Prop 8 Today - US Supreme Court

Today is a historic day for the US as the Proposition 8 case will be heard by the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS).

This issue, although more popularized than in the past, is still quite controversial. The Proposition 8 case is about whether or not states, specifically California, have the authority to deny marriage to same-sex couples.

Steubenville Rape Case - Rape Culture

As I'm sure many of you have heard there has been a recent case decided in Ohio regarding two young men who had sex with a 16 year old girl while she was essentially unconscious. In case you haven't here is a quick summary of what has happened: Last summer, two young men (16 and 17) were out partying, and were allegedly seen dragging a 16 year old girl's body from party to party and committing sexual acts with her. One of the young men even took a video.

The two boys have been found guilty as of late, and the story has received national attention. This national attention, however, has its own consequences. While it encourages a conversation about rape and rape culture, it also exposes many of the attitudes we have about rape. This case in particular shows a worrying unwillingness to hold certain people accountable, and a desire to sweep personal liberties and justice for rape victims under the rug.

White People Are Being Systematically Disenfranchised

The Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) was a source of great controversy on Friday. Apparently after a presentation called 'Trump the Race Card', given by K. Carl Smith of the Frederick Douglass Republicans, an attendee commented on how he was proud of his people (white, southern) and how he feels they are being 'disenfranchised' (as well as some other very astonishing things). See the video below:

Huge Advancements in the Battle Against HIV/AIDS

I'm not sure how many of you have heard but there have been some amazing advancements regarding HIV prevention/treatment this month! This is especially good news and I thought an appropriate thing to blog about considering my past posts on sex education in the US (you can see them here and here).

Early in March, a baby in Mississippi was declared 'functionally cured' of HIV after being treated with a high does of antiretrovirals. This child is considered only the second person in the world to be cured of HIV. The first patient was a man named Timothy Brown, who received a blood marrow transplant (to treat his leukemia). Timothy received marrow from a person who is HIV resistant and thusly his blood cells became HIV resistant as well (the new ones produced by the marrow for those not scientifically inclined).

US Sequester, Economy, Etc. - Idea

So I know I already wrote a post on this but after some time thinking about this I thought I'd put out an idea to all of you wonderful people. We all know that the US economy is in a bind. It has been for quite some time now. I think it is fair to say the economy is in a better state now than it was 4 years ago (if you disagree...well I'm sorry). That being said, the US economy is no where as strong as I believe it could be.

Does anybody remember the reports from a few years ago that said that we (the US) were in almost as bad shape as The Great Depression? Since then it seems that we were not quite as bad off, but certainly we were in terrible shape. And people are still in 2013 saying that we are having the worst economic recovery since then.

Sex Education in the US - A Summary

Sex education in the US has been an area of interest of mine for some time. When I was studying Social Justice at Rutgers I was curious to find out the correlation between sex education practices and results such as teen pregnancy, HIV/AIDS, and transmission of other STI's. 

Looking at the recent CDC Surveillance report, I noted in another post that it seems that the South has a higher preponderance of HIV transmission. I also noted that there seems to be a correlation with the extensiveness of sex education (many southern states don't have mandatory sex education or STI prevention, or birth control methodologies taught). 

US Economy, Revenue, and Taxes

As almost everyone has probably heard, the sequester cuts have taken effect in the US. This has spiked an increase in attention to tax policy, because President Barack Obama and the Democrats have said that they will not accept any policy that does not have in it tax increases on the wealthiest of US citizens. Republicans on the other hand have said that they do not support any measure which attempts to raise taxes, especially on the rich because the Republicans consider them the job creators.

This is a major divide in US politics, and an extremely polarizing issue. This isn't anything new, but is being put particularly in the spotlight because of these recent events. I think now is a very good time to share some very important facts about the current state of the economy. Particularly in reference to the distribution of wealth and how this is or should be reflected in the revenue and tax policies. For starters why don't we start with the following video :