Volkswagen/ Clean Air Act

URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/business/dealbook/thepotential-criminal-consequences-for-volkswagen.html?_r=0

The Potential Criminal Consequences of Volkswagen

This article is about the car company Volkswagen and the recent discovery by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that Volkswagen violated the Clean Air Act. The Clean Air Act is a government ruling on air pollution and car companies are required to certify their cars pollutants or emissions by doing official tests before they receive a "certificate" to be able to sell the cars. Volkswagen was basically caught cheating on the EPA tests because as it turns out, the cars ran one way on a test but ran differently (more polluting) when owners would drive them on the road. Volkswagen is accused of using a "defeat device" because what they did basically "defeat" the testing. This was done by using the complicated software and coding that is used to run car engines.

In my opinion, Volkswagen is cheating the government and its customers. They are lying to consumers, and falsified information about their products. Because the software is so complicated it shows that the way they cheated was by design. It's hard to believe that the leaders of Volkswagen did not know about the cheating. In fact, with the CEO resigning it shows that the car company not only cheated but has been cheating for a long time under the encouragement of their influential leaders.

This issue relates to government and politics because the Clean Air Act was passed by the US government as a law that is supposed to protect the environment and the public health. It is also a regulation of a private business sector because the law says that auto makers have to certify or test their vehicles and show that they are "clean" before they can sell to the public. Government makes laws to protect some people (car buyers) by regulating the actions of other people (car makers).

Lewisville Whataburger

URL:http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2015/09/16/lewisville-whataburger-dont-serve-police/

This past Tuesday night two local police officers from Lewisville, Texas walked into a "Whataburger" to grab something to eat. Expecting to get served, they were rudely turned down by one of the male workers stating, "We don't serve police". The two police officers left the fast food restaurant. The next day one of the police officers that witnessed the situation went onto a radio talk show and reported what had happened the previous day. The company "Whataburger” quickly caught word of the whole incident from news reports. Quickly, the fast food restaurant fired the employee that did not serve the police.

In my opinion this event is an example of a product of recent rising racial tensions between white law enforcement officers and African Americans in general. Such tensions were the source of unrest typified in recent large-scale riots in Ferguson MO and Baltimore MD. 

This event is relevant to our study of government and politics because it represents a negative side of the state of race relations in our country. In the US, some people may have the idea that we have now grown out of racism and the modern times, where the world is made smaller by technology and progress is more peaceful between race groups. Clearly, there still are tensions among races and cultures, and this is important to understand as part of both government and policy-making. Some people may believe that America has been successful at integrating cultures. Events such as those in Lewisville show that we still have a long way to go.

California Drone Bill Veto

Article URL: http://www.wired.com/2015/09/jerry-brown-shoots-drone-privacy-bill/

This past Wednesday California Governor Jerry Brown vetoed a bill on regulating drones from flying. This bill passed in the state Assembly with votes of 56-13 and then votes from the Senate, 21-12. These votes would've banned low flying drones from going onto private property, which most land owners wanted. "Drone technology certainly raises novel issues that merit careful examination. “This is what Jerry Brown wrote in his official veto message. The governor of California would like to look at things a little more closely before anyone gets too worried about this situation. Although some people took this as a shock, the drone industry was more than happy with the governor’s action. Then there are the citizens who believe that they have their right to privacy because it is their property and they should have that right, and quite frankly they would find them, quite frequently, annoying and nonsense to the environment.  There are the two types of people in this kind of situation, one: the neighbors who find the drones to be an invasion of their privacy; and two: the type of people who see the drone industry as flying moneybags. Most people are in it for the money, and drones are the big things now. There are plenty of people in the tech industry in California. I feel that Jerry Brown is appeasing the people so that they are able to keep their jobs and by keeping them happy will keep him in office.  This is a good example to our study in government because it’s about a law, the fact that it was vetoed, and that there were people for and against the law.