What's going on in Kim Jong Un's head?

Korean War Part 2? By Choe Sang-Hun in Seoul

The main idea of this article is that leader of North Korea Kim Jong Un is getting the rest of the world anxious on what he's planning. Kim is currently threatening South Korea and the U.S. with a military confrontation and a pre-emptive nuclear strike. In response to this nonsense the U.S. has declared that it would spend $1 billion on additional missile defenses in Alaska and California because Kim's threats are being taken seriously.

Details or evidence I have from the article is that Kim is starving millions and millions of people who life in North Korea because he is spending every last penny he gets on his million man military and secretive nuclear-weapons program, and before all of this dating back to 1953 North and South Korea had signed an armistice that kept some peace between them for 60 years but North Korea after all those successful years has nullified it. Another piece of evidence I have is a couple years ago in 2006 North Korea announced it had exploded a nuclear bomb and just 3 years after that tested missiles and expelled U.N. nuclear inspectors but also just 4 years after that according to Choe "North Korea has revealed a uranium-enrichment plant at Yongbyon thought to be for producing more nuclear weapons." My final detail from the text is how the U.S. is getting nervous of Kim and is already taking precautions to get him to back off such as sending B-2 Stealth Bombers over to North Korea in a show of force to get the leader to back down or as I said before being prepared to spend $1 million on added defense also like I've said before they're taking Kim very seriously because this is very unusual behavior even for him.

In my opinion I just think Kim is troubled in some way. I don't think he's actually going to want to start a war on South Korea and the U.S. because remind you the U.S. has the strongest military in the world they aren't something to take lightly of and we also have allies all over the world so if you wipe out even a quarter of our army there's many more to take their places. Also Kim may be making threats about nuclear strikes but last time I checked his nukes aren't even powerful enough to reach the U.S. and even if they were the U.S. is the father of nuclear weapons so I'm pretty sure we'll retaliate with the same force we were hit with. But despite all of that Kim would be making a pretty big mistake to actually start a war with South Korea because Kim may have a million man army but South Korea has double whatever North Korea has simply because they have more money, technology, and a better government and as I've said before they have the U.S. to back them up.

A connection I can make to this is back when Osama was still alive and he was possibly the most dangerous man alive and then the U.S. were nervous about him and wanted him taken out immediately but he was well hidden for years until Obama came into office and somehow tracked him down. This can relate to the article because Kim basically represents Osama he's unusual, unpredictable and sneaky and the U.S. feel threatened so they're going to do whatever they can to remove the threat even if it means bringing him to justice.

This article has helped me to think more deeply on the topic because I think Kim is being just rediculous but who knows what if he really deals heavy damage? What if actually starts a nuclear war? What if he starts the biggest war since World War 1 & 2? Millions and even Billions of innocent lives will be tooken as a result if war were to really break out that's why I'm hoping Kim will bluff out because I don't want to hear news about war and killing sprees and gun violence anymore. It's time for all of that to stop to many lives have been lost due to violence.

My only question is directed to the leader himself I wish he was reading this right now but my question is why even bother doing all this nonsense Kim? Because in the end we all know it will most likely backfire in your face just change your ways don't live up to your father if you know what he was doing wasn't right.

Minimum Wage Rises

Time For A Raise? By Patricia Smith

The main idea of this article is that President Obama wants to raise Minimum Wage encome to $9 an hour to try and get the economy kicking once again. However despite the fact he's trying to help employees their employers have a problem with what Obama is doing, "The idea faces stiff opposition. Many companies that hire low-wage workers have opposed raising the minimum wage because it increases their cost of doing business and, they say, makes them less able to hire new workers or give current employees raises."- New York Times Minimum Wage article, Companies according to the quote are upset with Obama because this could mean a significant increase in expenses so they say.

Details or evidence I have from the article is how Patricia makes an interesting connection to Franklin D. Roosevelt as she describes how in 1938 Congress enacted the first federal minimum wage during the Great Depression. That Minimum Wage was 25 cents an hour. I found this interesting because it kinda relates to what's going on in 2013 75 years after that event, I guess time really does repeat itself. Another detail I have from the article is how Catrina Crable, a 10th grader from Martin County High School in Stuart, Florida is working hard as a hostess for 20 to 25 hours a week to pay for gas, car insurance, and her phone but she feel as though she isn't making enough money at $7.79 an hour and I actually agree with her because I did the calculations and if she worked 20 hours a week making $7.79 an hour her total would be $155.8 and if she worked for 25 hour instead of 20 hours and made the same amount an hour then the total would be $194.75 and she's talking about gas bills and car insurance I'm pretty sure those are more than a weeks worth of working.

In my opinion I can understand both sides of this article. One side feels as though they need more pay to help better maintain their lives, and the other side feels as though if they had to raise minimum pay to $9 an hour then they'd have to get rid of a lot of their minimum waged workers because the cost would be to much of a burden to worry about because then they'd have to raise the price of the other more experienced workers aswell and their cost is already higher. But I choose to argue Obama's side because i feel as though hard working people who can only find minimum wage jobs should definitely be paid more because they at least deserve that.

I don't know of any connections I can think of right now but I do know that I have a question. If you have someone working minimum wage, you watch them and see they're working hard, and you know they're good people but you pay them 6.50 an hour when you know they deserve more. Why?

Cruel and unusual punishment towards Elephants

Slaughter of the African Elephants By Samantha Strindberg and Fiona Maisels

The main idea of this article is that there are African Elephants being slaughtered and tortured.... for their horns. That's right many people in Africa are killing full grown elephants for their tusks because their tusks are actually made of ivory and as you may know ivory is of high demand in China and other countries in the far east. The reason they're in such high demand is because ivory is worth a lot of money and appearantly the  hunters of Africa have discovered that.

Details or evidence I have from the article of this horrible crime is when the writer is describing the stock market and she was showing how the demand for the precious ivory was going up the stock or supply of them was rapidly decreasing. Another detail from the article is how it describes the many problems that are rising from this slaughter. Problems such as plant growth, other animals who look to the elephant for guidance won't be able to find one, and most importantly babies, baby elephants are dieing off aswell as their moms and dads because they don't know yet how to take care of themselves and fend for themselves causing them to die off from starvation, dehydration, and even stress from not having their parents around to show their love too.

In my opinion this needs to stop because clearly this isn't the right thing to do. It may get sellers a lot of money I do agree with that but money isn't everything just think of what you're doing to your OWN community, think what you're doing to those poor elephants your killing off, you may be to blind to see but that elephant you just shot up like he was some kind of beast, that elephant had kids maybe even a mate, he/she was raising that kid teaching him/her all he/she could teach them. They were building up YOUR community with their natural planting abilities and natural fertilizer. Most importantly unless I'm mistaken elephants are peaceful animals who wouldn't go out their way to hurt a fly they wouldn't even hit a mosquito if they annoy them the elephant will just dip itself in mud to keep them away. The point I'm trying to make is that you shouldn't be killing off elephants because I'm pretty sure they're doing more work for the community than you ever will.

This article has helped me to think more deeply of the subject because I don't like animal cruelty and I know I don't and just reading this article has made me personally angry because just to know their is animal slaughter going on makes me think about all the stupidity we as people are capable of, I think this is absolute nonsense what's going on and like I've said before this needs to stop immediately.

One connection I can make to this article is back when I was younger and word got out that Michael Vick was killing dogs, making them fight to the death etc. for his amusement and even when I was younger this outraged me because what he was doing at the time wasn't right and quite frankly that is a memory that will never leave my head because what he was doing was absolutely horrible.

The question I have is for any African hunters who just happen to be reading this blog. Why do you do what you do to those poor animals? When will you stop? Don't you have any heart for those precious animals you're killing? My final question is What is your problem?