In agreement with "Cyber Security"

I agree with Danagray. I mean why all of a sudden is cyber identity being taken seriously when it has been going on for years now, but since it has only started affecting national security they’re going to take extreme measures to stop it. This should’ve been stopped when it first started, not pushed off to the side till it came to be as bad as it is now. She also makes a good point when she says that they failed to mention the cost of their program that is supposed to “solve” the problem. Is this program going to be accessible to all citizens or a certain class? That is something that should've been included in the article. Citizens need to know that kind of stuff. Committee's should have been started a lot earlier because the longer it takes them to get this whole situation solved only gives the hatchers more time to advance and gives them the ability to figure out ways to overcome whatever program we come up with to prevent cyber identity.

Baby Grace

On July 24th, 2 year old Riley Ann Sawyers was severely beaten with leather belts, had her head shoved in the bathtub, was grabbed by her hair and thrown violently across the room slamming her head in the tile floor fracturing her skull in 3 different places. After her slow and painful death, she was wrapped inside a trash bag and thrown into a plastic container and left in their garage for up to 1-2 months. The body was thrown into the Galveston river and found by a fisherman about 5 miles from Galveston causeway. Mother, Kimberly Trenor, and Trenor’s husband, Roycle Ziegler, were arrested and charged with injury to a child and tampering with evidence, and bail was set for each at $350,000. Ziegler attempted suicide a week ago by overdosing on blood pressure medication and anti-depressants, he left a note stating that his wife had no part in committing the crime. I think that is crap, the mother did play a role in the murder of Riley because she just sat there, maybe also helped, while her own flesh and blood was being brutally murdered. What mother would allow her husband to murder her child that she carried for 9 months inside her? Trenor was 19 and had Riley at the age of 16 with her high school sweetheart, Robert Sawyers. About 8 months ago they broke up and Trenor got full custody of Riley and fled the states to Texas because when the couple was in court fighting for custody no lawyers were present to appeal for a relocation clause.
I think this article is just depressing. What has gone wrong with mother’s these days? And kids for that matter? It seems that it is now going to be somewhat common to find the murder of an infant or child by the parents or vice versa, death of parents committed by their kid. The thought of grabbing my mother or brother in that kind of way terrifies me. I could never bring myself to lay a hand on my mother or father. And even though I am not a parent, I still can’t see myself laying a hand, trying to kill her in that way. I hope both of them are convicted to a life sentence. If they don’t then you just have to question, what’s happened to our law system?

In agreement with "Innocent People That Die on Death Row In Texas"

I agree. Ok yeah there is a lot of executions to be done so people will want to get them over with, but I also think that if they are not 100% sure whether the criminal is completely guilty then a clemency should be given, and the case should be given another look at. There have been cases where after the execution has taken place that they tried the wrong person! If there is no doubt whatsoever that the person they are trying is the wrong person then I say go for it, I mean not necessarily the death penalty but no clemency is really needed. I am probably saying this now but when I am actually in the situation I'm sure my opinion will change...but I don't think they should always give the death penalty. I think they should give the life sentence more because that gives them actual time to think of what they did and the price they're paying for it, whereas just flat out killing them they don't really have time to reflect on their actions...! Is it also our right to take people's lives away? Isn't it's God's decision when it's time for someone to go "home"? Depending on how you look at it the death penalty could be considered suicide...I just don't think it's our right to take the life of another even when they should have their life taken away for the horrible things they committed. Anyways since the law isn't going to change and since the death penalty is still going to be given then they should set the execution day at least 5 years after the crime so that way the case can still be looked at thoroughly and they can make sure they have the right criminal, and they have five years to reflect their actions. All in all I agree with Mag that Governor Perry should grant more clemency.

TX Prison Guards indicted in inmates assault

In this article two former state correctional officers have been indicted on federal charges of assaulting an inmate, Robert Tanzini in November 2002. Eugene Morris Jr., 39, of Huntsville and Tracy Dean Jewett, 35, of Huffman are both accused of not giving an inmate his civil right to be “free of cruel and unusual punishment”. Morris is accused of kicking and injuring Tanzini, and both are accused of making a false entry into a corrections "use of force" report with the intent of obstructing justice. If they are convicted they will receive up to 10 years of prison and a fine of $250,000. This assault was witnessed by other sergeants and correctional officers, but the case was dismissed in 2004 because Tanzini was representing himself and wasn’t able to file the required court documents.
I think this case is ridiculous. This should have been taken cared of a long time ago. If this assault was witnessed by others, not by inmates but by correctional officers and sergeants, then these two “correctional officers” should have been sentenced back in 2002 when this assualt occurred. I thought there was some kind of law giving inmates the right to trial? Why did Tanzini have to be represent himself, isn’t the law supposed to offer him a lawyer? Tanzini didn’t come out of the assualt with just a couple of bruises, no we’re talking about him having to go to a nearby hospital in critical condition suffering from skull fractures and other injuries because of this correctional officer. Regardless of what provoked the officer to commit such an assualt shouldn’t matter, I mean it should to an extent but he shouldn’t have allowed himself to get this far carried away. If I were the judge of this case I would take away both Jewett and Morris’s privileges as a correctional officers, sentence them to prison for 10 years, fine them $250,000 and offer some help to Tanzini’s family with his future health bills.

Let teens work at polls

Should teenagers be allowed to work as election clerks? Roger Williams, former state’s chief elections officer, recently made the suggestion that people who are not old enough to vote should be allowed to work at the polls as election clerks. Personally, I don’t see anything wrong with this proposal because I think that by allowing teenagers to be involved with elections at a young age will prepare us and give us some insight/experience for when we do become of legal voting age. During the nonpresidential elections from 1990-2002 the turnout between young Texans declined to being below the national average according to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement. Maybe by allowing teenagers to be involved before they are of legal age, there will be a rise in the percentage of young Texans in nonpresidential elections. Some people may argue that teenagers are “too immature” to be able to handle something as important as this, but really all the teenagers would be doing is sitting for 12 hours making sure nothing goes wrong, just signing people in. I don’t think the teenagers who would volunteer to do this will most likely be ones who are thinking about having a career somewhere in politics. Forcing teenagers is a different story though. Rep. Trey Martinez Fisher tried carrying a proposal that require high school students to work as election clerks in order to graduate, but this House Bill 994 was never heard. If teenagers were forced to work as election clerks then of course you’re going to get the immature flock and they most likely wouldn’t take things as seriously as they are. Being a teenager still myself, I think by allowing us to work as election clerks by the age of 16 would definitely give us more knowledge of politics and that way we wouldn’t be so clueless when we go to vote. The only time we hear about politics is in our senior year during high school when we are required to take a government class, and that’s not enough. So I don’t see a problem with letting teenagers work as election clerks, it could possibly increase our turnout.

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/10/05/1005elections.html

Privately run youth lockup's closure raises questions about state oversight (Stage 3)

This article is talking about the living conditions of teenage delinquents. These juvenile delinquents are wearing the same disgusting dirty clothes day after day there were even kids sleeping on dirty mattresses, how sanitary is this? Some of the beds go without bed linens. Sure these kids have done some pretty horrible stuff, they don’t deserve to be treated this bad. Even state prisons have a cleaner facility than this youth commission. If this youth commission is being monitored by four state workers how could this abuse have passed unseen? Youth commission official announced that they were going to transfer 197 juveniles from Coke County Juvenile Justice Center in Bronte to Youth Commission-run lockups because of the unsanitary and dangerous conditions they have these juveniles living in. These kids were clearly neglected. If there is four state members supposedly closely monitoring the Youth Commissions, then they need to be reevaluated because this shouldn’t have gone unnoticed, this is ridiculous. The Youth Commission officials are seeing that this matter is being fixed. Psychological assessments are going to be given among all the youths and they are also going to be given clean clothes and a haircut. I’m not saying these kids should be given a luxurious lifestyle, but they also surely don’t deserve being treated like abandoned puppies. These kids did something horrible, but nothing horrible enough to be sent to this Youth Commission and be sent to their death. The complete article can be read at
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/10/03/1003tyc.html

Stage Two

In Trenton, New Jersey an AIDS vaccine experiment went terribly wrong, sending volunteers home with HIV instead of preventing them from ever having it. Merck & Co have experienced a major setback in finding a cure/prevention from AIDS. Their experiment was the farthest experiment to go this far, this is a shocking turnout considering this experiment was closely watched by experts in the field. According to the Associated Press it has been reported that 24 volunteers out of 741 received HIV after having received the vaccine that is supposed to prevent HIV. Another trial was done and once again 21 out of 762 people were diagnosed with HIV. Merck isn’t giving up hope yet, they are still trying desperately to find a cure and a way to prevent this deadly disease.
This article is worth reading because it’s very interesting that there are cures trying to be found for this deadly disease. I wish this experiment could’ve been conducted 10 years ago so that my family didn’t have to suffer the loss of loved ones.
Here is the link to the original article:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/health/5154789.html