sometimes we just gotta blame the government

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/12/11/security-at-us-consulate-in-benghazi-in-disarray-prior-to-2012-attack-state/
The article "security at US consulate Benghazi in disarray prior to 2012 attack" reveals new information about the state of the security of the benghazi consulate of the day of the attack in 2012. This new information was acquired through emails that have recently been released. The emails state that the sonsulate was being gaurded through an independent security agency located in Libya. However, these emails also state that this independent contractor was not legally allowed to work in Libya because their license was considered invalid. It has been determined that the security status for the consulate was at an emergency level mere hours before the attacks began. These attacks ended up killing 4 americans.

The people located in this consulate were employees of the state department. It was the state departments job to supply them with the necessary security for them to be safe in a very dangerous part of the world. The inability of the state department to control the situation was what led to the loss of american lives. It has been 2 years since this event and we are only now finding out that there was in fact a failure on our governments part to keep its own employees and citizens out of harms way. There has been a lot of speculation as to what exactly happened on the day of the attack, but these emails paint a clearer picture of how much the current administration is attempting to hide from the public about this unfortunate event.

The supreme election

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2014/11/28/why-the-supreme-court-should-be-the-biggest-issue-of-the-2016-campaign/
This article "Why the Supreme Court shouls be the biggest issue of the 2016 election" is about the relatively new idea of the Supreme Court having a huge impact on the next presidential election. The article states that the idea that a supreme court justice may retire in the near future may be a huge determining factor in how many people come out to vote and who they vote for. Becasue the court is split 5-4 to the republicans, a death or retirement could significantly swing the majority in the courts either way. So this means that if a judge were to retire after 2016 then the president will have the power to appoint who they like to that position, essentially appointing somebody with the same political views as them which could have tons of ripple affects.

I had never thought of this before. It was super interesting to me becasue of how important the courts, especially the supreme courts, are to the people and the issues. Just recently they have had many important rulings that affect all of us each day like their ruling on the Hobby Lobby case and their impact on changing the rules on legal marriages in the U.S. I think that this is something that could be just as important as keeping majority in congress becasue of the rights that the Supreme Court has on significantly affecting lives in the U.S.