Unfiltered Ocean

Today, Rep. Eric Swalwell became the second candidate (behind Richard Ojeda) to drop out of the race for the Democratic nomination. To Swalwell's credit, his decision was very levelheaded. "After the first Democratic presidential debate, our polling and fundraising numbers weren't what we hoped for, and I no longer see a path forward to the nomination." Instead, Swalwell will focus on getting reelected to his seat representing California's 15th District in the U.S. Congress. Now that Swalwell has exited the race, my hope is that some of the other candidates running will see the light and drop out as well. With 23 candidates running for the Democratic nomination, the field is too crowded. With that said, here are 16 candidates who I think should drop out: 1.) Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO). Sen. Bennet is unknown to most people. When he talks, he sounds kind of like when Cameron Frye from Ferris Bueller's Day Off is on the phone, imitating Sloane's father...

Like most Democrats, I will end up voting for whoever is the nominee for my party. I would like to think we learned our lesson back in 2016 - I know I surely did - however, I am worried about who might end up getting nominated. If someone is going to be the Democratic nominee in 2020, they cannot be the nominee overwhelmingly on the basis that they can supposedly beat Trump. Former Vice President Joe Biden fits this category. Yes, the Democratic Base has Biden crushing Bernie Sanders and all the other candidates in the polls right now, but it is not the Base that decides who wins the Presidency. If that were true, we would have President Hillary Clinton right now. Instead, it is Independent voters (who make up a voting bloc larger than both the Democratic and Republican Parties) and people who are dissatisfied with the status quo, people who are probably not wanting to back someone who represents the status quo of the Obama administration. Though one big part of the reason why...

America, listen up. I don’t care what party you’re in, what religion you worship, nor do I care what the color of your skin is, nor do I care about your gender. If you’re an American, you know that tomorrow is an important day. Tomorrow is a chance for you to vote for who represents you in the House of Representatives and in your State House. For the lot of you, tomorrow also includes a chance to vote for who will be your State Senator, Governor, other Statewide positions or Senator. These positions, and, who fills them, are important. They decide what kind of taxes you pay and how much. They decide how your hard-earned tax dollars are spent. They decide what priorities our country and our states have. They have more control over our lives that you realize. I know this from personal experience. In 2017, our Congress decided that the Federal Perkins Loan, which was established in 1957 to help low income students pay for college, was no longer needed. In 60 years’ time, o...

This is my final endorsement list for the 2018 midterm elections. Any other endorsements I make will be on my Facebook page. I don't have the time to give detailed information about every single candidate. And I'll admit, I'll probably miss a few candidates that really deserve to be talked about more. However, you can google all of these people. Regardless of my shortcomings on researching the candidates and what not, all of these people that I'm endorsing are good for working class people and are interested in ensuring that all of their constituents have equal opportunity and can live decent, dignified lives. Gubernatorial Races: Alaska: Mark Begich California: Gavin Newsom Colorado: Jared Polis Florida: Andrew Gillum Georgia: Stacey Abrams Hawaii: David Ige Idaho: Paulette Jordan Kansas: Laura Kelly Maryland: Ben Jealous Michigan: Gretchen Whitmer Nevada: Steve Sisolak Ohio: Rich Cordray Oregon: Kate Brown Pennsylvania: Tom Wolf (and John Fet...

This is my endorsement list for the state of Nevada. S enate: Jacky Rosen. Nevada deserves a Senator that will look out for their best interests and that's Jacky Rosen. Unlike Sen. Dean Heller, who first said he was against repealing the Affordable Care Act and then backtracked and has consistently tried to gut it since, Jacky Rosen supports the Affordable Care Act, but also wants to ensure that everyone can afford health care by putting caps on prescription costs and limiting out of pocket costs. Nevada deserves a Senator who won't try to take away their health care, but instead try to make it better. Furthermore, Nevada deserves a Senator who will stand up to President Trump. Sen. Heller not only failed to do so when the ACA was almost repealed, but he also failed to stand up when alleged sexual assaulter Brett Kavanaugh was appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court without thorough vetting. Sen. Heller sent a message to his constituents through his vote for Kavanaugh tha...

This is my endorsement list for Senate elections happening all over the country. I will not cover every election, but I will definitely try to cover the elections that matter to me. Senate Arizona: Kyrsten Sinema. Arizona also deserves a Senator who will be pragmatic and balanced. She has an established record in Congress as a moderate. That'll be helpful when dealing with a Republican President (or a Republican controlled Senate). There are things I dislike about Sinema, such as the fact that she voted in line with Pres. Trump's position on legislation 59.5% of the time. However, it reflects her bipartisanship and a very Arizona sense of being a Maverick, like Sens. John McCain and Barry Goldwater before her. Nevada : Jacky Rosen. Nevada needs a Senator who will stand up and protect their health care. Sen. Dean Heller voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Not only that, but Sen. Heller has been a part of the Republican cabal to sabotage the Affordable Care Act at ever...

This is my list of endorsements for the 2018 Elections in the State of Oregon. My endorsements are specifically for the gubernatorial race, Oregon's 2nd Congressional District, and the statewide ballot measures. The races in Oregon's other Congressional Districts aren't competitive, so I'm declining to endorse in those races. Governor: Governor Kate Brown. First, I respect that Knute Buehler is running as a pro-choice Republican. That takes a lot of nerve in this day and age. However, I can't vote for him. Buehler supports Measure 105, which would repeal Oregon's sanctuary law. That alone for me is a non-starter, as law enforcement resources are limited as it is and the potential for racial discrimination is high if police have to start looking for illegal immigrants. Also, I question Buehler's pro-choice record, as he voted against HB 3391, which ensures that abortion will remain legal in Oregon if Roe v. Wade (1973) were to be repealed. Gov. Bro...

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints recently decided that the term "Mormon" would no longer be acceptable to use in most circumstances by either members or by non-members. The only acceptable areas of use would be in official documents such as "The Book of Mormon" or in historical context, such as "The Mormon Trail." Instead of calling it "the Mormon Church" or even the "the L.D.S. Church," the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints would now prefer members and non-members alike to refer to it by its full name or in short as "the Church" or "the Church of Jesus Christ" or "the restored Church of Jesus Christ." If I were a member, I would try to respect that decision, as it was told by God to President Russell M. Nelson, who is considered by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to be a Prophet of God. However, I find the new designations, specifically "the Church of Jesus...

This blog is almost exclusively political, with some religious undertones as of late and the occasional pop culture reference. But today, I'd like to take a moment to write about someone I considered a role model. When a celebrity dies, I normally feel some sadness for them. But I get over it pretty quickly because I never knew them personally and like the rest of us, they're human, and all of us eventually meet our maker one way or another. The world continues to spin with or without us. Anthony Bourdain, however, was the epitome of cool. He got paid to travel around the world and try new things, which for an impressionable adolescent growing up isolated in the middle of the Pacific Ocean was mind-bending and exciting. He had a dirty, but hilarious sense of humor. But more importantly, Bourdain was open minded. He would talk to people and show the rest of us a snapshot of their culture, which always impressed me. In his Hawaii episode of Parts Unknown, he went to Moloka...

On this day 50 years ago, Senator Robert Francis Kennedy died from the bullets of Sirhan Sirhan. In the same decade, his older brother, President John F. Kennedy, and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. were also slain by the guns of assassins. In many ways, R.F.K.'s death was the tip of the iceberg for our country. People who our nation looked up to, who were seen as unifiers in a nation divided by race, the haves, and have-nots, anti-Vietnam and pro-Vietnam, and the other ways in which people were split apart, were suddenly gone. Fifty years on, what can we learn from the life and death of R.F.K.? Perhaps the greatest lesson we can take from R.F.K. is how he evolved as a politician and ultimately as a person. R.F.K. wasn't always the radical liberal icon that he has come to be. He was born into one of America's wealthiest families, and as such, grew up without the worries of the average American. He and his family associated with other elite families, attended elite sch...

Surely, you've seen Facebook posts that say that instead of protesting and "missing out on your education," how about at recess time, you just walk up to a student that looks lonely and start talking to them. #WalkUpNotWalkOut. Really now? We're gonna stop school shootings by just saying hi to someone? How silly. Yes, we should be nice and civil to each other, but to say Walk Up Not Walk Out is dismissive of the fact that since Sandy Hook, 3,500 plus people have needlessly died in mass shootings and our politicians haven't done anything to prevent further shootings. It's a farce because these same people are the same people who say "we should focus on mental health instead of taking away my God-given right to mow down someone with a machine gun" and yet continually vote for politicians who cut further and further from mental health funding. It's condescending because these people are the same people who say that teenagers need to grow up, b...

Yesterday, after striking since February 22nd, Gov. Jim Justice (R) signed a bill that gives all teachers, as well as all other state employees a 5% raise. After 9 days of school closures and hours of testimony to the Governor, the striking teachers got a better pay raise than the 3% raise that was originally offered. West Virginia teachers are among the lowest paid teachers in the United States, ranking 48th in the nation for teacher pay. Before the strike, they had not had an across the board raise in four years. In addition, they’ve seen their health care premiums rise, which still remains a problem. Gov. Justice agreed to form a task force in order to study what can be done to lower those health care costs. I applaud the teachers for standing up for themselves and for succeeding. As a child of the public education system, I’ve personally seen how teachers give so much of themselves, as well as having personally benefitted from their generosity; whether it was giving hungry stude...

In these times, we are sorely lacking in moral leaders. We have people like Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell, Jr. who claim to be our nation’s moral authority. And yet they continue to back a man whose actions and behavior serve as an example of what is unchristian: denying immigrants a safe refuge from their respective countries; working not as a steward to the environment, but as a shill for coal mining companies; and forgetting what Jesus said in his Sermon on the Mount “blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” These abhorrent examples among others have shown that we are lacking a true moral authority. These men of the cloth, along with their predecessors: Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Oral Roberts among others, have used their faith to move this country, the United States of America, in the wrong direction; towards a fiery path of destruction, hatred, and malice; and away from (to ironically quote Ronald Reagan) a shining city on the hill, where equality, lo...

This is my final post of 2017. 2017 has been a year of, well, ugh. For some people though, it has been a year of despair. Our fellow friends and neighbors who were protected by DACA now face an even more uncertain future. They do not know whether or not they will be deported to countries that they do not know, as the United States of America is their one true home. Our Grandparents could face cuts in their Medicare and perhaps even their Social Security. Our environment is facing a great crisis and yet our government chooses to deny that fact and to pretend that there are no problems; instead they choose to exacerbate problems by building new oil pipelines and deregulating environmental protections. Millions stand to lose their health insurance coverage in the coming years. Income inequality stands to widen further and further, as the rich will get their permanent tax cuts, while the poor will keep getting the shaft. It is hard to try and say something uplifting when this will contin...

Recently, I took a short break from writing the Profiles In Politics series in order to call for Senator Al Franken to resign over his recent sexual harassment allegations. This past week, he did just that. This conversation on sexual harassment must and will continue, but in the meantime, I'd like to continue with my series. The Reverend Ralph Abernathy wasn't a politician in the traditional sense. In fact, he never held elected office. However, his contribution toward the betterment of American society was far greater than any average politician could ever hope to achieve. Rev. Abernathy was born on March 11, 1926, in Linden, Alabama. His father, William Abernathy, was the first black man to vote in Marengo County, Alabama, as well as the first to serve on a grand jury. Growing up, the Reverend was no stranger to activism. At his school, he led a successful demonstration to protest the inferiority of the school's science lab. As a result, the school updated it. After...

I'm taking a brief break from my Profiles In Politics series to address the Al Franken scandal. I admired Al Franken, not just because of his background in comedy, but also because of his forceful advocacy of progressive values. In high school, I included him in a drawing that I did of Progressive Senators that I admired: himself, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders. His official Instagram still follows me after I shared the picture on Instagram; which I took great pride in. So, as terrible as it is to see someone I admire be named as a sexual harasser, what's more important is the fact that these people were harassed and it was wrong. Two so far have spoken out against him. Will there be more? Al Franken should resign from the Senate. In the Democratic Party, we have to set an example of the changes we want to see in our society. We can't expect things to change in regards to sexual harassment if there is no self accountability or self responsibility. As the real pa...

This is the second installment of my series, Profiles in Politics. In Profiles in Politics, we'll explore some of my favorite politicians and why I admire them. Kiefer Sutherland is well known for his acting in such films as Stand By Me , The Lost Boys, and A Few Good Men ; but one little known fact about Kiefer Sutherland is that his grandfather was Tommy Douglas. Tommy Douglas probably isn't a familiar name for most Americans. In Canada, he is more than well known. In fact, in 2004, a CBC Television program called The Greatest Canadian , which ranked Canadians throughout all history on a scale of greatness, ranked Tommy Douglas as the greatest Canadian of all time. Who was he and why did he win? Tommy Douglas was born on October 20, 1904 in Falkirk, Scotland. When he was 6 years old, his family immigrated to Canada, settling in Winnipeg. Before leaving for Canada, Douglas fell and injured his knee. He developed Osteomyelitis, an infection of the bone, and had to go through...