All Thoughts Being Equal

This post is a follow-up to the AS Elections series: Part 1 and Part 2 I have one more p ost left in this series, about the aftermath of the 2015 AS General Elections and what could be done in the future. Then, as befitting my position as someone who's not even enrolled at WWU any more, I'll let the matter rest. This post, though, is not the last. I reached out to people I knew, who had run for office in the AS or worked in the AS but are no longer a part of it. Katrina Haffner (of La Commedia Politica) and Dan Hagen stepped up. Here are their responses, lightly edited for readability and length. Any highlights are mine. 1. You said you ran for election twice and lost. What do you think contributed to that? The other candidates' messaging? Your own knowledge of the election process? Katrina: First and foremost, elections are popularity contests. When it’s mainly people from the AS and friends of candidates voting, it becomes quite apparent. When writing my cand...

The other day I decided to skip class in favor of a discussion with my friend. Well, it was worth it: from that discussion came the ideas in my previous post as well as what you'll read below. To summarize the last post: it was an analysis (and meta-analysis) of the classic Dickens fable, "A Christmas Carol." Suffice to say, the negative portrayal of Scrooge enrages free-market fundamentalists and intrigues me, because Dickens implies that it's possible for a person to be "not charitable enough." Enough for whom? Well, for society, I suppose. (And God, if you believe in a god and if your god believes in a certain level of charity from every human being.) This, more or less, segued into a discussion of human rights, and (in my opinion) a very good economic argument for defining them. How? Follow me..