Unfiltered Ocean

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as he voted against HB 3391, which ensures that abortion will remain legal in Oregon if Roe v. Wade (1973) were to be repealed.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...