U.S. Supreme Court

    The Supreme Court has existed since 1789. This powerful part of the system of checks and balances plays a major part in deeming things as constitutional or not. While watching the videos and reading the article, it has taught me a lot of things about the Supreme Court that I did not know. 

    One of the few things that I learned is that the Supreme Court is the U.S. highest federal court and head of the judicial branch of the government. My original thought on this branch is that the Supreme Court was the only part of that branch and no one else. 

    Another thing that I learned is that the court's first draft of the opinion is finished in four weeks and sent to all nine-justice. Then a justice may re-draft it twelve or more times in an effort to persuade others. The revision and adjustments may go on for months trying to accommodate different views. The way I thought it went was that they spent time talking about it and coming to a decision at that moment. This also ties in with the next thing that all case decisions are announced in late June. 

    The third thing that I learned is that the number of justices changed over six times until 1869. The number changed between five and ten for a six-year span. I always thought that the number stayed the same since the beginning. 

    The most surprising thing that I have learned is that everyone must speak one time before anyone else can speak again. Before this rule was put in people could not get a word out due to people talking over each other. At this point, I can see why it was implemented because imagine trying to discuss something and people keep talking over each other. You would get nowhere and just waste a lot of people's time.

    My thoughts about the Supreme Court were that they were a bunch of old people who only sat there and do nothing most of the time. Now that I have a better understanding of what they do, I feel like I can respect what they do as a whole and how tiring their line of work is.

Privacy Issue Breach

    These issues become more under the branch of privacy. Hearing these different TED talks raises a big question about today's society. Does privacy even exist in this given day and age anymore?

    The reasoning on why these issues are important is because they affect everyone in different and more ways than one. When using any social media platform, they have the terms and agreement section which no one ever reads because it's long and worldly and everyone thinks it's a waste of time. Within these terms and agreements is the ability to use whatever pictures you post on that social media platform as well as use any information you gave them. These terms and agreements also say that any information you give to them can be given to any other company. This information may include your name, phone number, and address. This does not seem like a lot but in reality, these things can give out info like who exactly you are linked to and what else your name is linked to.

    Unfortunately for everyone, I mainly feel like the government is the main cause of all of the breaches of privacy due to their paranoia of everyone. If I were to think deeply about what the government should do I would say to get rid of any information that is deemed as not suspicious of any kind or they do not have a history of incrimination in the last 2 years. This to me is completely unnecessary unless they have a valid reason to do so. So in order to get rid of this predicament, the government would not have tabs on us in the sense of knowing what our daily lives and routines consist of. After listening to Catherine Crumps and how the police basically keep tabs on you, it feels as if the government always wants to know what you are doing and where you are at all times so getting rid of this information that is not useful for anything can protect our privacy in the sense of tracking our location and routine.

    The same can be said about tapping into people's phones for no reason. The government can tap into your phone at any given time without you even knowing. Unfortunately, this is happening to people who have nothing wrong. This could mean that any phone conversation you have with someone can be recorded at any time and possibly be used against you. 

    There are ways that you can protect yourself from an invasion of privacy. One way is to be careful of the things you post online. Another thing is to not get distracted by things that are meant to keep you there. There are also certain apps that help with privacy like Duck Duck Go and Whatsapp.

Five Top News Sources

As someone who is not completely consumed by different types of news outlets of sorts. Here are some of the sources I get my news from.

One of my main sources of news comes from my family. Since these are people who I talk to on a daily basis, the topic of news always appears. From there I get the news and their opinion on that news.

Another source of news is CNN. At my grandparents' house, 9 out of the 10 times the news would be on more specifically CNN. I have no idea why my grandparents were so obsessed with this news outline but I would also watch it with them without complaint. CNN gives news from all over the place from the East to the West in many other countries.

Being on social media at times, I see different types of news on Instagram. This news either comes from friends' and families' stories or the suggested area on Instagram. Sometimes, whenever anything piques my interest I click on the post in order to learn more information on the subject. Sometimes my friends and family will post news that affects them or the way their loved ones live. 

TMZ is another one of my news sources. This source of news however is deemed under the latest gossip in the entertainment industry. Though I never really pay attention to celebrity rumors and gossip, I sometimes go here in order to see what happens from another aspect of the world. I also look at this for a source of entertainment at times. In this case the entertainment industry side of the world.

One of the last major news sources I use is IGN. IGN is a news site mainly for video games. I rarely check and look at this though. I might check this once every two weeks or once at the end of the month. I mainly only ever check this site to see the most recent news in the gaming industry.