Operation Gratitude

Today I did not come to class until later because I had certain things to get done. However when I came to school later I found that our letters were still being collected. Mrs. Clazie collected an envelope full and I'm sure that would make the whole class happy to hear. It makes us proud to see posters on the wall and our support for the troops now it's just time for us to wait and see how much letters we can collect.

Operation Gratitude

Our community project to thank the soldiers has been going ok at the moment, even though we only have around 170 letters those letters are good ones that will make soldiers feel better about who they are as individuals. In the end what's important is quality and not quantity. I don't know if we are done campaigning because the classrooms we've gone to aren't growing in numbers but I've suggested to a couple of teachers so we can keep on informing people what we are doing. Mrs. Naif was happy with what we were doing and was proud that we came so that we could inform her class.

Operation Gratitude Continued

Today our group went to Mrs. Naif's ceramics class first period to inform them about our school wide thanks to soldiers. In fact the word has been growing bigger and greater than anticipated. in fact during Ap Lit., Mrs Clazie passed out some of the papers we had used to write some letters and I wrote another one to a soldier. It's great that we are doing this and tommorrow we'll try going out to more classrooms to raise awareness.

Operation Gratitude

Today during class we went out to other teachers classrooms to present what we had been working on for the past week, which was to get the 1000 letters to soldiers fighting for our country. During lunch some of us where at the booth getting people to send their own apreciations. I'm excited because we have a lot of work left to complete the goal but at the same time we hit the first day starting strong.

Operation Gratitude

Today in groups we discussed how we were going to go about telling other people in classes about this plan we have to send troops "Thank you" letters. Jorge Cortez, Chris Ashmore, and I are going to make it natural and explain what we are trying to do in terms of our goals to get letters from at least 1000 people. Likely there will be a few who won't listen to us but we''ll do our best.

Operation Gratitude

Today I finished up a poster that I was working on in class. The Poster says"Thank them for all that they do!". It was funny because Mrs. Clazie who is very patriotic and has a son in Afghanistan had a poster near her door or a flyer I think and I know the whole operation would probably sit well with her. I will make another poster on monday Since I saw very few up today around school.

Community Service Project

The song I thought about doing has been cancelled due to a busy schedule and a lack of time. I instead have put efforts into finding out what things can be shipped to the U.S. troops. The letters that are sent to troops have to be positive, uplifting, and all about the appreciation to the soldiers who serve the United States.

Casualties in Iraq

http://usliberals.about.com/od/homelandsecurit1/a/IraqNumbers.htm

Deborah White-usliberals.about.com

The war in Iraq although not as long fought as the war in Afghanistan has yeilded many casualties and deaths since its start. The stats. show that as much as around 5,000 soldiers have been killed since the commence of the invasion of Iraq. Besides those casualties there have been around 33,000 seriously wounded; casualties range from gunshots to car bombings. The civilain casualties of the Iraqi's dwarfs the damages done against the troops as the estimated list of casualties goes into the 600,000.

The genorosity of countries in the world

http://www.carolsvault.com/statistics-most-generous-countries/

anonymous-carolsvault.com

The donations made by many countries who need help counts up to many millions of dollars. The countries vary by which one gives the most depending on how they are ranked. The United States is one of the most giving countries in terms of the total amount of money they give but however it looks different through a different perspective. In terms of the average amount of money donated per person in the United states would make the country appear a little selfish as the ranking descends to a spot around the 20's.

Black Friday's estimated revenue

http://www.prevailingbuzz.com/2010/11/29/cyber-monday-sales-for-2010-encourages-estimated-100-million-americans-to-shop-online-cyber-monday-deals-extension-of-black-friday/

Roshanda Little-prevailingbuzz.com

The days after the Thanksgiving holiday are the most busiest days in comercial sales in the United States. It turns out that sales besides the shopping at stores on Friday is just one of the days with many things on sale. Monday after Thanksgiving, Today, is the a major day when people purchase many things over the Internet. It is estimated that $1 billion dollars will be spent on merchandise online today, overall bringing more stimulation  rise the long falling economy.

George Bush's Book

http://www.politico.com/click/stories/1011/bush_book_selling_well.html

Amie Parnes- Politico.com

It turns out our former President George Bush released a book about his time as President including Personal opinions on the leadership America now has. It was a public known fact that George Bush was disappointed when he found out there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. George Bush's book has been a success unlike his Presidency and has sold 700,000 copies in a week almost as much as the 800,000 books Bill Clinton sold when he released his book for the first time.

The National Debt.

http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

Ed Hall- brillig.com

It turns out that the major concern of the United States has been turned to other public matters but in fact the economic crisis we are still in as a country is not gone and it's surprising the attention in the media isn't focused on it. As of today is approximately a staggering amount of  $13,000,000,000,000 or thirteen trillion and most of that money is owed to other countries such as China for example. It is estimated that of the approxiamately 300 million people who live in the United States the only way to pay it all back would be if everyone paid their share of $45,000!

Sarah Palin for President 2012?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sheldon-filger/what-if-sarah-palin-was-e_b_784443.html

Sheldon Filger-thehuffingtonpost.com

Back when Sarah Palin was running for the vice-presidency alongside John Mccain many wondered whether she could be the Republican nomination for the Presidency in 2012. Some say she could be a dangerous opponent for Barack Obama since she does get much press and this could raise her popularity amongst the people of the United States. However other expert presidential analyzers claim that Sarah Palin wouldn't know how to run he resposibilities that are of a president nature and herself in such a position would be a complete and utter disaster.

Travellers might be scared away

http://www.metronews.ca/ottawa/article/692444--hotel-explosion-in-mexico-kills-guelph-man

The Canadian Press-Metronews.ca

A day ago in Mexico in a Hotel in Playa del Carmen 5 Canadians, many others, and plus 2 Mexicans where killed in a hotel explosion. The explosion  was not known but speculations have been made to explain the tragedy including the ignition of some kind of accumulated gas. The explosion rocked and shook not only the hotel but also the relations between Mexico and othe countries as safety is becoming a big concern for tourists and lately there have been too many deaths.

Why relations with Pakistan and India are essential for America.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/article883765.ece

PTI- the hindu.com

It turns out that the United States should be concerned with the way Pakistan and India view the country because they can be important allies or vicious enemies. It turns out India and Pakistan resent the United States for deserting their interests when they most needed the United States. Pakistan and India don't want America to leave Afghanistan in tatters because they don't want to have to face a problem that America could just leave behind for them to solve when they didn't have musch to do with it. If America starts something it should be done right.

Obama's trip to India

http://www.americasnewsonline.com/obamas-trip-to-india-nets-50000-american-jobs-supposedly-911/

James Fox - Americasnewsonline.com

President Obama has been in India on a trip to propose that the country be a permanent member of the United Nations which will be a major breakthrough in the country. Other business includes increasing trade amongst the two nations so that jobs can be created of as much as 50,000 new jobs for Americans as well as more for the Indian population. At the same time some don't know if Obama's trip is justified as in whether the cost of the trip will reap any profits since the trip is estimated to cost very much for his security as well as paying for around 30 planes to escort him.

What is going on with Afghanistan?

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.kaltoons.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/kal-lex-Afgan-war-web.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.kaltoons.com/wordpress/2009/12/kal-economist-afghanistan-cartoons/&usg=__LKdMlOUa3qlyDsCK2sW8b2fJFL0=&h=388&w=500&sz=278&hl=en&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=F0-6btKm-B2GmM:&tbnh=130&tbnw=167&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwar%2Bin%2Bafghanistan%2Bcartoons%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Dactive%26sa%3DN%26rlz%3D1R2ADFA_enUS382%26biw%3D1259%26bih%3D571%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=396&ei=0ObZTL37Noe2sAPQpKG3Bw&oei=0ObZTL37Noe2sAPQpKG3Bw&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:0&tx=50&ty=49

KAL- kaltoons.com

For nine years America has been involved in Afghanistan trying to take the country away from the Taliban and return it to the people of that region. However it has been 9 long years of war and some who don't see the plans of the US see the way America gets into Afghanistan as a sort of conquest. It looks like America went over there to invade the middle east spreading more trouble than there already was as civilians see there way of live get harsher.

Greater security on Airplanes

http://www.bradfitzpatrick.com/weblog/347/offensive-cartoons/

Fitz- BradfitzPatrick.com

It turns out that yet again in America some are thinking of doing full body scans at the airports on people but with more measures than before. These new measures are being considered to save lives and prevent terrorists  from blowing up airplanes where passangers travel. However when will the security agencies stop banning items because it seems terrorists can just about make a bomb out of anything.

The Republicans where an endangered species?

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-november-3-2010/who-wants-it-more----endangered-republicans

Anonymous-Thedailyshow.com

The retaking of the house by the Republicans in this last midterm election has been  a major decisive win for the party and some have even said the Democrats are at fault for their acquisition of the majority. Jon Stewart from "The Daily Show" provides a funnt and humorous take on how the mistakes of the Democrats fed the fuel for the Republicans to regain power. According to a one fellow the Democrats where working on the environment to help endangered species come back and guess who are the endangered species? None Other than the Republicans and they came back for good.

Swing voters: Are they persuaded?

http://www.gallup.com/poll/144065/fewer-swing-voters-2010-prior-midterm-years.aspx

Jeffrey M. Jones

It turns out that in 2010 there were less swingvoters than in past midterm elections showing that the voters are becoming more decided about what their vote towards policies and congressmen will be.  The statistics show that more Republican voters were decided on who they were going to vote for, as much as 86%, while the Democratic voters said they could be flexible until voting day as less were decided on their votes, 82%. Swing voters are important to the political parties' candidates who need as much votes as they can pick up; some would say swing voters can make or break an election.