The Great Red State of Texas

                  Let's face it. Texas has lots of white people. And most of those white people in Texas support Republican. The reason is simple: Republicans are especially known for their xenophobia and state's right. Over more than a century, Republicans, or Democrats during Civil War era, have been making agenda for Texas. However, some of those policy agenda are slowly driving their power away from them. The recent Republican push on the abortion bill enraged many Texas women across the state, tough immigration policies have made many Latino voters to turn their back against them, and the recent court ruling on the Voting Rights Act that would eventually encourage the Republicans to perform unscrupulous gerrymandering is making people sick of their action. With all these reasons accountable, is it time for Texas to turn into a blue state?

                  Texas abortion bill had outraged many Texas women. I know that they are angry, because I marched and protested with them. This is a bill that would supposedly improve the standards of abortion clinic and make sure that abortions are performed safely. Under these pretty sugar coating, people have realized that this bill will narrow Texas women's abortion options to five clinics across whole Texas and increase the cost of women's health care.  No matter how much a person supports Republican political agenda, when things become personal and poke her skin, she will stand up against it. Republicans have poked the most vulnerable part of Texas women. Whether she is a strong Republican or not, if she feels that she's discriminated, she will not vote for them. This is where they lose potential half of Texas population.

                  It's easy to see how Texas Republicans are abandoning possible Latino supporters. The most vulnerable part for Texas Latinos is immigration, but Texas Republicans' policies are trying their best to suppress any chance of illegal immigration. It's not that they are encouraging legal immigration either. I haven't noticed any news about the quarter for international students earning the green card increasing. They stopped issuing driver's license to illegal immigrants and even discussed the similar racist law that Arizona had passed. Texas Republicans also were trying to enforce an ordinance in Dallas to outlaw landlords from renting their housings to immigrants without legal documentation. Fortunately, the Supreme Court found it unconstitutional since immigration is in the hands of the federal government. The growing number of Latinos can't be undermined. As we saw in the last presidential election, Republicans can't no longer depend on Texas that easily; Obama had 41.7 percent of the total  votes.

                  Recently, the Supreme Court had allowed the government to make voters to present their photo ID in order to vote. Now this news is a very good news for conservatives, because they get to discourage minorities from voting. Many minorities are living in a city where they take public transportation. Many of them don't even have a valid photo ID or have the time to wait ridiculous hours in DPS to get a twenty dollar photo ID; they just don't have the inspiration to go through all that. This is pretty much like putting poll tax on people. Most of minorities have supported Democrats in the past. Republicans might benefit from this unscrupulous gerrymandering for short time, but people will definitely be disgusted by it for sure.  

                  It is not too much to say that the Red state is slowly turning blue. Republicans had to touch the most vulnerable part of Texas in a very wrong way. Texas women will remember who voted for this ineffective abortion bill, Latinos will remember how they have been treated, and black and other minorities will remember the shadow poll tax that bar them from voting. If Texas really want to stay red, they really need to wake up and fix their political agenda.

  Since The University of Texas at Austin is my major target school to transfer, news and opinions about them interest me very much. A recent news that I encountered is about UT board of regents' investment on an online academic tool known as MyEdu. This website, according to my UT friends, is an useful tool that helps UT students to plan their schedules and research about their future professors. It also contains features that help students to find internships and career planning using a specified major. While many UT students find the system useful, some people like TheDaily Texan is skeptical about their use of school money. Since 2011, UT have invested 10 million dollars on MyEdu to aid them aid UT students. According to The Dailey Texan's research, 90 percent of UT undergraduate students now use MyEdu compare to 75 percent before 2011. Clearly, UT helped MyEdu, but the question is, did MyEdu use the money wisely to help UT students? I never used MyEdu since I don't go to UT yet, but my friends who had been using MyEdu before 2011 are saying that they haven't felt anything different. One of the main features that students find it the same is class update. MyEdu doesn't tell students whether the class is open, closed, or cancelled. Now I doubt UT's investment. If UT really wanted to help their students using MyEdu, why not share their data base to MyEdu? Also, many of its features can be substituted by many other websites like RateMyProfessor and Google Calendar. Sure MyEdu tells students about available UT classes, but its inability to update the status of those classes doesn't match the full potential of 10 million dollar investment. Furthermore, MyEdu's other features like job research and profile are only used by 5 to 15 percent of the website users according to The Daily Texan. This proves that these features are either inefficient to aid UT students into their career or not advertised well. Since UT is my main target school, I really don't want the school to waste student's tuition money. Sure MyEdu is helping UT students, but are they doing 10 million dollar job? The Daily Texan says not so much. I agree with them if the facts that they present are true. 

  I have read an opinion about the recent Texas abortion bill, HB 2, by The Dailey Texan that didn't disclose the name of the author. The Dailey Texan took a con-position about HB 2. Introducing the bill before any further discussion, this bill would supposedly improve the standards of the abortion clinic to the standards of ambulatory surgical hospitals. The bill will also criminalize abortion of fetus that is over 20 weeks old with exceptions of inevitable circumstances that threatens the life of the mother. The Dailey Texan say that people are angry about women's right to abort babies, but more importantly, the right to women's health care. They argue that this bill would eventually drive up the cost of women's health care on individuals. They also went on to half jokingly suggest that women might use a hanger to perform barbaric abortion. They were also mad about the comments made by certain Republican law makers during the voting. Singling out Senator Dan Patrick, they have called his comments, "confusing'' and "insulting to women." They have made a position that supports the amendment that saves 20 week old babies, but they were rather enraged by the fact that the bill would limit the availabilities for Texas women to get abortion in Texas to five clinics across this vast state according to the study done by Planned Parenthood. They have called the lawmakers, especially Republicans who supported this bill, "willfully ignorant." I was very surprised by this opinion that is very similar to mine. Just like many people in America as well as Texas, I'm a swinger. I do like certain provisions about the bill but absolutely despise certain amendments as well. I'm 130 percent with The Dailey Texan about saving the 20 week old babies. When the babies are 20 weeks old, if anyone has seen the completeness of the human form that the baby bears, nobody would ever argue about the mother's rights unless the baby would pose a threat to the mother's life. Besides, perhaps the argument that the woman didn't know about her pregnancy during those 20 weeks will fade away during those 20 weeks. Any women will know there is something wrong with her body if her period stopped for 20 weeks and her belly starts to get bigger. This is exactly the place to tell her that her procrastination will not work in this situation. I was very disappointed by the sort of ignorant decision made by the lawmakers that will supposedly improve the standards of abortion to those of St.Davids. I unfortunately didn't read the bill to be enlightened about the level of standards that the lawmakers are expecting, but I can guess this; you don't need a million dollar equipment to trim your nails. It may sound little bit too much, but this is what I can guess about the current situation. As it seems, Plan Parenthood has estimated that only five clinics in Texas have the financial ability to meet the standards that the lawmakers are expecting. I really hope that Rick Perry sends back the bill to the House floor to re-discuss about the amendment that would close down many abortion clinics so that many women who are making the hard decision to get the best operation that they deserve.

Texas Republicans, as it seems, had touched the most sensitive part of Texan Women: abortion. The bill called, SB 5, has been reintroduced to the Texas senate floor by the push of our governor Rick Perry despite of it being struck down recently, Texas women were furious. I have witnessed hundreds and thousands of women from all over Texas protesting against this measure. This bill would eventually close down most of the abortion clinic in Texas except five. Many protesters were arguing that the Republicans are not caring about their constituency’s opinion. They are saying that this bill would discriminate against women’s health care. The advocates of this bill are saying that this bill would make the women’s health care safer and more regulated. The most important thing is this; the bill is now passed and many of the Republicans including Rick Perry might lose their office because of this. Article link: The Daily Texan