Cuba- Home Sweet Home

Alan Gross, who's permanent home is in Maryland, has found himself in a predicament. He has landed him self in jail at a Cuban prison, for bringing illegal media equipment into the country. The sentence? 15 years of hard time. Moss is hoping for an executive pardon from the country for his release. Former President Jimmy Carter travelled to Cuba and met with Fidel and Raul Castro, in hopes of releasing Moss. The first comment to Jimmy Carter from the Cuba government about his visit "The freedom of Alan Gross will not be granted."

Chinese Espionage

As I was watching 60 minutes the other day, there was a story brought up about chinese espionage. The Chinese, they say, find America to be there biggest threat when it comes to military weapons. The way the Chinese get information about America is the same way America gets there information about China, through spies. A man who had citizenship in the United States was a small business owner, who wanted to expand his business in China. China granted the man his business licenses, but they had a little favor they wanted from him. They wanted him to steal secrets from the pentagon, which the man just so happened he knew a guy. Over a series of months, the FBI recorded the transactions as the Chinese man wine and dined the man with the secrets from the pentagon. The chinese man posed as a guy wanting to know what military weapons the US was going to be selling to Vietnam, but really he was sending the information to the chinese government. Both men were arrested with a sentence of five years each. When the reporter said to the FBI "well isn't that how American gets there secrets from the chinese"? No response was given to that question.

Inside Job

I recently watched a documentary about the collapse of the economy because of the housing bubble. But the documentary starts in Ireland and the deregulation of their banking system. Years ago, the Ireland government decided to deregulate the government banks letting them go private. But the three major banks in Ireland that became privatize started to become corrupt. Many of the banks leaders were borrowing billions of dollars against the banks for their own personal use. One banker took 40 million dollars for his own personal use, to buy a pin striped jet. When the collapse of the banks started to fall, many people turned to the government wondering why they hadn't regulated these banks more closely and lead to the fall of the Ireland economy.

Inflation on Food Prices

Due to the demise of dictators, global food prices are on the rise. The unrest in the middle east has made record high food prices,which were recorded for February the highest in Twenty years. When the price of oil increases, many people try to find alternative energy sources using ethanol, which is derived from corn. When ethanol increases in production, more corn is needed driving the prices of food products up. Another factor of increasing food prices, is that cost that companies take to transport those goods. These cost then get passed on to the consumers. Some people say that they don't need to worry about problems in other countries, because it doesn't affect them. Well it does affect us, sometimes we just don't know what is causing the affect.

The Dominio Effect After Sunia

After the successful attempt of Sunia to over throw their government;many countries have followed suit.  After violent protestors forced President Honsi Mubarak, Egypt has been liberated and hopes to find a new democratic system. Other countries like Bahrain and Libya are pushing for the same ordeal. New violent protestors have taken to the streets, feed up with their current government, in pursuit of a new liberating freedom. My question is How Far is This going to Go? After each country overthrows their government, what will happen to the treaties that have been put in place by the old government. Who will take over and bring new democracy. The USA is already feeling the strain on gas prices as Egypt finds new order.   

Center for Missing and Exploited Children

I was watching a movie the other day called The Tiffany Rubin Story: How I got My Child Back.
It's about a woman who had a child with a man, whose native land was Korea. He lived in the U.S. and had custody of the child every other weekend and one week ever summer. He asked his wife if he could take their son (colby) to walt disney world in florida for a week. She said yes, but he never took their son to disneyland, but to Seoul, Korea. Ms. Rubin contacted the FBI who found the two in Korea, and issued an arrest warrant for the father. The problem was that Korea doesn't recognize U.S. law in their jurisdiction and the U.S. had no authority to go in and take the child. Five months went by with no resolution about bringing her kidnapped son home. She went to visit a man who works for the Center for Missing and exploited Children, who helps bring children back from other countries. He said without a contact in that country it was too dangerous to try to get him back. He did say that teachers in Korea have website and that if you posted a picture of Colby a teacher might contact her. She posted a picture of her son and a teacher called her with a location of her son. She and the man from the Center for missing children went to korea, pulled her son out of class and raced to the U.S. embassy before they closed. The father had issued a warrant for the arrest of the mother,but because the embassy has closed for the weekend, they let the mother and the man take Colby back to the U.S.. Her husband was eventually arrested in Singapore trying to get back into the U.S. and is now serving time in jail. 

For the First Time Ever, Mexican Citizens Worry About Their Safety, Instead of The Economy

Only five weeks into the new year, 15 human heads sat glistening in the sun, in front of a shopping center in Acapulco, Mexico for natives and tourists to see. Within hours of the discovery of the decapitated heads, several more bodies were found in the back seat of taxi cab. End of the week total body count was 33 deaths. Mexican police officials attribute the deaths to the drug lords, who have continued in their long battle of violence in Mexico. The death toll has been steadily increasing, as government officials try to combat the drug lords that control Mexico. Many native Mexicans  feel that the government is not doing their part in controlling the situation, stating, " That only two percent of the criminals that are caught are actually tried in a court of law." Since 2004 the death toll from violence in Mexico has reached 34,600, half of which came from 2010 alone. For the first time ever Mexicans are more worried about their safety, than the economy.

I feel really bad for the Mexican people who are trying to combat this situation. It reminds of Columbia in the 1980's when Pablo Escobar ruled the country for many years. It's going to take alot to bring down the drug lords part of which, will mean increased violence for Mexico. I think this might even be worse because the say there are 70 crime boss's, in which only 36 have been caught.