Saturday, December 31, 2016

A Merry Late Christmas and Hopes for 2017

 Hello Everyone,

I'm sorry for not posting any articles recently but Christmas time is a busy time for me especially since I have so many family groups to be around and I visited them all and with the recent work of my yard sale and selling of some of my items online, I was a little busy before I could message you all.

All in all, I wish to give you all a belated Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah (it's the third day I believe), Yule and Saturnalia and Happy Holidays to all of my friends and family who celebrate all the other holidays not mentioned.

Now for 2017, I do have a lot I wish to do for 2017 and with the greatest possibility of more articles that I'll be writing a weekly article on any matter of Subject and include something else other than the issues of politics and economics. As of right now, I'm reading a few books and I'm still trying to get some of them finished as well as planning another yard sale and a couple of other things too especially since New Years is approaching.

I also am still working on Pomegranate Wine but I have 3 other shorts stories I am going to work on soon. I cannot reveal their working titles as of now but I'm hoping with great enthusiasm, I'll finish 2 of them by October. Also I am working on a new play, It's a little unique in my opinion as not too many plays or stories deal with this subject in the way I am telling. All I can say is my main character in the play, Damien, has a lot more than becoming an adult to deal with in this play.

So to everyone. a very Happy New Year's Eve for 2017. Hope you all are having fun!


Saturday, December 10, 2016

Ms. Betsy DeVos, School Voucher's won't solve the Department of Education's corruption.

Hello Everyone, Sorry for such a long hiatus after trying to do this but I was interested in doing this since I saw a lot of my Objectivist peers go at it on the subject of whether Betsy DeVos' ideas of promoting school vouchers is a good one. I won't be going into her Christian Values campaign as that is but an effect of the cause of her main goal with implementing this idea in the hopes of getting to privatize the school system. However, after going over this, I have changed my opinion on the issue of school vouchers and am now against them.

I had originally thought that the School voucher program would instill some good effort into the public education system but one of the biggest problems is mainly that School Vouchers don't get rid of the Public Educations system since they are just continuing what Normal Taxation has done. In order for us to realize why this is so, let's define exactly what school vouchers are. School vouchers are government subsidies for children to attend what schools their parents wish. Even private schools get vouchers too under the system. However, because of this private schools will have to go under the standards of the governments education plan if they made one because of accepting the government subsidy. And the way people pay into the system is just the same. People are still being taxed to pay for schools but they just get what is consider the illusion of choice.

And as I said earlier with the issue that private schools go into the public sector, The Private School System will now have to listen to the standards of public education. Now the private sector must do this in order to appease the school choice philosophy with the unintended consequences of stamping property rights and free market interference. This is especially noted in Craig Biddle's article "Louisiana Demonstrates Problem With School Vouchers" in The Objective Standard, A magazine I recommend all Capitalists, Republicans, Libertarians, Philosophers, Free-Thinkers, and even my own Family and Friends read as a main source of information in news in contrast to the yellow journalism of today's media. (I'll leave the link at the end of this article.) This will no doubt hurt the private sector when they lose the choice of how to run their curriculum in response to government propositions.

Lastly, and most importantly, The School Voucher Program doesn't solve the main problems with privatizing the education system. But how exactly is this so? It has to do with the philosophy of education. Two educators helped changed the education system with their work, Maria Montessori and John Dewey. Montessori focused on an individual based curriculum in teaching students all a manner of subjects the individual child is interested in. However, John Dewey believed Schooling was a social experiment where society shapes an individual rather than what Montessori teached with her individualist approach. I had talked to Ms. DeVos about this issue but sadly I was left with nothing and no real answers to what she cares about.

Folks, what we're left with and what we should take from all of this is one simple fact. Government needs to get out of education and only we individuals can make that happen. It's obvious that Ms. DeVos has absolutely no idea about how her ideas actually hinder the free market and make our students even worse of than currently and we had to suffer the effects of both No Child Left Behind and Common Core. Let's not make things come into threes and tell her this is not a good idea and start finding better and more free market solutions to our education mess.

https://www.theobjectivestandard.com/2016/01/louisiana-demonstrates-problem-with-school-vouchers/

Sunday, December 4, 2016

Updating about me in A Day in the Life and a very early Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all.

Hey Everyone.

Sorry about promising a post this week when things were pretty difficult with my schedule. Anyway, I just wanted to at least say here is a non-political post. (Sometime covering politics can make me rip my hair out about stupid policies politicians promote and trust me, I'll cover that another day to roast over the coals why school vouchers don't help promote school choice in the near future.)  But anyway, here is a little article about me and what's going on.

As of right now, my family and I are going to dim sum because my Oma Eta asked for some and we all decided to go to a new place recently so I'll post pictures on Instagram and Facebook if you follow me on both social media sites!

In other good news, my sister Lizette will be 8 tomorrow and I'll be dropping by to a special birthday party with close friends and some relatives on my Dad and Step-Mom's side of the family as well.

Now as for my shorts story I told everyone about, Pomegranate Wine, I have some bad news that the story will be delayed as my main priorities are involving searching for work as of the time being but once I find some work I'll update you all and tell you about which draft I'm on or if it is finished.

And one last note I wish to make. I want to let you all know I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy Holidays.

Marcos

Saturday, November 26, 2016

Fidel's Death and Cuba's Future?

When I heard last night of Fidel Castro's death, I thought to myself that there might be some justice in the world after all. Although it took 90 years to do it, Fidel Castro has been officially declared dead. And all in all, I didn't expect myself to write 3 posts in one week of just starting this blog but well hey, I can't resist saying something so I will.

So let me give some of my opinions on Fidel Castro's death. In my honest opinion, when I heard Fidel's brother, Raoul, would take over his brother's position for his illness, I think this was primarily the beginning of the stage set for the obvious transition of power necessary to give the Communists the power they still want and keep things in line obviously. Simple transition of power nothing more and that I also think they kept the illusion of Fidel alive to keep the populace from knowing better and to keep basic morale up. 

Now for Cuba's future and what we can do about it because believe it or not, we can actually do something to stop Cuba from oppressing any more people and stopping them from violating any more human rights. Just because Fidel Castro is dead doesn't fully help us due to his brother and the entire regime still in place but Fidel's lost touch can be an asset to many. The cracks in the walls are there but we need the right tools to break down the walls. One such tool is education. Unfortunately, many books are banned by Fidel's regime and yes it most possibly includes the ones I will put on a list that should be given to Cubans all over. I suggest to any of my friends or any of yours that are deciding to visit Cuba to give Spanish editions of the books I'll put under my list to fire the flames of a true revolution. Yes it's breaking the law but it's out of pure civil disobedience against a tyrannical government. Any government that tries to suspend forms of free speech including banning books should be morally condemned in any way. And anyone here in the US, who can't afford a trip to Cuba should just keep fighting here at home for Western and Enlightenment Ideas. History is a battlefield of ideas and that the ideas that win were the most successful in being argued and persuaded. Right now is that time for Cuba.

And to bastardize what Che Guivera said

Larga vida a la verdadera revoluciĆ³n! (Long live the true revolution!)

Sic Semper Tyrannis!

Thursday, November 24, 2016

Thanksgiving Wishes, What I'm Thankful For, and Good News

Since it's already here, Happy Thanksgiving and Turkey Day everyone!

Now here are some things and people I'm thankful for. First and most of all, I'm very thankful for living in this country where I have multiple opportunities and can flourish as much as I want without having to fear constantly for my life. I'm very thankful for my family especially now that we were able to get my Oma Eta (My great aunt actually but she was kind of a grandmother to me and Oma means grandma in Dutch) a new home to stay in and that she'll be surrounded by many of my family members this holiday. I'm also thankful for people like Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Jeff Bezos for creating technology and services we can often take for granted but have helped revolutionize communication all over and making our lives easier too. And to all past inventors, innovators, scientists and others who take pride in their work and truly are focused on human flourishing. And I'm particularly thankful for my grandfather with helping me with my Oma (his sister) through all of this with her transition to 24 hour care and my mom and aunt for finding a wonderful place for her to stay. I'm thankful for my boyfriend for being there as both emotional support and for being invested into my writings and work. Thanks to veterans, thanks to police and firefighters, nurses and doctors, volunteers and anonymous people for helping save people's lives. I'm thankful for having a very large family who supports and loves me very much. I'm especially thankful to my dad, step-mom, and sisters for just being able to spend time with them after so long without being able to see them. And thanks to you for following me at the beginning of my very first blog. It truly is an honor to start this.

Now I said I had good news and I do. I'm proud to mention I'm in the writing draft for my very first short story. It will be published on the site and hopefully be more as part of a short story collection of some of my very first works. All I can say is that this story is called Pomegranate Wine and I hope your very anticipated for future news of this story.

I'm very happy to mention this stepping stone in my journey as an author. And for all to have a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Monday, November 21, 2016

Begining Party and Q and A!

Hello! Bon Soir!

Welcome to Marcos' Musings, the blog where I go on about an assortment of discussions and talk about my future writing projects too. I just want to let everyone know this to celebrate on the discussion of the blog so far and that I want to give a brief overview of what this blog will be about.

This blog is dedicated to my opinions on Art, Philosophy, Politics, and my current writing projects. But also, I'll be discussing other things like reviewing certain TV Series and Movies I decide to give down time to see, video games, and my updates on my life too other fun stuff as well. As much as it is hard to make a balance since I am still debating what times I would like to Blog, I do know at least once a week I would like to update everyone on all my projects at least so that's a start.

Thanks for taking the time to come on. For this special event, feel free to ask me any questions about what plans I have for my blog, myself, or any other questions. Thank you very much!