I am moving to another place

Dear readers,

Thank you for your time reading my first blog ever. I hope you enjoyed reading it. You probably liked some of the articles I have written about so far, others, I guess, you found not as good as the rest of the articles.

I, personally, see what I like and what I do not like (or should I say dislike) about my blog. That I will not share with you but will keep it in my mind instead. After all, whatever a person gets involved with, there are always some weaknesses, related to the particular involvement, experienced based on his or her incompetence and/or lack of experience.

Of course, I will tell you where you can find my new website: just click here. There are not particular articles yet except for the welcome one. I will write a new article as soon as possible

My Opinion About the War in Georgia

This week will be discussed for years to come because of the military conflict in Georgia's province of South Ossetia. I expect a lot of interpretations about it in the future, and it cannot be otherwise. After all history can be interpreted differently no matter whether or not we want it.

I am not going to say which country was good and which country was evil in this conflict. I am going to express my unbiased opinion instead, because, in my opinion, every country's goal is more or less the same - power, influence and wealth.

This week I somehow have not been using the Internet, and this time my observations are based more on what I have seen on CNN rather than what I have read on the Internet and/or books. Every day, along with watching the Olympic games on MSNBC, I have watched CNN reports on the crisis in the Georgian pro-Russian province of South Ossetia.

While watching as much as I could on CNN concerning the war there, I tried to play the role of an ordinary person who does not watch politics as much as people whose life is obsessed with it. To put it in a nutshell, I tried to let CNN reporters and influential politicians tell me everything without pondering as much as I am supposed to in order to try to discover the truth.

As a result I came to the conclusion that Georgia and USA were good and Russia was evil. Russia was so evil to me that I got the impression that a Third World War should be initiated, and this time every country should unite against them, and crush them once and for all for all the evil it has caused so far.

I don't remember anybody in CNN reminding their viewers the fact that Georgia attacked South Ossetia in the beginning of the month. And even if CNN reminded this fact, it sure did not do it in a way that people know about it.

Georgia have managed to play their pro-Western cards right for the past several years. They are one of the Top 3 U.S. allies in Iraq with their huge contingent there (I think CNN mentioned that Georgia troops in Iraq rank first in numbers); and they seek membership in the European Union and NATO. In my opinion, those steps are crucial in preserving their territorial integrity despite Abkhazia's and South Ossetia's separatist sentiments.

Speaking of territorial integrity, I cannot help but smile at Condoleezza Rice's statement while she was in France that Georgia's territorial integrity should not be put into question. What about Serbia's territorial integrity, Ms. Rice? Wasn't USA one of the first countries that recognized Kosovo?

What about Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili's statement that Russia actually wants to replace his government? It makes more sense than the Condoleezza Rice's one but it could also be considered an exaggeration because in this military conflict the Western world is more sympathetic to Georgia, and such statement could further mobilize the Western world into taking measures against Russia.

On the other hand, observing Russia's mainly unfriendly relations with former Soviet republics that are currently being run by pro-Western governments, I cannot say that what Mr. Saakashvili (his name is not Shashkavili, Mr. McCain) said was false.

Possible solutions

The situation is very delicate. I don't see this conflict as just a political and a social one. It sure is political and social: Russia would like Georgia's breakaway provinces to secede from Georgia; they violated Georgia's sovereignty for the sake of a pro-Russian population, and I believe that USA would have reacted in more or less the same way if there are pro-American people who want to secede from Mexico in Northern Baja California if those pro-American people are being attacked by Mexican troops. However, what I see as a more consistent reason for Russia's invasion in Georgia is economic interests. There are energy transportation routes in Georgia, and of course Russia would like to take control of them.

As ABC and other media pointed out, there are three key pipelines that run through Georgia. The biggest one, Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC), is considered one that bypasses Russia. Russia imposed gas price hikes in recent years, and countries in Europe and around the world started to demand gas that does not reach Russia. That, of course, enrages Russia because oil is fundamental in its geopolitics.

Why Georgia decided to attack South Ossetia and thus create a reason for Russia to invade its sovereign territory and bring down the BTC pipeline and make British Petroleum temporarily take offline two of its pipelines in Georgia (information taken from ABC News: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Story?id=5595811&page=2)? That question, in my opinion can be answered only by people who are rather aware of what is going on in South Ossetia. Who knows - maybe Georgia attacked its breakaway province because they noticed certain supply of arms provided by the Russians.

Back to the Presidential Elections: On the Issues

Both Barack Obama's and John McCain's presidential campaigns are relatively in a standsill. Some people are rather disappointed of that because they feel that the only time when the two biggest presidential hopefuls come out and speak is when it is actually time to vote. However, I cannot fully agree with such thinking. What can John McCain and Barack Obama do right now? Both parties' national concentions haven't passed yet so it is too early to flex their political muscles as intensely as they are about to in a month or so. Now the only thing that they have to do is remind from time to time of their political and social record and of their stands on the issues. In my opinion, they are currently saving their energy for after their parties' national conventions, so you can definitely expect debates and countrywide tours similar to the ones that took place during the primaries.

Which one of the two is having an advantage to the opponent

when it comes to electorate, reputation and issues?

That's a very good question that needs to be analyzed carefully. On some aspects, Senator Obama is having an advantage, and on other aspects it is Senator McCain the one that is more consistent.

Electorate

John McCain is ahead of Barack Obama in terms of attraction of one's core electorate. It can hardly be otherway since the Arizona senator locked up his nomination 2-3 months before the end of the primaries and caucuses, whereas Mr. Obama had to fight for his nomination with Hillary Clinton till the end even though it became almost entirely clear that he was going to be the Democratic presidential nominee right after he took the lead in the superdelegates. The former First Lady made him spend too much money on primaries and caucuses instead of letting him focus more on attracting the party's core supporters and independents and Republicans afterwards. Of course, I don't mean to blame her for anything because she was having certain chance to get the nomination after all, but voters in the last 5-6 states that cast their ballot on the Democratic primaries or caucuses could have voted without pondering that much - just like the voters in the Republican primaries and caucuses that took place after Mike Huckabee said that he was done with his presidential campaign.

The result: A comparatively great percentage of Hillary Clinton supporters would not vote for Barack Obama in November. There is always a percentage of supporters of a politician, who lost the primaries, that decide to vote for their party's opponent. However, in the very beginning of a campaign for general elections this percentage is not that big. Because of that and because of the fact that John McCain could attract even more Hillary Clinton supporters in the course of the campaign I can say that Barack Obama is in a bad position right from the beginning of a campaign. This beginning, I repeat, is attracting your core electorate.

Reputation

Barack Obama praises himself for being a defender of workers' rights when Hillary Clinton was working as a corporate executive in Wal-Mart. He also praises himself for being a child of different parents: a mother from Kansas and and a father from Kenya. He often tells us stories of his childhood. Those stories are often connected with his race and also with patriotism. Unfortunately, he has to deal with racial issues, and people who question his patriotism, which takes him much time instead of focusing on the issues. There is still racism in the United States so there are some people who are not going to vote for Mr. Obama because of his race even though they do not confess. It is the same with Hillary Clinton's gender. In terms of age, both candidates have disadvantages: some say that Senator McCain is too old, others say that Senator Obama is too young, inexperienced and naïve.

Another disadvantage in Barack Obama's reputation is his name. I read once an article in Yahoo that presented results concerning his name. Too many people admit that when they hear his name the first thing that comes to their mind is terrorist or Islamic fanatic. Moreover, a relatively high percentage of American voters still think that Barack Obama is Muslim although he reiterated his Christian faith by mentioning that his daughters were baptized and by being a member of a church. This church, however, did him more bad than good.

And I cannot miss the scandal that involved his house and garage in Chicago that was bought for too low a price with the help of Antoine 'Tony' Resko - a person with bad reputation who also helped him with his state Senate campaigns. Barack Obama admitted that his connection with Mr. Resko was a boneheaded mistake but in my opinion it will definitely be used by the McCain campaign later on.

Meanwhile, Senator McCain's reputation is not as bad-reputation-free as you might think it is. He may have locked up his nomination early compared to Barack Obama, and he may have had most Republican voters on his side, but to me he is alienating himself from his spiritual colleagues (the veterans of the war in Iraq and their families), indepentents who want the troops out of Iraq and liberal Democrats who support gay rights and abortion. Of all those electorates, I think he should be sorry for losing a big percentage of the veterans' electorate by voting against the New GI Bill, i.e. the Post-9/11 Veterans Education Assistance Act of 2008, that became law. He called the bill too generous but let's not forget that its generosity accounts most for soldiers who have been there for at least about 36 months (see page 1 of the factsheet: http://www.gibill.va.gov/S22/Post_911_Factsheet.pdf or go to http://www.gibill.va.gov/ for mor information). The less a post-9/11 veteran has served the less percentage of the total amount of money per person.

Another thing that the Obama campaign will attack is his speech about the veterans having come home from Iraq in 2013 as victors. Those ones of you who watch Countdown with Keith Olbermann know what I mean - John McCain has had different statements about the end of the war in Iraq for the past 2-3 years. He even hinted once that the war could last for decades to come. What is your final statement about the end of the war, Mr. McCain, and what is your comment on your previous controversial statements? That's what the American people want to hear from you, not a speech whose target is the naïve independents.

Issues - which one of the two is more consistent

in what issue, in my opinion

The war in Iraq: Barack Obama! Barack Obama because he has been consistent in his standing against the so-called War on Terror from the very beginning. Hillary Clinton voted for the war in the past and that automatically made her a loser in this issue in the Democratic debates. John McCain has several different statements when it comes to the war's end and although he is consistent in his standing for it.

Energy policy: I believe that John McCain is more consistent but it is controversial! When it comes to addressing climate change, protecting environment, developing new technologies, producing cars (fuel efficient and the futue electric ones) and imposing requirements for buildings, both John McCain and Barack Obama have comparatively the same stands. Although it is completely disputable, I support John McCain because he stands for energy independence.

Energy independence could be good and could also be bad because:

1. Dollars will not be given abroad that much. Thus it could prevent the currency from devaluation.

2. We don't know for how long USA could deal with being energy-independent. In other words, we don't know how many oil resources the U.S. have.

3. It is unclear whether or not nuclear power plants, what Mr. McCain stands for, are environmentally acceptable. I am not an expert and I cannot tell for sure.

Also, when it comes to windfall profits tax Barack Obama's plan of imposing windfall profits penalty on oil selling at over $80 per barrel is too ambitious to me. Who is going to sell oil at under $80 per barrel with current oil prices at about $120 per barrel? In my opinion, windfall profit tax will not scare oil sellers and prices will increase as a result of those windfall profits.

Those are two extremely important issues. If I analyze the rest of the issues, this article will be rather long, so if you are interested in what I think of them, you can always email me at dimitar.naydenov@quinnipiac.edu and I will create a new article that focuses on the other numerous issues.

How History Can Make a Myth of a Political Globalization

Globalization is a nice process in today's world. It has various aspects: economic, cultural, sociological and so on. Its basic principle is integration regarding those aspects. Countries and national identity are presumed to remain. The final goal is a better world without bashing past and today's national, ethnic and communal belongings.

My political, economic and social beliefs completely overlap with such tenet. Unfortunately, after millenia of incompatibility between peoples, this tenet has become nothing more than a basically, but not fully, accomplished mission. Rome was not built in a single day: same thing with globalization. However, I can never see it happen not simply because of political, economic, social and financial inequality but also because of people's mentality. My meager experience has proven it so far: my observation indicates that people always want to have a strong leader but then again they are not satisfied and make plans on dethroning him or her. Thus there is no such thing as a perfect order: from the tribal one to communism and capitalism there have always been, and will always be, complaints.

In this article I am going to discuss the European integration. It first came to some imminent people's minds in the second part of the 19th century. Unfortunately, scenario is completely different - the French-Prussian War and later on the two World Wars after which it finally gained significant popularity thanks to the Marshall Plan and the Monnet Plan: plans that advocated European economic integration in an exhausted and destroyed Europe. There were a lot of meetings and controversies between leaders of Western Europe (Central and Eastern Europe were under the Soviet sphere of influence) but the result of the meetings was the today's European Union.

The today's European Union is perceived as a sort of an equivalent to the United States. In fact, one of its founding fathers back in 1950s offered it to be called the United States of Europe. There is shared sovereignty between member states, the latter's economies are interconnected, customs taxes do not exist anymore, people move freely from one country to another just like U.S. citizens move from one state to another. Amazing! Now French know they are French but they have completely forgotten their long-lasting enmity with the German people. And not only that: from now on borders will remain as they are.

Since Europe is the continent where I was born and since it is the continent that I am most acquainted with based on what I have seen life, on TV, read in books, and discussed with friends - I can tell I cannot see the desired result. Two Europeans from different countries who greet each other subconsciously know that the person facing them is foreigner. It is not necessarily hatred what comes to their mind in this particular situation but unfortunately certain form of prejudice still exists.

What is extremely disturbing is separatist sentiments that exist in some regions in Europe where, for example, a country's minority is majority. There are plenty of examples: Albanians in Western Macedonia, Hungarians in Romania, Basques in Spain, Albanians in Kosovo and others. Those are examples of majority-minority regions where the local majority wants their rights promoted to autonomy and why not independence.

Such questionable local patriotism exists in Belgium - a country whose capital city is both national and European Union capital. Belgium consists of Flamand-speaking, French-speaking and German-speaking citizens. It is today's most decentralized European state and its future is vague. Residents in Dutch-speaking Flanders and French-speaking Wallonia can't get along and neither can't their politicians who act on national level for the sake of their region and not for that of the country. Flanders and Wallonia are two regions that differ not only in language being spoken but also in the state of the economy: the Flanders economy is in good condition while the Wallonia experiences difficulties and besides, Wallonia residents are not as well-off as Flanders residents. So what we have in Belgium today is two linguistically and economically different regions and a federal government that resigned because of its unpopularity and unability to cope with the issues.

That happens in one of the founders of the European Union: Belgium. Prognoses vary but the nowadays' status quo and roles are least likely to be preserved. Among the basic most popular ones are further segregation of the two regions into two different countries and confederation similar to the one in Switzerland.

Do people, besides Belgians themselves, care about the future of the country? I have no concrete answer to this question but in my opinion they have to care. The most insignificant reason why people do have to care is the fact that Belgium's capital is the EU capital as well and having Belgium vanished from the European map may symbolically mean the beginning of the end of the European Union. It may turn out to be that the European Union is a myth: that after all borders in fact do matter.

Another reason why people have to care in my opinion is that a possible segregation might cause a chain reaction, regardless of the fact that Europe is integrated in a way that there's no need for any regional independence, autonomy or certain form of sovereignty. In this case I believe that the state of the economy doesn't matter because richer regions will want to secede from poorer regions in order to spend their budget on whatever they want without caring much about the poorer region.

A third red flag is the size of the overall European bureaucracy. More independent countries or autonomous territories means more governments, ministries and agencies which therefore is more costly. Most people are generally unaware of those details and they will not pay much attention to them when considering seceding. All the more, the struscture and the status quo of the European parliament are to be changed accordingly. This change leads to a pretty complex structure that is much more difficult to analyze by political scientists, let alone the people who will be so confused that they would not be able to figure out who is in charge of what because certain institutions' functions will partly overlap, to say the least.

I consider lobbying the fourth red flag: weaker lobbyists will have less opportunities to have an impact on most decisions in the European parliament. Thus stronger lobbyists' impact will increase and as a result they will be the ones to determine laws and conditions regardless of who is in control of which branch.

Possible decisions that could solve the problem in Europe:

1. Consensus: The most popular solution but is it easy to achieve?! I don't think so as long as funds are not injected in poorer regions' economies so that it, at least partly, compensates the financial inequality. Job opportunities should also be taken into consideration in order to reduce unemployment wherever it is necessary.

2. Help from abroad: Such possible European crisis does not satisfy the U.S. and Chinese interests. On the contrary, they need the European market as much as the European market needs them, all the more that Europeans generally buy goods at higher prices than do Americans. Oil prices are a good example. Like I said above, more countries and autonomous territories lead to more governments which leads to more institutions which leads to more governmental expenses and citizens' taxes. Besides, in my opinion, help from abroad in the form of political pressure or certain incentives is not difficult to achieve.

3. Change in the educational system: According to my observations, educational system is problematic in Europe. Reform in the educational system is necessary in the form of richer interpretation of history, greater attention paid to promoting not only national but also European belonging is a good start. That could be achieved in some elementary middle and high school subjects. The European educational system should also focus more on foreign languages or at least English so that the language barrier is no longer a problem. All this is a rather complicated task but for the sake of the harmony in the relationships between the European peoples, it has to be achieved.

4. Measures to increase national, cultural, social and financial integration, of course without any use of coercion: I can't see such measures to have any effect without educational reform. In my opinion, they have to be initiated later.

Mysteries in a Recent Military Operation

Thursday, July 3, 2008, is another historic day. On that day 15 hostages were liberated from FARC - a marxist-leninist terrorist organization operating on part of the territories of Colombia, Venezuela, Panama and Ecuador, according to http://www.fas.org/. The terrorist organization is most famous for its activities in Colombia. Among those 15 hostages 3 are American citizens, 11 are Colombian citizens and 1 is a person of double citizenship. That person is the one whom the media paid most attention to. Of course, I am talking about Ingrid Bentacourt. A charismatic woman, a former presidential candidate, a person of Colombian and French citizenship, a loving mother, a dedicated politician - those are few of the characteristics that this woman is presented with.

Six years ago presidential campaigns in Colombia were on their way. Presidential candidates were giving their messages to the Colombian people on television, on radio and on open air. Two were the main competitors for the honorable position in the Columbian government: Alvaro Uribe and Ingrid Bentacourt. The latter decided to campaign everywhere - even on territories that were under the rule of FARC, and that was a mistake that even she admitted to have regreted to do it although not entirely. The consequences were, the guerilla kidnapped her and she has never been seen again for the next six years.

Mysteries

What a boneheaded mistake, some would say, to campaign on a territory that is under the rule of a terrorist organization that is famous for having about 700 people as hostages! Some of those people who have this statement in their minds may be asking themselves why exactly Ingrid Bentacourt decided to campaign there. Is it because of bravery? Or is it because of stupidity? Some probably even see certain form of conspiracy, that is, she knew the whole scenario from the very beginning but wanted it to happen because it served certain interests like the Israeli ones, for example, and those conspiracy theorists will indicate the Israeli secret services involved in the recent military operation as an argument of their statement. Unfortunately, wherever where there are Israeli or people of Jewish origin involved, conspiracy is present in some people's minds. However, there is no need to comment on this particular hypothesis since it is more of a search of popularity rather than anything else. I cannot call it a mystery. After all, Ingrid Bentacourt is not the only politician kidnapped by FARC so far. The terrorist organization's 700 victims are mainly politicians. Some of them are even alleged to be FBI agents.

What I call mystery is the military operation that led to the liberation of those 15 hostages. It was a military operation that did not cost lives or injured people - the Colombian army just managed to save them without the FARC's consent. Or at least it is the general information that the media gave us. If this is true, it is worthy of a Rambo-type American action film in which the good eventually vanquishes the evil like it always does.

Here's what the military operation was all about described by Colombia's Minister of Defense Mr. Santos:

The hostages were divided into three groups, so the
guerrillas were persuaded to bring them all together at a point where they would
supposedly be transported to the south of the country to be under the direct
orders of Alfonso Cano, 'the rebels' top leader... It was arranged that the
hostages would be picked up at a predetermined site by helicopters belonging to
a non-existent humanitarian organization, and for Cesar himself and another
member of his staff to travel with the captives to personally hand them over to
Alfonso Cano... But the helicopters, which were really army aircraft, picked up
the hostages and took them to San José, the capital of Guaviare.

The operation was called "Jaque" or check as in chess: a good name for a good military operation. Was FARC in a check situation though? Are they in a check situation now without those 15 hostages, because with operations like this their overall hostages may gradually decrease thus weakening their influence in the region. Those are hard questions although most people believe that this is the beginning of the end of this marxist-leninist guerilla.

No matter how professional that military operation was, I still cannot imagine it as one similar to those in most of the American action films. It's not that what is happening very often in those films can never happen in reality and it's not that I question the professionals' brilliant skills. It's just that I can hardly imagine a long-time famous guerilla being fooled that easily. Believe it or not I read several times the Defense Minister's words and I was more than amazed at FARC's stupidity.

My doubts increased after I read the next day what the French newspaper, Libération, wrote about Ingrid Bentacourt's liberation. First of all, I think that the French people's extreme pride of what they have done to rescue a compatriot are rather exaggerated. I see it more like part of their nostalgia toward those years when France was one of the greatest powers in the world. In my opinion, this is one of the things President Nicolas Sarkozy will be remembered with in the future - having such type of foreign policy. After all, Ingrid Bentacourt is 100% Colombian. There is nothing French in her origin.

Libération cited a Swiss radio, Radio Suisse Romande, that mentioned something that will probably remain unknown by most of the people, just because the mainstream media did not pay enough attention to it. The radio stated that Ingrid Bentacourt and the other 14 hostages had actually been freed for money in exchange. RSR is talking about around 20 million dollars, most of them having been paid by the United States. One of the reason is, the three freed U.S. citizens were actually FBI agents, according to the radio that even mentioned FARC whose members confessed to that.

If what the RSR said were true, I would not assume that it is the beginning of the end of FARC. 20 million dollars is a lot of money, especially for a guerilla. What is going to happen with FARC in the next few years is probably the biggest mystery. I am having certain doubts that the members of FARC were losers in this particular situation but I hope I am wrong.

Nevertheless, even if we assume that RSR is telling the truth, good thing that this truth is not known by everybody because in my opinion, certain military operations should be kept in secret. At the end of the day, it is better for certain things to be kept in secret.

Supreme Court's Decision on Gun Rights

The day is June 26, 2008. It is a historic day for the American system of checks and balances. Since the enactment of the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments in the U.S. Constitution, this is the first time the Supreme Court interpreted the Second Amendment.

The right to bear arms has always been an issue in the American history. Even in a more peaceful environment, as the 21st century is, that right is not out of the Americans' agenda. In a country where there is much attention on what is written in the Constitution and, provided that it is mentioned there, the right to bear arms cannot be a disregarded political, judicial and even a business issue.

What the Supreme Court ruled today will doubtlessly be included in the history books. In my opinion, the today's Supreme Court ruling is the beginning of a continuous debate on the Second Amendment. It is not that it has never been a debate, but from now on, more and more justices appointed by America's future presidents are expected to be scrutinized by the media on how they stand in the right to bear arms.

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" is said in the Second Amendment. This awkward sentence is among the major reasons for the creation of the debate. It appears that the people are Militia. In a time when the American people were fighting for their freedom from Great Britain, they were truly Militia, so that is I believe is the reason why the Second Amendment presents the people as Militia.

In my opinion, what the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution says is that the American people are directly involved in the security of their free State and that is why they have the right to bear arms. And by American people I mean each American citizen: including mentally retarded, criminals, murderers and others. Good thing the Supreme Court ruled that some laws can in fact encroach on phrases such as "cannot be infringed", as the website www.usconstitution.net points out. Thus mentally retarded people, criminals, murderers and other groups of that kind could be stripped of the right to bear arms as it is unthinkable to consider them involved in the security of the Land of the Free. However, this ruling leads to endless debates and interpretations of the U.S. Constitution, especially after the today's ruling against Washington D.C.'s 32-year ban on guns [which ban] excludes those guns being owned before the 1976 ruling.

It appears that Washington D.C.'s ban on guns cannot in fact encroach on the cannot-be-infringed part of the Second Amendment, opponents would say. However, the Supreme Court ruling on the so-called encroachment involves only some and not every encroachment. The other side of the coin is that this is an outstanding way the Supreme Court justices found in order to interpret the Constitution in a way they find most convenient so that their lifetime judicial service can hardly be impeached! On the other hand, the encroachment ruling leads to the immortalization of the U.S. Constitution thus making it compatible with every generation. That's why there are two types of justices in the Supreme Court: strict constructionists and judicial activists. The former are conservative justices. In other words, they are justices who interpret the Constitution literally: for example, the right to bear arms cannot be infringed regardless of the time we live in. To the latter, the judicial activists, the Constitution is a living document: for example, we do not need guns in 21st century.

In my opinion, today's Supreme Court decition on gun rights must not surprise anybody for at least two reasons. First of all, of the nine Supreme Curt justices, five are strict constructionists: Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Chief Justice John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, and Anthony Kennedy. The rest are judicial activists: Ruth Ginsberg, Stephen Breyer, John Stevens and David Souter. The former voted for the strike down of the District of Columbia's 32-year-old ban on handguns as incompatible with gun rights under the Second Amendment while the latter voted against the strike down. You can see it on page 3 of the following published document: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf. Justice Antonin Scalia said that the individual right to bear arms is supported by the historical narrative both before and after the Second Amendment was adopted. He also said that the Constitution does not permit the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home. In the minority report, Justice John Paul Steven pointed out that the majority would have us believe that over 200 years ago, the Framers made a choice to limit the tools available to elected officials wishing to regulate civilian uses of weapons which evidence is nowhere to be found.

Those are two typical strict-constructionist and judicial-activist opinions and only represent the current status quo in the U.S. Supreme Court. However, I somehow doubt that there would be a way different decision if judicial activists were more than strict constructionists. They probably would not discuss the Second Amendment in such a situation. In my opinion, if the majority of Supreme Court Justices were judicial activists, they would not make any decision on the Second Amendment unless the gun rights ban had already been enacted not just in the District of Columbia, a rather small part of this big country, but also in vast territories of the United States of America. However, even under those two conditions I cannot see them ruling other way because gun rights involve money as well. A ban on handguns in most of the states would hinder the development of the business connected with the production of handguns and therefore would serve as a prerequisite for a possible creation of a handguns black market.

What I am saying is that the right to bear arms shall never be infringed in USA unless the Second Amendment is eliminated from the Constitution which calls for a new constitution and such a decision will never be endorsed by the American politicians and people. I am not saying that the U.S. Constitution should be rewritten. What I am saying is that I see the Second Amendment as a main reason for the creation of a never-ending but fortunately not a grave debate in a powerful country.

Gas Prices or the Prices That Control Prices

Gas prices have always been an issue since the beginning of the use of gas-operating devices. They have always been not just a political issue but also an economic, a financial and one that concerns the security of a country, that is, the most important issue for its existence.



Throughout the years gas prices have suffered a significant rise. And, while their rise in the past was generally based on the fundamental economic principle of supply and demand, nowadays things do not look that easy. There are currently so many factors that have a certain impact on gas prices that even some economists struggle in figuring out why they rise or decrease. Factors such as: the U.S. dollar's value; the global warming; North Korea's missile tests; the wars in Iraq, Israel, Sudan, even the temporary unrests in Nigeria - are among the contributors to the rise in gas prices, let alone speculators - people who unrealistically raise those prices.



At first sight, those so-called factors are not just illogical - it is preposterous to consider some of them even a slight contributor to the rise in gas prices. I am about to make some hypotheses why everything matters nowadays when it comes to gas prices.



Let's pay attention to North Korea's missile tests. What first comes to mind is that those tests can threaten the world's security and/or can cause the world to unite and crush the Secret State. The second thought immediately goes to the trash can. Those beliefs preached by the United Nations, as much respect as I have toward them, are naïve. A famous British politician once said that Great Britain does not have eternal friends but eternal interests. I endorse this statement. Great Britain is a country and from this point of view it is not at all different from North Korea, the United States of America, Germany, France, China, Brazil, South Africa and so on. So, the North Korea's communist government launched missiles thus somehow showing the world what its interests are. In other words, they want to show how mighty and frightening they are to their enemies as a result of which they expect that the latter will give them whatever they want.



That immediately created an opportunity to raise gas prices. In this particular situation, I see only speculation. In other words, missile tests were presented by speculators as some kind of a possible military conflict between the United States, Japan, China, Russia and the two Koreas and, since such conflict between the six countries involves gas, which then causes higher demand, speculators then take the initiative to further rise its prices. After all, wars cannot be waged without gas. Military vehicles, like every other vehicle, run on gas.



The now-and-then unrests in Nigeria, on the other hand, decrease the supply which is another factor that determines prices. When supply is low, prices rise. Unfortunately, supply is not among the most important factors in today's value of the barrel. Saudi Arabia is about to rise its supply but people are pessimistic about a possible substantial decrease in gas prices. The booming economies of China and India are a huge obstacle not just for the environment's beneficial condition but also for the decrease in gas prices since there is increased demand for gas in those two countries.



In this particular situation, gas prices can hardly decrease. And, with the fact that oil gayzers will one day be depleted, things get even tougher when it comes to lowering gas prices. Oil-producing countries will not miss the opportunity to get more profit from something that one day will not give them profit at all.



The gas prices issue is so complicated that several decisions can be made in attempt to curb them and still none of them can be effective. The simplest one is boycott, that is, people stop buying gas for several days. However, it is not as simple as it looks like. Everything that we find at the supermarket and take for granted was delivered there by a truck driver from far away, and trucks run on gas. Besides, it is preposterous to think that so many people will be boycotting since there are so many commuters and those commuters have a family to feed.



Another decision is for countries to find [an] alternative producer[s] so that demand for Chinese goods will be lowered which will most likely bring its economy to at least a standstill. However, China is such a great producer of goods and it sells them so cheap that no countries can reach the supply and prices that China provides unless a new economic organization like OPEC be established. Its slight difference will be that its purpose will be production of goods that will be similar to the Chinese ones in terms of quality and prices. However, that brings the issue of building plants for the production of those goods along with cheap labor. This cheap labor cannot be established in first-world countries like Great Britain, USA, Canada, France, Germany and so on unless the state provides those cheap workers with privileges such as free food every day, free electricity and water and insignificant taxes. Such tactics are about to enrage the local population that pays for those conveniences, to say the least.

Another decision is for countries to gather at a special meeting and discuss the issue with mostly China and India but talks should involve each country. After all, in today’s economy countries are interdependent. In this special meeting, what has to be taken into consideration is mutual investments, average salary per worker in state-sponsored factories and plants along with the local living standard. The purpose of such a summit will be to understand where every country’s economy is going to and figure out what measures should be taken so that gas prices decrease and people all over the world live as well as possible. It should all start with solutions referred to the countries that most significantly increase the demand for gas. If a particular solution obliges a country to lower its economic development, then economic or material compensations from countries that import goods from there are to be initiated on the basis of the amount of goods being imported. As to the private sector, conditions will of course remain the same. Thus not only could gas prices decrease but pollution as well.



In my opinion, one thing is for sure. If gas prices continue to rise, measures that I mentioned in this article should be taken into consideration. Disadvantages such as importing not as many goods as it would be without those measures could be curbed by signing an international treaty that includes those conditions mentioned above. This international treaty will expire as long as gas prices lower as much as it is desired and/or when alternative energy such as hydrogen or electricity starts to be widely used. Even if my proposals are not the best ones, something should be done because people all over the world are starting to get furious. Electric cars and trucks are not a solution yet and if gas prices continue to rise with the same rate, things will get way worse.