Max Rice Post

This is a Max Rice post. It is a Max Rice post because it has a very clever title and it doesn't entirely concern our wonderful class American Studies. I hope Max isn't mad at me. Any way, my post is about the Baltimore Ravens. The Baltimore Ravens are a great football team. There defense is always a top rated defense and this year we finally have a good offense, that's why we are going to the AFC championship. I have to say, the game against the Titans this Saturday was extremely nerve racking. I was so scared, it was tight the whole way through and the Ravens caught a number of breaks. Ray Lewis, my man, he had 11 tackles and one forced fumble. This is why the Raven's defense has been so good for so long, the one common denominator, Ray Lewis. Also, we do have The Ball Hawk, Mr. Ed Reed. He's really good, but where was he Saturday? I didn't really see him make any plays. Flacco also, he really keeps his cool. If you've ever seen him in an interview after the game you would be able to see how cool his demeanor is for such a young quarter back. He's also the only rookie quarter back to every win not only one playoff game, but two. Thank you Max Rice for setting the precedent that its ok to sometimes write a blog post that doesn't concern AS.

iPods, and why won't the stop changing?

IPods, everyone has them and everyone has had more than one. Most people at least, there are a few who are so careful that theirs haven't broken. However, I have broken my fair share of iPods. I have also tried to go without one for awhile, but its very hard. I think for a lot of people, an iPod is a safety blanket. When your in public just walking around or hanging out, it gives people the impression that your doing something. Also, how much cooler does a person with an iPod in their ear look than one without? The answer is a lot cooler, and that is why a lot of people cannot live without an iPod. When you finally convince your parents to buy you yet another iPod, you arrive at the apple store either disappointed or very enthused. The iPods have magically changed in the time you've been away. They've gotten smaller or changed shape from a wide rectangle to a very long one. Or they have grown on the inside, having more gigabytes or the capability for movies and photos. For some people, this is great news. There are no more of their old out of style iPod, their parents are forced to buy them a new and improved one. For people like me, this is devistating. I liked my old iPod, why do they have to force this new one upon me :(? Also, where did the old ones even go? Surely the did not sell all of their 2nd generation nanos. They must have disspeared, or evolved into new ones. Who knows? To me, its a mystery.

What Would You Do?

Before getting sidetracked by the fact that anamericanstudies.com is blocked, I was going to respond to the Choose Your Own Adventure blog post. Because I cannot read the whole post, only glimpse the first part from my homepage, I will create a situation and ponder about what I would do in it.We will set our scene in World War II Nazi Germany. If I was a non-Jewish person, witnessing people being loaded onto a train surely going to a Death Camp, I wonder what I would do. I'd like to think I'd do anything to help, but I honestly do not know. Would I endanger myself and my family to save another? However, if I was Jewish and in a Death Camp I know I would have done everything in my power to escape. I would have tried to rally everyone up and get them to rebel against the guards. I'm pretty sure that although the Nazis had guns, the Jews outnumbered them in the Death Camps. If I knew everyone was going to die anyway, I'd try to maybe jump some of the guards, get there weapons and do my best to escape. After that I'd lead my people to other Death Camps and free those Jews as well. I know looking back, all that sounds so easy, and it probably would not have been, but I'm sure I would have tried. This situation is truly a "do or die" situation.

AnAmericanStudies.com is BLOCKED??

It is 5th period and I decided that I'd get ahead on my blog posts so I logged on. I decided to first comment on one of the posts on anamericanstudies.com, but to my shock, the blog page was blocked! At first, I could not believe my eyes. I thought that I must have made a typo, but alas, I found that no typo was made. New Trier has truly blocked anamericanstudies.com by deeming it inappropriate. I do not understand why blog, made by our two fine AS teachers, could possibly be bocked. I feel like many websites that can be used as learning tools are blocked by our school. One pain in the butt is YouTube. I understand why YouTube can be distracting for students, but also is a key tool to use for many projects. Blocking YouTube deters us from learning. I think that the school should allow students working on a project to be able to use YouTube and other websites normally blocked. Also, they should really not block every website that has an inappropriate word on it. It blocks too many.

Do we Trust our own Government?

Through all our discussions in American History, I feel like a people have a general distrust for the Government. Whenever there is talk about the limitations of Civil Liberties, people act like the Government is out to get us. I wonder, why is that? Isn't the Government here to protect as, are we not a Democracy, for the people by the people? If we in fact are, then why do people have a fear of our Government and what it can do? I think that if they want to wiretap our phones, why should we oppose them? Shouldn't they be doing it to keep us safe? Shouldn't limiting free speech be something to protect us, rather than being a tool to suppress and control us?  My main question is, is there a reason people distrust our Government so much and are these reasons justifiable? We elect these people and they are Americans like us too, why should they be feared?