The Times 4/20-4/23

Monday-
A story that caught my attention right away was the one about the horse races in Hungary. Since I studied abroad there last semester, I was probably more interested in this story than the average reader would be, but I think it was well done. The writer did a good job of making this story a cheap-horse-turned-hero story, which I think could interest people even if they have not been to Hungary.
The story about the American troops in Afghanistan was interesting as well. It was written in a different format than most news stories, as it read more like a story. I think that’s a cool idea, sort of showing almost a day-in-the-life sort of story.
There were several crime stories in today’s paper. One discussed the legalization of marijuana, which is becoming a big debate across the nation. Another showed a worrying result of the falling economy: a rise in crime. This article looked at a town in South Carolina where the police are having trouble with people committing more crimes like stealing. It is interesting to think that with the economy down more people are “having to resort” to things like stealing to feed their families.

Tuesday-
One article that explained a sort of ridiculous situation was the one on the Obama administration investigating the CIA interrogation techniques. Apparently, Obama told the CIA that although they are being investigated, there will be no blame placed on them for the “mistakes” they have made. This seems sort of impossible: if you find mistakes that someone made, aren’t you by definition saying they screwed up? It seems rather weak to be saying that they are going to investigate the CIA’s practices and then do nothing about them. This will be a good story to follow and see what they do find and what they actually do about it. I bet there will be more done than Obama is limiting himself to now.
A story about a legal case caught my attention: judges are deciding whether or not to say that depictions of cruelty against animals should not be protected under the constitutional right for free speech. It seems that this law would put videos or pictures of animals being hurt on the same level of things like hate speech. I’m not sure how I feel about that. But the article brought up an interesting point: if you ban depictions of animal cruelty, does that also ban depictions of things like bullfights? Would this law keep bullfighting images out of classrooms when students want to learn about traditional Spanish culture? I think that the “slippery slope” argument works well against this law.

Wednesday-
The article about the trial of the Somali pirate brings up some worrisome issues. I wonder if this man could actually ever get a fair trial in America. It seems almost like it could turn out to be a trial just to make people feel like justice is being done. But are they going to go back to Somalia to find witnesses that could provide testimony for the defense? Are they ever going to actually find out the defendant’s age? I think it is telling that they don’t know that, because if they can’t even figure out his age, how are they going to find enough evidence to actually put on a convincing defense? I am not saying that this man should necessarily go free, I’m just skeptical as to the worth of this trial in a country that is up in arms against this man’s country and the piracy that he (allegedly) committed.
There seem to be a lot of law-related cases in this issue (and actually in past issues this week as well). There was a ruling that made it so that police don’t have a universal right to search the cars of people that they just arrested: they either need to think that they are in danger of the arrested person grabbing a gun or something out of the car, or believe that there is evidence in the car for the crime they just arrested them for. I’m not sure how much of a different this will make, because I don’t know how broadly the second reason for checking out a car could be used. Couldn’t an officer almost always say that he had reason to believe that evidence of the crime s/he is charging the suspect with was probably in the car?

Thursday-
One big story on the front page was the one about the election in Lebanon. It seems crazy how much this election is based on money. It basically seems that whoever has the most money will win. But sometimes it seems like that’s similar to how it is in our country. Not to the same degree, of course, but candidates definitely have a huge advantage if they have more money than those they are running against.
The story about the Taliban in Pakistan had an amazing picture with it, which made me start wondering about the photographer. It looks like he took the picture from like ten yards away from the Taliban fighter who had probably just killed the police officer lying on the ground. Was the photographer scared for his life? Was he hiding behind a bush or something? Did he ask the Taliban fighter “hey, could you just stand over that guy and look scary for a minute?” seems like a pretty intense job.
The article titled “slump creates lack of mobility for Americans” seems to make a few assumptions that can’t necessarily back up. It is written on the assumption that lower rates of people moving definitely show that people don’t have the money to move or aren’t willing to move because they are worried about the economic climate of the country. While I think that this could be a valid explanation for why people aren’t moving, it is possible that something else is at least partially responsible as well. The writers just don’t seem to take that possibility into account.