to do anything to have a separated America. The laws are not the only things that need to change; our hearts need to change as well, and if they do not change, we will be challenging what our founding fathers said regarding natural-born Americans. Do ‘minorities’ who were born as a natural citizen of the United States deserve the same rights as we do? Yes, they do. Many, many people are against Muslims entering our country because they think that they will be a threat. Back when the Italians, Irish, etc. entered our nation, people thought the same things about how they were going to ‘ruin our country.’ Obama mentioned that we are starting to only believe things that agree with our views, and we are not looking at what is actually going on around us. It’s almost like we block out information that we do not want to be true, and filter others so that we only hear what we want to hear. During these next four years, we need to come out of that ‘bubble’ and challenge ourselves.

“I reject discrimination against Muslim Americans, who are just as patriotic as we are.”

The third problem that Obama presented was that “politics are a battle of ideas.” With all of these biased news outlets, nobody knows what to believe anymore and that’s causing people to stay closed-minded and without a “common base of facts”. Without a common base of facts, we will be more separate than ever. Another extremely debatable political point that Obama made was that we have made much progress with the prevention and controlling of climate change, but many politicians think that there are bigger things to deal with first, politicians including Donald Trump, our future president. When the problem is denied, it betrays America. We can use the freedom that we have been granted by showing people the problem and making it known to everybody. We must act against the people who are saying that ‘minorities’ do not have the rights that everybody else has because they are trying to cause larger problems than there already are. Obama said, in his address last night, that we have to be “vigilant but not afraid”, which means that we must work with others to be able to gain the rights that we need.

Obama’s last topic of the night was that “our democracy is threatened when we take it for granted.” When we use our rights but do not give back to our people, we are, essentially, taking our democracy for granted. We should be looking for help in “rebuilding our democratic institution.” For example, if the issue of same-sex marriage is brought before the Supreme Court during Trump’s presidency, we need to remind the justices that marriage is a right and we should not be allowed to take that away from somebody. If Congress ends up making a decision that outrages many citizens of the U.S., the fault is entirely ours because we did not try hard enough to prevent them from passing the decision.

A topic that Obama mentioned was that the Constitution is just a piece of parchment with no power in itself unless we, the people, give it power. This is a great example of how nothing happens on its own, as our country would be in complete chaos right now if we did not have certain guidelines as to what we have rights to do. “Embrace the task that we’ve been given” is another point that Obama brought up last night. By embracing the task that we’ve been given, we can make America the greatest it can be and hopefully resolve many of the conflicts that have troubled our country. During his farewell address last night, President Obama mentioned that, if we are unhappy with our government officials, there is nothing stopping us from running ourselves. This is important because it shows where almost every politician started. At the end of his speech, Obama requested one thing from us all. His request was for all of us to believe in our ability to make changes, and those words will inspire many in the future. Many people will miss having Barack Obama as a President, but we are sure to have at least some good come from Trump’s presidency, as well as lessons learned.

Secret CIA Assessment Shows that Russia had Influenced our Election

Image: Inquisitr

For awhile now, before the eighth of November, we all heard the rumors about Russia attempting to influence our election. Do you remember that? Well, Intelligence Agencies have identified individuals connected to the Russian Government who provided WikiLeaks with the thousands of DNC emails, including those of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman.

Officials have recognized these individuals as being part of a larger scheme to boost Trump’s chances and lower Hillary’s.

It is the assessment of the intelligence community that Russia’s goal here was to favor one candidate over the other: to help Trump get elected.

According to the Washington Post, Senators were briefed on these matters sometime around September, but Mitch McConnell had voiced doubts about the validity of the intelligence.The Trump transition team has declined to comment on this issue.

The Trump transition team has declined to comment on this issue, though since the rumor was first spread, Trump has repeatedly assured us that there was no Russian hacking in this election, even this week to TIME Magazine!

[The hacking] could be Russia, and it could be China, and it could be some guy in his home in New Jersey.

Though the CIA has proven that these individuals were responsible for hacking the DNC emails, questions are still left unanswered. The intelligence agencies do not have specific intelligence pointing to officials in the Kremlin directing these hackers to pass the emails to WikiLeaks. According to the officials that spoke with the Washington Post, rather than government employees, the individuals were “one step” removed from the Russian government. The deniability is still plausible because Russia has used operative middlemen for intelligence operations in the past.

The Obama Administration has been debating for months on how they should respond to the alleged Russian hacking because many officials were concerned about creating tension in Moscow and/or being accused of attempting to help Hillary Clinton.

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