Are You Smarter Than An... Elected Official?

By Ali M.

Who were two enemies of the United States of America during World War II? Does the President have the power to declare war? What's the original purpose of the electoral college?

If you answered any of the above questions correctly, you may be smarter than an elected official. Questions based on American history, government, and economy were given to both groups: elected officials and the general public. Elected officials scored a grade of 44% while the general public had 49%.

The group that developed the test, Intercollegiate Studies Institute, was appalled, and even worse, disturbed. The question even arose asking how these people can make "educated" decisions when they aren't even aware of what America has experienced.

In order to fix this, ISI said, people are going to have to start staying current on the events.

Starving for an Answer

by James V.

A new story coming out of the West Indies shocked and surprised me as I learned of such horrible events taking place right under the United States' perspective noses. CNN recently reported a story on the subject of the atrocious food supply conditions in Haiti. There seems to be such a food shortage within the nation that a large number of mothers are forced to make the decision of which of their children they should feed. Some mothers are so desperate that apparently, these women do not give their newborns names due to the great potential of them dying from malnourishment, CNN reports.

Personally, I could never think of a worse situation for these people, the mothers specifically. The fact that these Haitian mothers have to actually choose which of their children will live due to their lack of food supply is appalling to me. Being an American middle class citizen obviously makes this seem almost unbelievable but for some, it is an everyday reality. They must struggle and beg for food every single day and even with what they get from begging and other methods, they still must resort to only feeding one child as opposed to feeding both. According to the World Food Program, a child dies of hunger every six seconds due to starvation or malnourishment throughout the world. This is a statistic that desperately is in need of alteration.

Some documented causes for the rise of world hunger are the rise in oil prices. This affects world hunger due to the fact that companies require oil to distribute their harvests and these poor countries cannot afford the shipping costs. This single fact shocks and tells me something about the society we live in as Americans specifically. Americans are the biggest users in oil due to our highly industrialized nation and our gas guzzling vehicles. Our nation burning this natural resource is not exactly helping the oil per barrel price go down. We are further using more and more oil, making it almost seem necessary to drill for oil in places that would hurt our environment even more. In my opinion, America needs to become less dependent of oil and start developing eco-friendly technology or else it seems as if it will not only be the environment hurting in the end.

One more thing also jumps out at me because of this article: why is this the first I've really heard about this topic? American media is heavily reliant on its viewers and the viewers obviously need to be entertained. These days in media, that requires a deep injection of sex, drugs, violence, humor and action into the human psyche – people will not tune in otherwise. When it comes to news, the stories must be dramatic, or celebrity related to even stop the average viewer from immediately changing the channel. If American media as a whole took the initiative to put these types of stories on headline news rather than how much Sarah Palin's Japanese glasses are worth or how great Michelle Obama's fashion sense is, then maybe America would be a better informed nation. Now, don't get me wrong -- nothing interests me more than celebrity gossip, the latest fashion icon and glasses. However, I do think that there are more pressing issues at hand, like, you know. . .anything besides that. What I'm getting at here is that maybe Americans would step up and make a unified attempt to change certain things in this world if they actually knew what was going on.

I feel bad based on my own morals but also on a personal level. I feel bad eating my potato chips and drinking my root beer as I write this with the knowledge of world hunger as one of the more major issues these days. I know that I have these privileges because my parents worked hard for what they have which allows me to live a comfortable life. I know that they could have never gotten to the point they were at if they hadn't been living in a country as comparatively better off than Haiti or other “third world countries.” But it makes me feel bad because I have come to the realization that no matter how they work, it would be almost impossible for the people within that "catagory" of countries to succeed. Impossible due to the economic situation working against them. I know that there is not nearly enough opportunity in Haiti as in America to succeed but I know that if they only had the opportunity, they would take it and be better off. America could potentially be that opportunity. I hope that our foreign policy will one day change to pro humanitarian one and not just an anti-imperialist, anti-terrorist government. I know that we are already in this war with Iraq (justified or not) and are having military issues in Afghanistan with potential problems in Iran but if we were to ever take a stand as a nation and a government, then maybe we could change our ways. Help the cause of world hunger, stop the genocide in Sudan. Fight for morals, fight hunger, fight for the right reasons. Feeling bad to be an American is not uncommon these days. I believe that it doesn't have to be cliché to feel bad about being comfortable; but doesn't that notion say a lot about the condition of our global society? I believe it does.

Hillary Clinton Considers Secretary of State Position

By Ali M.

While many speculations have arisen since Barack Obama became president-elect of the United States, an idea of who the position will go to has been narrowed down.

Although Senator Hillary R. Clinton's potential seat as Secretary of State has been only a leak, an article written on the www.guardian.co.uk has stated that Clinton is taking the position into consideration.

Right now, Barack Obama's advisers have gone into deeper research of Clinton's past, including her foundation that distributes millions upon millions of dollars to Africa. The fact that they research her past is a necessity, as to cause no future conflicts. Regardless however, his advisers feel that this will not be a problem.

What is causing her to consider things in such minute detail is the fact that the two positions of Secretary of State and Senator are quite different. The Secretary of State title would only be for the four or eight years, while her Senator position is a seat for life. She would be taking the place of current Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (R).

Obama is looking to put those that have been his rivals in the past as to have a better form of a bipartisan cabinet, as well as a wider variety of views. I feel having Clinton as Secretary of State would be a prime example of this. Yes, she is a Democrat so she is of the same party, but she went up against him for a while to become the nominee of the Democratic Party. She has worked with foreign affairs and defense in the past, as well as put an effortless battle for healthcare, and had supported the war in Iraq. Now, however, they basically agree that it is time our troops come home.

At first, I have to be honest, I didn't think it was a good idea to have former rivals be apart of his cabinet because it may seem as though it was hypocritical of him, or any other president for that matter. But after analyzing his views and considerations, it makes much more sense to have people that do not have the exact same views as him.

Having people such as this in his cabinet would be able to keep him as open-minded as possible, and give him many more allies. His meeting with Sen. John McCain was a great way to publicize the fact that he wants to remain friends with those that he had gone against for a year and a half. It also shows that he will keep in mind the concerns of Republicans, which is necessary since the Senate has majority Republicans, regardless the increase in Democrats it had this past election, although the increase was quite large. They fell short of the 60 necessary to make it impossible for Republicans to reject completely what Obama suggests.

McCain will not be offered a job in the cabinet, but his views will be considered on a number of issues, including their agreement of the fate of the Guatanamo Bay, immigration reform, stem cell research, and so on.

Ultimately, I think the way president-elect Barack Obama is going about his future role in the United States is great, and he is certainly appealing to many when he involves all citizens of the country's ideas.

Economy Running On Empty

By James V.

I recently came across many articles strewn throughout the internet of the top three American car companies in financial trouble. GM, Ford and Chrysler executives went to Congress and requested a 25 billion dollar bailout in government loans. GM chairman and executive officer Rick Wagoner actually told Congress on Yahoo! that the United States economy would “face a catastrophic collapse” if they did not bail the companies out. Wagoner also stated that the government itself would lose billions upon billions of tax revenue dollars if the government decided not to bail them out and let them fail. As well as the huge economic loss, thousands of people would be laid off and the city of Detroit, Michigan, a city which economically relies on said companies, would be in a state of utter chaos. Given this ultimatum of epic proportions, the White House and Congress are trying to come to a swift compromise over the situation as soon as possible.

I personally think that this is one of the worst things that could have happened at this point in time. Not only did our government just implement a 700 billion dollar bailout into four major American companies just months ago, but now GM and all of the other major American automotive companies are asking for one of their own. It seems to me that Wagoner thinks that the bailout system is the only solution to their problems -- he may be right. It seems as if GM and the other car companies have dug themselves into a hole they cannot get out of and now they expect the American government to cop them out. I find this upcoming “trend” of bailouts to be utterly ridiculous. First of all, the fact that Wagoner essentially demanded money from the government with no sign of a “plan B” is foolish. GM told the AP sometime during mid year that they would have enough cash to sustain themselves until 2010. I think there has been a small miscalculation. For months, GM has been cutting jobs and selling assets in order to stay afloat but it seems as if nothing is working. I realize that nothing has been working for them over the past couple of months, but you would think that someone within the company would've had a contingency plan not involving the U.S government.

The fact that GM was not doing enough to help themselves before they hit rock bottom makes me wonder whether or not they deserve to fail or not. I suppose ethically, they absolutely do deserve to fail, however, with GM, Chrysler and Ford being the biggest American companies, can we as a nation allow them to fail? They are deeply engraved into the overall American company due to the fact that American economy has more to do with foreign imports than exports. In simpler terms, the majority of things that we make, others don't want. The fact that these car companies have been around for a century or close to it shows the staying power and relative success of these companies in America. If we were to actually allow GM to fail on the basis of laissez-faire economic policy (something we're obviously good at) then what would happen to our economy? Thousands of jobs lost around the nation for starters. Then, Americans would further rely on buying foreign cars which would take money out of circulation and into foreign markets, thus killing our economy even further.

The other side to this, however, is the fact of the U.S government creating money for the sake of bailouts thus causing inflation. Even if we did bailout GM and these other car companies, would it help our economy in the long run? The U.S dollar value would be in shambles and be worth comparatively nothing. Also, even with the bailout, who says that GM would naturally recover afterwards? What if the company fails again at selling vehicles and goes under again? Then the loans could not possibly be paid back and the money would disappear into thin air, making our debt worse. With the bailout, it would also make American economy seem weak if we have to bailout every company in need. That plus our dollar value decreasing might halt trading with foreign markets, thus making it officially a “catastrophic collapse” of our economy.

I am not an economist. I am not a professional. I don't watch the stock market every day and I don't read the financial section of my newspaper everyday; these are just my opinions. The general conclusion that I have made of this situation is that the American economy is certainly screwed whether it be short term or long term. American companies need to be regulated more frequently and more efficiently to better stop these types of disasters from happening. I know people that are hardcore laissez-faire will disagree with any form of government involvement or regulation. Now that we are in this situation and we run this type of government, however, then I think it is agreeable that at least that needs to be done. I personally don't know where I stand on this issue but I know America is sitting upon a double-edged sword. All I know is that it is time for these American companies to start being more financially responsible and spending their money on ways to improve the company as a whole before running and crying to be fed from the teat that is the American government.

New Recycling System Stumps Audience

By Ali M.

A lot of people always say it's better to recycle because it helps save our planet, but sometimes it's a little difficult to do that when you don't have an easy way to go about it. What if your town doesn't support recycling and it becomes a hassle for you to go out of town just to put a few cans or bottles in a blue can elsewhere? Many people just don't think it's worth it.

And now, behold, a new system to get this Earth-cleaning job done. While you may be thinking you have to take a long trip to some foreign undisclosed location you've never been to, you can simply go to the post office and get rid of any recyclable item you can think of.

Unfortunately, it comes with a price. And I mean a real one.

While there are programs that make it more beneficial for you and the environment to save those items you would normally just throw out, some come with a fee. For example, batteries may seem to be nothing much to throw out, but in fact they can be recycled. A program called Battery Solutions lets you recycle batteries, iPods, cell phones, and other electronical goods that you would simply throw out at any other time. This process has a fee of $24, however, it does come with a pre-paid FedEx label though.

There's a program also for CDs and DVDs, as well as other items relative to the aforementioned, but it comes with a fee of $7. You can send in practically anything electronical, but the fee works for only up to 20lbs worth.

Nike has a program to give back used athletic footwear in which they will turn them into an athletic field for use. It's called Nike's Reuse-A-Shoe.

There are many other programs available for those interested to recycle, but whether it would work is the question. Responses by readers of a Yahoo! article on this topic led me to believe that many are not exactly willing to pay extra money to recycle when they could easily save money by simply throwing it out or giving their used clothes and accessories to the Salvation Army. There is a valid point to this. The money that they would be spending to send in recyclables to benefit businesses would be causing more money to be spent on the same businesses. It would be a cycle; a cycle some may see as vicious. On the other hand, some are seeing this as a way to help the Earth, and even more so the future inhabitants of Earth -- this includes our generation's great grandchildren and further on.

What do you think of this new system? Answer in our poll.

[Source: http://green.yahoo.com/blog/the_conscious_consumer/19/recycling-by-mail.html]

Advice from Alex

Welcome, my name is Alex. In this blog I will be able to give advice with supporting facts and information that may help in the long run. If you need any advice or help on anything, like life issues or personal issues like relationships, trouble in school, better living habits, or even which book you should read, I can help with that!

Let me tell you a little about myself. I am currently a student at Suffolk University in the heart of Boston majoring in Psychology and Creative Writing. A couple years ago I went to Nicaragua to help build a school there and live with a host family. The trip to Nicaragua really changed the way I view people today. I don’t waste my time judging people. Instead, I believe I am here to help and support those in need, including you.

Letter from the Editors

Human potential. A powerful phrase that can mean many things. We, at Reader's Feed, believe it starts at a young age. We believe in an opportunity for a voice; a chance for our peers to give their respective opinions about anything at anytime and be heard. We believe in opportunity; an opportunity for young writers everywhere to practice their craft without scrutiny or ridicule. A chance to either exercise their skills, put their foot in the door as a writer, or just have a say. We believe in equality; a system that will not push anyone away but in fact welcome anyone who wants to write with open arms. Writing should not be a granted privilege but a natural right and we subscribe to that belief. Most of all, we believe in a future here at Reader's Feed. A future of promise. A future that follows the belief that we, as a generation, have the power to do great things. We believe that this could be a gateway to something new. Something that inspires, gives chances to those who have not been given a chance, and something that could potentially open peoples’ minds and sparks their imaginations. Writing is one of the best tools to share your thoughts with anyone who is willing to listen. That’s where we come in.

The editors of this webzine are constantly writing – whether it be for their classes or their responsibilities. Ali is a freelance writer and intern at newspapers, obviously she always has a deadline; James is majoring in history, and his classes never fail to have assignments needed the next week or so. We know what it means to have work to do; what it means to have responsibilities. And we most certainly know what it means to be students in this generation with thoughts and opinions aching to be shared. Reader’s Feed is our opportunity, and yours, to get what we think out there.

It may take weeks to get the members of our generation and others following our webzine; it may even take months, but rest assured, work will be developed. Articles will be written, photographs will be taken and analyzed, and thoughts will be provoked. Reader’s Feed is everyone’s chance to speak their mind or listen to what the future holds. We believe it is not only an opportunity, but a privilege to be able to work with our peers in order to create a community of excellent writers. This could be our and your chance to write what you need to write; to say what you need to say. Give writing a chance. Give us a chance. “Ability is nothing without opportunity” - Napoleon Bonaparte