Boredom= Boring Writing

Once again, I really have nothing to add to the blog world. I guess I would just prefer to discuss the horrendous health care bill that just passed in the Senate, but that would just be a waste of time. I could talk about the beautiful smack down that occurred in LA, but that would be too easy. I could spend the time discussing my lack of straight A's, but no one wants to hear me bitch. I have the option of talking about the lackluster holiday season with all of my family, but what would that solve? I think it would solve nothing, which gives me plenty incentive to not go any further. Maybe, I could talk about my new love of biking, but people reading this would think: "what took him so long?" I would describe the weak actions that took place in Copenhagen, but the Daily Show already covered that too well.

I have the option of discussing my year in review, but, will that really draw your interest? I think not. There is just so much to talk about, but I really have nothing to add. I mean I could add my opinion, but no one wants to listen to some underachieving undergrad. I could describe my problems, but that won't do any good. Man, I thought by this time in my life I would have something to add to the vast dialogue of the Internet; however, this has remained not to be the case.

The CSU was supposed to turnout better writers, but it seems that I have fell through the cracks and now I remain to be an incompetent writer. Oh, my bad, I forgot that no one wants to hear me bitch about my life. Everyone already has it tough and giving my "two-cents" of bitching is like watching a horror movie that makes you feel like shit later.

I apologize; I just slipped there. Wow, where did this blog entry go? I guess I did have something on my mind, but nothing of any substance. However, I find it funny and a little lame how the highlight of my day has involved writing this "entry" and listening to 3OH!3. But I think most of us could agree that this group is decent. Great, now, I probably just alienated the two people who may view this blog. Well, I hope everyone has enjoyed their holiday season.

Happy New Year!! I hope that 2010 treats you far better than 2009!!

A Little Nervous

I have nothing really to say of any significance. I wish that there was some cool and interesting topic that I could discuss, but I have nothing to offer this week. My focus is just on surviving finals. This is all on my mind. I have never been so stressed. I have three take-home finals, and ironically I feel more pressure from this. I wish I could explain why, but I can't. I'm just so bummed that I have nothing to write about. I'm too stressed to write anything of cachet. I have never been so frustrated with myself. I hoped that by this time of the semester, I would be writing about some avant-garde topic, but that remains to be far from the truth.

I hope that I survive this finals period. For the first time in my college career, all of my grades are up in the air. There are no guarantees that I will pass any of my classes, which is quite disturbing. I did this to myself, and there is no one I can blame. I failed myself and everyone else this semester. I find it harder and harder to discover what I bring to any situation. It is sedulous to imagine that this semester is coming to an end, and the weird thing is I don't want it to come to an end. I guess it's just to put off the inevitable, pending how bad my grades are going to be. Best of luck to everyone, during finals season.

I didn't follow through

On my blog entry last week, I made a point that I would write two blog entries per week and would start to edit my older blogs. However, I did not follow through on this. I really have no excuse. I believe that the "reason" for this involves my high level of laziness. I was just way too lazy to take a few minutes and write in my blog. I'm not looking to make an excuse, but just to express this high level of disappointment with myself.

This feeling of unremitting disappointment has continued over the past two weeks. I'm still doing major term papers the night before, and now I'm doing the wrong homework assignments. This would have been somewhat understandable if I were a freshman, but now that I'm in my fourth year, this is now abhorrent.

I thought by this time in my life, I would not be pulling these petty all-nighter's for my term papers. Pulling all- nighter's for exams is a different situation, but since I was aware of these papers being due months ago, it makes it even worse.

The reality is that if my grades stay on track, I will be graduating soon. These type of mistakes and irresponsible actions will not be acceptable once I start a career of some sort, and even now these actions are not acceptable.

However, on the brighter side of life, it is Thanksgiving. Despite my shortcomings, I still feel thankful for everything. I'm thankful for the support of my family and friends. I remain thankful for still having a job, and I'm thankful that I have the opportunity to help people when I work at my internship. I know that times are tough and life only seems to be getting tougher, but I still remain grateful for the chance to participate in what life has to offer. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving, and more importantly to get plenty of sleep.

I Want to Hibernate

Sleeping is one of the best activities to partake in. The reasons behind this statement are unadorned. First of all, sleeping is free. Second of all, sleeping is quintessential, since no one is around to bother me. I am an extremely deep sleeper. I can sleep through anything. Even my alarm clock does not always do the trick to wake me up, as this has caused myself to show up late to many classes and shifts at work throughout my life.

I find it funny when a selected group of people are in a constant quest for material possessions, I instead find myself working for the opportunity to sleep and relax in the comfort of my own home. Nothing is sweeter than being at home on my recliner, couch, or floor, sleeping. It is true, that the best things in life are free. Sleeping is near the top of this list, as being one of the top free things that any one person could attend to.

Due to my now "semi-busy" schedule, I find myself searching for the chance to relax in the confines of my own home. All I know is that I'm extremely excited that Thanksgiving break is near. I will have the chance to finally relax in my house, and sleep for more than four hours. Turkey and pies may be something to celebrate, but nothing is sweeter than the feeling of a nice, calming sleeping session, where the stresses of school and work remain at bay.

Since I mentioned Thanksgiving, I just want to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving, and to acknowledge the things that I'm thankful for. In this case, I'm thankful for my family and friends, having the opportunity to be going to college, my job and internship, and having the chance of making the world a better place with the gift of life. I may not have the life I want, but I still remain grateful for the life I have.

Trying to Find the Words

I hate this. I'm in a constant state of writer's block. I have no rhythm in my writing anymore. My grammar and punctuation placement has become worse this semester, despite the significant strides that were made in my writing last semester. I wish I knew what I could do to help break this quandary on my writing, but nothing has worked. I tried to just type out random statements on essay's, but this has not worked. I have tried listening to some favorable music to help myself get in the rhythm of writing, as this method did not work.

I feel and know that I can write, but the constant amount of mistakes that I continue to make is truly unforgivable. After surviving Professor Quill's class last semester, I believed that my writing had reached a new level that was untouchable, but this has turned out to be false. The reasons why this has become a false belief, involves what happened in class last week. The activity involved the entire class and the faulty sentences from everyone's blogs, which as a class we were required to correct. Let's just say that I had more than one entry in this activity. This went as far to include two of my own faulty sentences, which were listed right next to each other. I was constantly shaking my head in embarrassment, as I continued to identify my lackluster sentences. I really had thought by this time in my college career that I could write, but this once positive mindset about my writing has now greatly deteriorated. The fact is I have no excuse for my macabre writing efforts. There is still much work to be done, before I can even consider my writing to be up to the level that it was up to last year.

I love writing and all of the positive opportunities that it provides to express my ideas, concerns, and anything else on my mind. I vow that for the rest of the semester that I will edit my older posts, and will contribute more blog entries, so that I can continue to develop my writing. I'm thankful that my Professor sent me this wake up call.

Justice Was Not Served

I'm in shock, and I remain even more confused since the end of the 2009 World Series. The World Series this year was between the New York Yankees and the Philadelphia Phillies. It is hard to imagine that this one man, who cheated the game of baseball would have the opportunity to celebrate the end of a season with a World Series title. The person that I speak of is Alex Rodriguez.

Before this season had started. Mr. Rodriguez admitted to using performing-enhancing drugs to give himself an ever greater advantage to dominate his profession. It is a given that Rodriguez was a Hall of Famer before he had started to use performance enhancing drugs in 2001. Rodriguez would eventually stop using these performing enhancing drugs in 2003. His reasoning behind these actions, all had to do with the pressure of a 10-year, 252 million dollar contract that he signed with the Texas Rangers in 2000.

Rodriguez would express his admission to ESPN reporter Peter Gammons about his use of performing enhancing drugs and the reasons behind his decision to use these substances:"When I arrived in Texas in 2001, I felt an enormous amount of pressure, felt all the weight of the world on top of me to perform and perform at a high level every day". (1)

This type of reasoning is understandable, but at the same time it does not exculpate the use of these substances. If, Rodriguez did not want the pressure of such a high stake contract, he should not have signed that brobdingnagian type of deal. Rodriguez had a choice, he knew what he was doing as he embarked on a risky procedure to help meet the high expectations of his record setting contract. It really makes me cringe when Rodriguez uses this reasoning to justify his use of performance enhancing drugs.

The fact is every single person on the face of this planet is faced with pressure, it may not be the same level of pressure, but it is still pressure. I work part-time, intern for a State Senator, and are apart of a variety of Student Organizations, but I'm not trying to cheat the system to advance my own interests. I would rather fail and live to fight for another day, than succeed and live with the constant feeling of guilt, as well as the feeling of regret for my actions.

The pressure that engulfs the average individual is a mixture of internal and external circumstances. In regards to the internal circumstances, it is based off of the decisions that we have control of. This includes having a choice at the selected situations at hand, which is basically an elective pressure. Internal pressure can, for instance, consist of joining school organizations or being apart of a school team.

On the other hand, External pressures arise from situations that we cannot control. An example of external pressure, can consist of the tough economic environment that is around today. The average worker has no control over the outside factors that are involved in the fate of their own job security. Due to these external factors, it puts additional pressure on that person to thrive in the terrible economic environment. This inability to control the outside forces only complicates the struggles of the average individual, and their desire to advance their status in the world.

However, in this case Rodriguez had internal pressures before him. He had the choice of signing that contract, and being at the center of living up to the largest contract in sports history, which would later be triumphed by a larger contract that he signed in 2007. Rodriguez had a choice in his actions to sign the contract, and he had the choice to train with integrity to live up to that contract. Still, Rodriguez decided to cheat the game of baseball.

Rodriguez did not deserve to win a ring, but I guess the unethical side of this world is allowed to prevail. This does not only go for Rodriguez, but I feel the same way about people of every profession that go about their ways to cheat the system intact.

It makes me pessimistic that once I actually enter my future profession that people are going to cheat their way to the top because of their own insecurity of failing within the system. I know that people need to survive and will do anything to advance their own well-being, but I would rather be down and out knowing that I did things the right way, than living with the continued pressing guilt to achieve my own potential success. In the end, it all comes down to making the right decision, with the choices that are available. All I can say, it is going to be a long winter, and knowing that Mr. Rodriguez has a ring will only make it harder to have faith that justice is served in our World.

Source: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/baseball/mlb/02/09/arod.admits/index.html#ixzz0WFSUpYIm (1)

Where were the Parents?

Last Monday, I was in the MLK library studying with a few friends. It has now become a weekly thing where every Monday, a couple of friends and I meet up and study at MLK to try to start the week right by studying in a nice sequestered environment. The feeling of silence makes it possible to help me focus, and actually get some work done, which otherwise would be near impossible in any other situation. I just seem to have a problem of studying at home, as there are too many distractions that await, but now getting back to the story.

Just as my friends and I were finally settled in to our table on the fifth floor, suddenly the fire alarm goes off. There remained to be incessant flashing of the alarm lights, and a nice uproar of people making their way to the stairs to exit. It was hard to imagine that this was happening. I was not sure what to think, and I tried not to rush to judgement, but then about an hour later another friend of mine walks into this local coffee shop, where my friends and I were attempting to study, with some news about the fire alarm being pulled. The reason why the fire alarm was pulled was due to some kid pulling the alarm. Just as I heard that I started to feel a little bit angry at the fact that some kid destroyed my relaxing study area. Yes, I know I'm complaining just like a little kid, but when I'm struggling to find the right place to study, it makes it hard to feel any type of understanding towards the kid. It is just other people in the library were trying to do the same thing and be productive in their studies.

I know that kids will be kids, but the question I have has to do with the Parents. Where were the Parents? Why were they not watching their kid? I know that I do not have the full story, but it is still hard to understand that this kid would be able to pull the fire alarm. Pulling a fire alarm is serious business, and when it is a false alarm that can make some people very frustrated. Yes, that includes myself. However, it was a false-alarm, but I just hope for future reference that these Parents are in complete control of their kid. Kids will be kids, and life goes on. So, in this case I will stop complaining and welcome this new week, as well as new month. May November be better than October. Good luck to everyone in this critical and defining month.

A Nice Change of Pace

Pain=Happiness

People are afraid of pain.

However, I am not afraid anymore.

It felt so right, despite the circumstances.

She was worth the sacrifices.

She helped me grow, and for that I will forever be thankful.

I hope that she knows that I was sincere.

I did find her perfect in every way.

There is nothing I wanted to change.

There was a reason I fell for her, and because of this I never wanted her to change for anyone.

She was real and that was all that mattered.

Before I met her, I thought love was an illusion.

However, this illusion became reality. I then became the fool, but a fool in love, nonetheless.

No grade, no amount of money, no level of accomplishment, could trump this feeling.

I felt like I had already climbed the highest mountain or made that breakthrough discovery.

I may feel full of pain, but this is a joyful pain.

Even though it feels like my city is burning down, I remain hopeful that I will rebuild it.

This feeling of repeated shock still remains, but I will always hold her in the highest regard.

I wish her the best, she deserves the best, and whoever is lucky to be with her, better get this memo.

The reaction to your writing may sound brazen, but expressing these type of feelings should be hackneyed, and will help to create the necessary growth needed to advance in this world. Let your heart speak to the world!!

Surviving The Daily Grind

This past week I have been thinking about my future. I guess I have come to the realization that my undergrad will be done in just over the next year. I find it hard to imagine that this time spent in college has passed by so fast, and the baleful part that remains involves the upsetting job market that awaits. However, with this ever shrinking job market, I find it easy to fathom that I will be unable to find the job I want after I graduate. Still, I have come to the conclusion that no matter what job I land out of school, it will still be an irreproachable job, as it will come down to what I make out of the situation. During my time working in retail, I have come to be humbled by the fact that this job does matter, and that if I cannot handle this job, then I will not be able to handle anything that life throws my way.

So, as this job market continues to get worse, just remember that whatever job that is available, it is up to making the best out of every job situation. I know that it is easy to state this on my blog, but it all comes down to embracing the times of our struggle and making the best of it, since the climb up the mountain top will only remain steep in the future. There is a reason why all of my fellow classmates have made it this far in life, as they have persevered to handle the daily grind that has come their way. I know that in the coming years, life will only be more difficult, but it is important to remember that with the right mindset and work ethic that things will change for the better.

Procrastinating On Midterms

This procrastination has to stop. It is catching up with me. Well, there are two things I need to do in order to make this change happen. This first includes staying off the website known as Facebook. This website just has a dynamism over me, for which I'm having a problem shaking. It is quite frustrating that this website is taking time out of my life like this. It is just those pointless applications and the time I take to posting articles on my page, which takes the most time.

However, it is not the website that needs to be blamed. Only I can make the changes necessary to get past this obstacle. The other thing, which I have finally come to determine creates this procrastination is my lack of ability for me to focus when I'm at home. I'm just never able to focus, which is for a multiple amount of reasons. So, my main focus will now be to just get all my homework done at school. I know that if I actually stay a little later studying on campus, I will be able to get the work I want to get done.

The reason why I'm writing about this is because this past week I put off studying for two midterms, which were back to back, and with the same Professor. Before Monday of last week, I had done none of the reading for any of the classes and was just going off what I knew from lecture, which of all I attended. It was extremely difficult to balance studying for both midterms, as there did not seem to be enough time to internalize all the information. In order to best prepare for these midterms, I just avoided Facebook and studied at school later. The grades for these midterms are not out yet, but when I was focused at school studying, I felt I was getting something done and was beating this terrible habit.

Whatever my grades happen to turn out for these midterms, I remain hopeful that I have learned my lesson. It is climacteric that I get my studying schedule in order, and to take the necessary steps to beat this habit, instead of blaming other factors that I can control. So, now I'm off to go study for a midterm that I have this Tuesday, but if you are suffering from procrastination, spend a little time and analyze what is causing this problem, and what can be done to solve it.

Yes, I am a "Traitor"

This morning, I turned on my computer and checked the daily headlines. I was browsing around the Internet and found a very interesting story, which had to do with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) deciding on the site for the 2016 Olympic Summer Games.

There were four finalists for this event: Tokyo, Madrid, Chicago, and Rio de Janerio. The first two cities that were eliminated came to be Tokyo and Chicago. It then all came down to Madrid and Rio De Janerio. Madrid would end up being eliminated and for the first time in the history of the South American Continent, a South American country will be hosting the Olympics.

Brazil will be the second Latin American country to host the games since Mexico did back in 1968. This is a monumental occasion for the country of Brazil and the Latin America countries in the region. It will be the formal ideal situation where Brazil, like China in 2008, to showcase their rising nation.

It is now time to address my "traitor" status, which has come to hit me, since I first professed my congratulations toward Brazil for scooping up the 2016 Olympic Games. Yes, I was not in support of the Chicago obtaining the bid, it was not due to any type of anti-Midwest sentiment toward this region, but I find it hard to take this bid seriously when the division between the citizens was so tempestuous.

However, this was not the main reason why I was excited for Brazil gaining the games. My main reason has to do with the lack of site distribution that has occurred since the Modern Olympics were first started up in 1896. I was looking over some numbers and I found a disturbing disparity of how many times the U.S. has hosted the Olympics games, which was a staggering 8 times. When I saw this my jaw just dropped, and after browsing through all of the other regions of the world that got to host the Olympics, I saw no country from the South American Continent had hosted the Olympic games. So, due to this reasoning, I find it prodigious that Brazil gets to host the 2016 Olympic Games. It is about time that this booming country and growing Continent firmly get to be on the World stage to show all that they have accomplished.

So, please if you happen to be upset that Chicago didn't get the games, remember that America has been more than lucky to host the Olympic Games.

Can Despair Create Happiness?

During my Freshman year of College, I had the opportunity to take part in a Drama class. In this class, we watched a lot of movies, trying to analyze what type of camera angles were being used, if we could really believe the acting of the characters, and in this case we would have the ability to critique the movie. There was this one movie, which really grabbed my attention, it was not due to the phenomenal acting, the strong story line, or the cinematography, but it was because of this one statement from one of the characters.

This movie was "Little Miss Sunshine", in this film it gave a detailed analysis of the complex inner-workings of the average family, as this one family would experience their own set of complex problems. Toward the end of the movie, there was this scene where Frank (Steve Carrell) was speaking to Dwayne (Paul Dano), about a comment that he made about wanting to skip through high school.

The dialogue is presented as follows, thanks to imdb.com: (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0449059/quotes)

"Dwayne: I wish I could just sleep until I was eighteen and skip all this crap-high school and everything-just skip it.
Frank: Do you know who Marcel Proust is?
Dwayne: He's the guy you teach.
Frank: Yeah. French writer. Total loser. Never had a real job. Unrequited love affairs. Gay. Spent 20 years writing a book almost no one reads. But he's also probably the greatest writer since Shakespeare. Anyway, he uh... he gets down to the end of his life, and he looks back and decides that all those years he suffered, Those were the best years of his life, 'cause they made him who he was. All those years he was happy? You know, total waste. Didn't learn a thing. So, if you sleep until you're 18... Ah, think of the suffering you're gonna miss. I mean high school? High school-those are your prime suffering years. You don't get better suffering than that. "

The basic meaning of this dialogue is centered on the belief from Frank, that the years which Proust suffered through helped to make him stronger and wiser from the adversity he experienced. The time that Proust was happy and successful, as Frank explains were a waste, since he was not able to learn anything of any real substance. The question now remains: Do you buy this?

I do buy this statement to some extent. The reason why I take this statement seriously has to do with the idea that when we are faced with conflict or unfavorable circumstances, it causes us to get out of our comfort zone and take the actions necessary to survive the situation. Then the after- effects of this selected situation helps to prepare us potentially for similar future conflicts, which most likely will take hold. The lessons that we take from these past obstacles can spill over into other areas of our lives as well.

In my life I have had to overcome many obstacles to get where I am today. Even though I'm in no position to brag, I still feel that through the obstacles, which I have had to overcome have put me in a better position to succeed in the future.

In this case, I will give an example of how a situation of uncertainty and adversity has helped to put myself in a better position today. Going back again to my Freshman year of College, I was saddled with what felt like extreme pressure to do well at school, being that I was the first in my family to go to college.

The Fall semester started off terrible, I had no idea what my Professors expected or what I expected from them. I had this constant fear of flunking out, being that I previously heard horror stories of how Freshman usually flunk out. All of these new found pressures had a deep and negative impact on my psyche, as I entered in to the intense college environment.

However, there was one defining moment during this first semester for which would change me forever. In my Political Science class, we were assigned back in August, a 10- page research paper, which had to be based on the analysis of any political ideology. The only problem that occurred was that I put off writing this paper until 8pm the day before it was due. I already had my sources, but no real understanding of the subject that I was writing about. Despite these palisade type obstacles I plugged away at attempting to write a decent research paper, which at the time was my longest. I then had finally finished at 5am, and when this happened I suddenly felt a sense of accomplishment, despite having the feeling that this was not my best work.

However, I still had this feeling of Sanguineness, which I had never quite had before. The reason for this feeling as I later analyzed involved overcoming this once unthinkable obstacle of not being able to meet a college level deadline, and that if I could create a paper of decent standing with little effort and time put into it, that I could handle any situation that will be put in front of me in the future. This was a powerful feeling and a feeling that has remained with me to this day, when a new obstacle comes up. Despite having this moment of dark despair, I was able to fight through it, and because of this I'm better off for it to this day.

Even though I did not get an "A" on this paper, my "C" felt like an "A", being that I knew it was not up to my potential. Success and a little adversity can go a long way in still helping a person grow, but there is no way that it can measure up to the struggles that we all suffer through.

So, just remember that the times that you are suffering through, will end up paying dividends in the future. Facing adversity head on, despite the result, will in the long-term make the average person better off, but in the end it all comes down to if we are willing to put in the work necessary and are willing to take the bumps and bruises that come with the territory to advance our own well-being. I would hope that everybody, in every situation, in every background, and in each phase of their life will remember that there is some good, which comes from suffering through adversity, and just to remember to embrace the struggles which you are involved in, because you will be better off for it. This may sound naive or idiotic, but just think back to a time where you were faced with an uphill challenge, which you may have thought was impossible to accomplish, but even with these obstacles you were still able to push through and accomplish the goals you were seeking to meet.

Success is beyond fantastic, but there is still so much more that we can take from the adversity that we face. It may not be the best way to get where we want to go, but in the end we will be better off for the difficult situations that we get to experience.

It Never Ends.....

During this past weekend, I had the opportunity to see first hand the desolation that plagues our environment. This activity consisted of helping to clean up Upper Carr Lake in Salinas. This activity was in association with the statewide Coastal Clean Up that took hold this past Saturday.

Members of the SJSU Environmental Resource Center (ERC) as well as students from around the greater area volunteered their time to help clean up this heavily neglected Lake. It was quite disturbing to find the wide amount of litter that engulfed the Lake. The things the people would put into this lake ranged of the most random things. This included finding street signs, tires, rims, bikes, mattresses, crap bags, desks, paint cans, strollers, and everything else that you can imagine. All in all, as a group we found over a 1,000 pounds of trash just by cleaning that one Lake. This is just an eye-popping number that caused me to have a weird churning feeling in my stomach. This feeling developed in the way that I felt a sense of guilt that our fellow community is doing this. As this once marvelous Lake has been diminished of its purity, and the innocent animals that are being threatened is quite a perturbing scene.

This experience helped me understand unlike anytime before that as a community we need to continue to work together to stop these things for happening, and continue to put the work in to our environment to have it remain pure and pristine.

There is still much to do to right the wrongs of the past, but there still is hope for the rest of us, when groups like the ERC and the many volunteers take time out of their busy schedules to help make our planet a cleaner place.

A New Season Opens

The feeling of optimism is quite a sensational feeling. Today was one of those days for the millions of football fans around the country, as the NFL opened up their season. Thirty-two teams started the day with the idea and the hope that this could be their year. This is the ultimate feeling for the fans, players, and owners. The feeling that anything can happen brings upon smiles and excitement for all of these groups.

I too felt this feeling of optimism as my San Francisco 49ers started their season. The way that this team finished last season on a high note was remarkable, but the one thing that helped to bring about these positive feelings had to do with the official selection by the front office to name Mike Singletary the permanent head coach. The fact is in order to solidify a team of any sport or in any other situation which requires teamwork involves the necessity to have a strong leader, who everyone respects and is willing to risk everything for the betterment of the situation. Mike Singletary makes his players, fans, and the front office believe that he can get the franchise where it needs to go.

The team under Singletary has shown verisimilitude that it is truly developing a winning attitude. Hopefully the 49ers continue to produce results, just how they did today by defeating the Arizona Cardinals. When I was watching the early part of today's game against the Arizona Cardinals, there was a brief moment where the announcers showed the various billboards that the 49ers have displayed as a part of their new marketing campaign, which displayed key quotes that Mike Singletary made last year when he first took over as interim head coach. One of the billboards and most talked about statements that Singletary made was "I want winners". This statement has proven to be a staple under the identity of the end of last year's team, as this has carried over to this season for this moment.

It is unerring to think that this could be the year that this team could make the playoffs. The NFC Western division is already so weak and this team has the talent, but more importantly the mindset to officially change up the power structure of the NFC. It should be an interesting season.

Where are the phone calls?

Over this past year, I have had the opportunity to intern for one of California's Representatives. The Representative that I have been interning for is State Senator Elaine K. Alquist (D).

During my time interning at this office, I have been able to see in bits and pieces how the real world works, what problems constituents are going through, and just in addition how constituents are dealing with the continuing cuts in the State budget.

In this time of pliable budget cuts, our constituents have mainly voiced their concerns on the topics of health care and unemployment. These two very important issues have really taken this office by storm, as our constituents have heavily explained their views and what they want done in regards to each of these issues. However, the issue of funding higher education has not been greatly addressed by our constituents.

The point I'm getting at is that in addition to the towering pressure that is already being applied by Organizations such as Students For Quality Education (SQE) and the California Faculty Association(CFA), there is another way that we can help these organizations apply an additional amount of pressure to all State Representatives.

The simple way to do this is to call both of your State Representatives every week and voice your opinion about the budget cuts or your support on SB 218 and AB656. The other thing to help make this method work to the fullest extent is to inform people around you to do the same. If a State Representative's office is constantly experiencing phone calls on this subject for instance, it will be a great message sent to that State Representative, causing them to even take a harder look at the actions they are about to take.

This may not be the most demiurgic idea, but being that I'm already in this environment, it would be amazing to constantly hear from our constituents on the critical issue of rightly funding higher education. A simple phone call can make a difference, but an overwhelming amount of phone activity can bring a District Office to pay even greater attention to these problems at hand. So, if you have a few free minutes, feel free to call your representative and let them know what's on your mind.

The Top Continues Not To Sacrifice

In this unprecedented time of budget cuts in the State of California there are millions upon millions of people suffering throughout the State, however, the leaders of our State still fail to comprehend the problems that the rest of their citizens are suffering from these cuts.

According to SFGate, State Senator Leland Yee (D) proposed SB 217, which had to do with limiting the pay of UC/CSU executives who are making over $200,000. This policy would only be implemented during times of economic hardship for the State. SFGate continued to report that back in May, this bill had support in favor of 35 to 3 in the State Senate. However, this support would be changed by the hard hitting lobbyists of both the UC/CSU systems. These lobbyists were able to effectively inveigle the Assembly Education Committee to reconsider the bill.

The argument that was presented to this Committee consisted of making the points that it would most likely cause these Executives to quit, and that because of this result it would cost more in taxpayer dollars to be used to recruit new talent, and in this case would make it harder to recruit the top Executives.

Let's be real here, these are valid points made by the lobbyists for the UC/CSU system, but just because they are lucid points does not necessarily mean that they are the right points. The reason why these points are skewed involves the lack of reality that these Executives are experiencing. They (Executives) continue to drive home the point that Students should pay higher tuition, that layoffs, and pay cuts are necessary for their faculty, but when it comes to their own self-interests they are unwilling to not take the hit with the rest of us.

Where is the leadership? Can someone please explain to me where the leadership is? I'm looking for it, but I'm still not able to find it. Everyone else is making less, Students are paying more and getting less, but while this is all going on the Executives of the UC/CSU systems cannot even muster up enough willingness to go along with the cuts like everyone else.

However, as much as I would like to continue to blame these Executives for getting away from these pay cuts, the blame all comes back to the State Legislature. They actually had a chance to show that everyone will go through the budget cuts together. It sets a bad precedent that one group is allowed to skate by these cuts unharmed, but while the rest of the Students and Faculty suffer.

So, does this situation float your boat?