Discussion Questions on Politics: Political Instability, the Dream Act, Penalties - Paper Example

Explain why high youth joblessness leads to political instability

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Political instability is associated with high youth unemployment rates, where they are not only the victims, but also actively participate to cause the political instability. Two reasons explain this. One, in the quest to access the national resources and other privileges, the unemployed youths easily fall prey to patronizing groups that operate to oppose the current government regimes. Most of the youths are used by the activists as their militias to undermine the political administrations.

Secondly, the participation of the youths in rebellion stems from the fact that they stand little material to lose and if anything, the chaos presents them a chance to gain through robbing, looting, and allocating themselves some natural resources by collaborating with the transnational criminals. The factors when supported by radicalization, ethnic orientation and religious brainwashing supplement political instability. In this regard, reducing unemployment is an issue that should be prioritized to stabilize a country.

Explain why all gun sales should be registered in national database

Guns registration laws require individuals to record their guns after the purchase from designated authorities. The law also requires individuals to re-register the firearm whenever it is transferred to another person and when they are stolen or lost. This law is necessary to trace and reliably identify the owner of guns which are recovered in a crime scene. In addition, individuals are also taken through thorough checks before they purchase or renew their registration annually, which also help to retrieve the weapons from individuals who have legally been prohibited from owning firearms due to the previous criminal activities and other bans.

Furthermore, registration will minimize gun crimes through transfer and sale to unauthorized persons because the firearm owners will be required to be more accountable thus reducing gun lending to individuals who can potentially engage in criminal activities. In turn, they will be forced to keep their firearms safely to avoid unauthorized individuals from accessing or stealing them. Moreover, gun registration will also deter eligible people from purchasing the firearms for ineligible individuals because it can easily be traced to them (Korwin and Anthony, 2009).

Explain why congress should pass the The Dream Act

On average, about 65,000 high school leavers do not join colleges, work, or the military for one reason; they are not documented by the authorities. These are the immigrants who grow up in the American culture with little attachment to the countries they were born in, and most of them do not know they are not documented as American citizens until they go to apply to join college or work, when they realize they do not have the Social Security numbers or other required documents. Moreover, some are even deported to their countries they were born in. These barriers to continue with education and to join the workforce has discouraged many of the young immigrants from continuing with education making many to drop out of school and others to engage in criminal activities.

The development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act, otherwise known as The DREAM Act if passed by the Congress will allow a change of status of thousands of these young immigrants so that they can pursue their aspirations to join college or the workplace (Brittain, 2002). This will provide an opportunity for the young people to develop their careers and it will also benefit the U.S economy through increased workforce. In addition, it will also halt brain drain to other countries, reduce crime rate since most will have formal work after studying and increase tax collection as the immigrants will now pay higher taxes in their better jobs which is higher than that for high school dropouts. The individuals will also have better living standards due to the access to education and jobs.

Describe why Americans should not be penalized for unhealthy behavior

While the U.S government struggles to cut the medical costs, the American Medical Association recently released data showing that almost a quarter of the money used in healthcare is spent on diseases attributed to individual behaviors (Ellyn, 2006). This raises the question as to whether the medical costs on people who engage in such activities should be raised to discourage them from such behaviors.

As clear as the thought may seem, penalizing people involved in unhealthy acts may amount to great social injustice. Statistics show that 33 percent of the smokers live below poverty level while 18 percent of the smokers live above poverty line. Raising the tax for the medical bills would, thus, only have a regressing consequence on majority of them who are poor people. It also means they would also have less money to spend on essentials such as food, resulting to even more disease for them. Studies also show that genetic, social-economic and psychological factors also lead to some unhealthy behaviors. As such, ignoring those causes and penalizing such people will not be just for them.

Likewise, it is not just to claim that the persons behavior contributed to the disease because a lot of evidence that links behavior with disease is only correlational as opposed to causal. There are many smokers who do not develop lung cancer while some non-smokers develop lung cancer. Therefore, it is unfair to punish people when there is no direct link between the two to show that it is indeed the behavior that led to the disease.

References

Korwin, A., and M. P. Anthony (2009). Gun laws of America: Every federal gun law on the books: with plain English summaries. Bloomfield Press.

Brittain, Carmina (2002). Transnational Messages: Experiences of Chinese and Mexican Immigrants in American Schools. LFB Scholarly Pub.

Sanna, Ellyn. (2006). Americas Unhealthy Lifestyle: Supersize It! Mason Crest Publishers.