Human Rights and freedoms in China

I think I'll be writing about Chen Guangcheng, a political prisoner in China. He is a blind, self-taught lawyer that reported the local government of a town he lived nearby for infringing on women's rights. Because of the One-Child Policy, many of the women that had recently had children were not allowed to have children. The local government in Linyi held a town ultrasound, where women are subjected to an ultrasound to check for pregnancy. They enforced the One-Child Policy harshly and illegally, and subjected thousands of women to be sterilized or forced to abort the child. Some women who were there were well into their pregnancy. After women from Linyi went to Chen Guangcheng, he attempted to help them and reported this incident to a higher level in the government. Afterwards, he was kidnapped and beatten by Linyi's government personnel. Because of the lack of response, many citizens from Linyi and Chen Guangcheng marched in protest. Since then, Chen Guangcheng has been subjected to beatings, and is now in jail for intentional property damage, and for organizing people to block traffic. There are other lawyers that have tried to join the cause, and are also in the Linyi provence jail. He has been recognized by many organizations, including Time magazine as one of the top 100 people that will shape our world, and have been given awards. I believe that the US government and the UN could pay more attention to this area, because I feel this is a battle they can win. The Chinese government is currently under more scruitny than ever, and this could create very good PR for them, and I think they would take the effort to do so if nudged into that direction.

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Hardcore Article

Throughout this "War on Terror", and unofficial war with Iraq, the US has used mercenaries. It, essentially, is a battle the US has paid for under the table, since mercenaries do not count as US troops. It is very interesting, because much of the money that goes towards Iraq is counted as "International Charity and Aid" in official reports, so this just shows how much is hidden and misrepresented to US citizens. As our military shrinks, since people no longer want to sign up and end up in Iraq, these expensive contractors are called on more and more often. It is interesting that this article puts a spotlight on this issue, since there is very little known about them. Much of what they do or how they are paid are all classified information, but this article attempts to expose them. However, after reading the article, I'm not sure if the author is proposing a solution. He expresses that we should stop this, but I'm not sure if the article even addresses those that can do something about this situation. In the last class, we discussed how it may be a very critical part of a paper to address an audience that actually has powers to change and fix the problem. Since I can't discern that this is done in the paper, I'm not sure how convinced I am to make change, besides that I agree there is a problem.