Gov. Brown signs 2 of 3 bills prescription drug abuse

Governor Brown said that he supports the idea of requiring coroners to report prescription drug deaths to the medical board. However, he vetoed it because of the cost. On Friday he signed two bills that aimed towards the abuse of drugs. The third bill however, he vetoed it, this could have helped the state’s medical board identify the doctors who are irresponsible and have prescribed pills to their patients that eventually died. This all started because many people were dying because of the prescribed pills by doctors or overdose suicides. People were happy about the bills because they would give” authorities better tools and broader powers to crack down on problematic doctors.” Governor Brown said that he vetoed the bill because it made an “unfunded mandate for the state, potentially in the millions of dollars.” All of these bill signing was to help and stop those doctors that prescribe pills to people that eventually kill them. This required money so they need to work on the economy first in order to make change.

http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-0928-rx-reforms-20130928,0,6850019.story

Prison Hunger Strikes

A federal court order has been issued which allows force-feeding and other steps to keep prison hunger strikes alive even if they don’t want medical attention. The state argument was that they believed that some inmates may have been force into participating in the hunger strikes and signed the paper against their will. Henderson agreed with “signing and order that would allow the state to involuntarily feed any prisoner it deems was coerced into signing a “Do not resuscitate” order, as well as those who signed such papers just before the July 8 protest began.” It will also allow involuntary feeding for those who a state doctor says are incompetent to give consent or make any medical decisions. For those inmates that were forced into participating in the human strikes they were protected from any serious harm. The motion is signed by lawyers for the court-appointed agency running prison medical care and the Prison Law Office, which represents California inmates on healthcare issues. The Prison Law Offices says that this motion should be limited and only focus on the current hunger strike. The hunger strike continued in 6 prisons with 69 inmates refusing food for 43 days while 67 others were fasting for shorter periods. Two of the prisons ended up being under medical watch.
http://www.latimes.com/local/political/la-me-ff-california-asks-judge-allow-force-feeding-20130819,0,4726207.story 

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Immigration

 For quite a while now there have been a lot of issues with the whole immigration situation. White House officials are trying to pressure the house to act on immigration reform by launching a state-by-state campaign. This campaign is to try to convince voters that if the immigration system is opened that will help local businesses. The white house released economic projecting. This will show how “the senate immigration bill could boost state economies, create new jobs, increase tax revenue and bolster flagging home prices”. Gene Sperling, the director of the White House National Economic Council said that it was “common-sense, immigration reform is just the right thing to do, but it is also very clear from a number of sources that it is the economically smart thing to do”. With all of this a lot of changes can be on the way. The legislation would create about 77,000 jobs or even more in the first year and that would increase the economic output by $7.3 billion, most impacted would be California, Texas, and Florida. The Senate immigration bill that passed in June with bipartisan support will allow about 11 million immigrants who came here illegal to apply for legal status and receive work permits. First they’ll have to pass a background check and pay a fine in order to do so. However, legislation had a problem once it got to the house because Republican leadership said “it would not bring the Senate bill to a vote”.  President Obama and others are trying to push this Senate bill forward and are fighting for it. They’re trying to convince the Republicans to pass it forward. Republicans are denying that immigrants can bring an economic boost. Still not giving up many people are in favor with passing the bill and are fighting for the immigrants’ rights.
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jul/31/nation/la-na-pn-immigration-economics-20130731Read more

 

Same-Sex Marriage

Same-sex marriage is a huge controversial topic among many people. Not everyone supports same-sex marriage because they think that it’s wrong for people of the same gender to love each other and get married. However, times have changed and now more people have an open mind about this topic. The world itself is now experiencing changes for same-sex marriage couples, in the sense of having more rights for same sex couples. Same sex spouses who are military members are suppose to be getting health care, housing, and other benefits by the end of August  by the Pentagon. This however, doesn’t apply to gay couples whom are not married they would not be getting the same benefits. Another huge change that has come is the fact that same-sex marriage is legal so now people of the same sex whether it’s two men or two women, have the right to get married. Not every single state has made it legal for same sex couples to get married. When it comes to same sex marriage or couples no every state has the same rights or benefits for these people. The Marriage Act says that it prohibits federal government to recognize a marriage if it’s not that between a man and women. This was overturned in late June when the court said that married gay couples should be recognized under the federal law, not only that, but same sex marriage in California was to be resumed. This didn’t mean that somewhere else in the country were they legalizing same sex marriage. Still not everyone supports these changes that have or are yet to come people are still fighting to get the rights that these couples deserve. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter if someone marries someone from the same sex because they are still human beings and deserve the same rights as everyone else has. People can still expect more changes for same-sex couples to come.
http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/national-world/pentagon-may-revise-same-sex-benefits/article_ddd4f749-8f15-563c-8de5-bcdf725afe6a.html 

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New protections for minors using the internet

This past Friday there was a measure approved by the senate and it was sent to the governor about new protections for minors. The bill prohibits the marketing of certain products which include guns, bullets, dietary supplements, alcohol to minors, and bars the compiling of personal information provided by underage Internet users for marketing by third parties. Senate Darrell Steinberg said that this measure will also protect those teenagers who post something on the Internet which later they regret. The bill states that all websites in California will have to have something that allows a young teenager to remove the post so a third person won’t be disturbed. However, this measure was opposed by the Center for Democracy and Technology who prefer the open use of the Internet. What they say is that this measure may cause confusion and ended up leaving minors with less Internet access. They also say that this might discourage the development of new content and services for young users. Not only that, but popular websites that are appealing to teens won’t be able to be accessed by them anymore.
http://www.latimes.com/local/political/la-me-pc-california-senate-approves-new-protections-for-minors-using-internet-20130830,0,6525019.story

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