Anne Applebaum from The Washington Post

SACRAMENTO, Calif.- Everyone reads their news online or watches it on television.  The increase in online readership is skyrocketing.  As a college student, I rarely, if ever, watch the news on television anymore.  It seems all they focus on is death, terrorism and chaos.  Rarely do they ever have a happy story or a story that brings pride among the community.

Anne Applebaum is a foreign affairs columnist for The Washington Post and Slate.  I have read a few of her articles, some titled: "Chile and Haiti: A look at earthquakes and politics", "A terrorism alert to ignore", "'It's too soon to tell' how the Iraq war went", and "Anger over papal visit shows religious freedom is alive and well in Britain".  Her column appears every Tuesday.

In the column titled, "Chile and Haiti: A look at earthquakes and politics", she talks about both earthquakes and how it was more devastating for Haiti to experience this type of natural disaster because of the aftershocks of rebuilding their cities.  Applebaum says Chile has a better democratic government so it will be easier to rebuild, where Haiti has nothing working for it to rebuild it.  She says, "She has nothing to do with luck."

Her other column titled, "A terrorism alert to ignore", was a funny ironic piece.  She speaks about a terrorism alert that alerted people in Europe to be careful to ride public transportation because terrorists might attack.  Has it not occurred to their government that a terrorist attack can happen anywhere and at anytime?  So why now would they send this alert?

Applebaum has achieved many accomplishments in her journalism career such as writing two books, "Between East and West: Across the Borderlands of Europe" and "Gulag: A history", which she won the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction in 2004.  She she has also won the Charles Douglas-Home Memorial Trust award for her journalism skills in post Soviet Union.

She has her own website which is linked to previous articles she has written, her columns, as well as introductions and critiques of her books.

Applebaum was born in Washington, D.C. and graduated from Yale.  She then went to the London School of Economics and St. Antony's College in Oxford.  It seems as though foreign affairs runs through her veins.

I tried to contact her, however she never returned my email.  Her columns are easy to read and if you don't watch the news, her columns are a great way to know what's going on around the world.  She'll even write a column on things that do not make the first page of the paper.

I decided to profile Anne Applebaum because of the simple reason that I do not like to watch the news, especially what's going on in other countries.  Like I said before, it seems as if the media simply focuses on tragedy, but Applebaum focuses on not only tragedies but focuses more on a humanistic level of all of her stories.

Donations for Students!

SACRAMENTO, Calif.- There's nothing new to being a broke college student.  If you're a college student and not broke, you definitely do not fit in.

The budget crisis of California is not new.  We've been in debt for about 4 years now and maybe even before then.  The state has taken money away from schools and increase our tuition fees so the burden lays on us.  In the academic year 2009-2010, tuition increased to about $4000 a year.  Financial aid is a huge portion of how students are able to afford their housing, books, cell phone bills, and everything else.  Without financial aid, personally, I would be living out of my car and going to school.

According to IES-National Center for Education Statistics, for the year 2007-2008, 66% of all undergraduate students receive any kind of financial aid.  I know for most students, they rely on financial aid like a lifeline.

There have been times, I didn't know how my rent was going to get paid.  Thank God for financial aid.

There are different types of financial aid a student can get.  They can get loans, Cal grants, University grants, and Pell grants, are just a few to name.  With grants, students don't have to pay them back, however with most student loans, they do not have to be repaid until 6 months after the student graduates.

Along with financial aid, students get part-time jobs like working at the mall or at restaurants.  Personally, I work at the mall.  No one likes to work at the mall.  Working at the mall is a necessity to live, to pay the bills financial aid cannot, and to have a life outside of school.  Mall and restaurant workers have to put up with the rude customer who cannot make up their mind or wants their meal made to unattainable standards. 

Another way we, students, survive going to school is the help from our beloved parents.  The people who love us to death and don't want to let go.  They taught us to save, save, save.  They're the ones to tell us, "Don't put your purse on the ground or you'll be broke forever".  My mom always told me to save.

However it's hard to save your money when your priorities are: rent, food, books/school supplies, cell phone bill, car expenses, and the dreaded credit cards.  With financial aid paying mostly for tuition, the little, unfriendly customer, part time job has to pay off all these other expenses.  How can a measly $400 a month pay for all that?  

Some suggestions on how to make a students financial troubles easier:

1)  Public transportation- CSU Sacramento offers a shuttle that goes to different areas around school and picks up students like a city bus, and it's free.  Also if the shuttle stop is not near your house, use a city bus.  School's offer free bus passes for students.

2) Reduce, Reuse, Recycle- Recycling cans is the best way to earn a little bit of cash.  You can find any recycling place in your area at any gas station.  

3) Food Stamps- The Welfare Administration office will give students $200 a month for food.  Food should not be something anyone should have to worry about.  

Financial aid is one of the best things that could ever happen to a student.

Libraries for Profit

SACRAMENTO, Calif.- The book, Fahrenheit 451, is about America in the future and how books are illegal to read.  In this book, it's not unusual to read about books burning and how the main character tries to maintain reading books as a way to keep his sanity.

I read an article in the Sac Bee about the library in Santa Clarita becoming privatized.  At first I didn't quite understand the concept of privatizing something.  But the general jist of it is, to make a profit.  

A few folks in class spoke about different structures in a community are privatized, for example: roads, bridges and what not.  Some people said it was good to privatize libraries and others said it wasn't ethically correct.

In my opinion, I don't see a huge difference in privatizing a library than not privatizing one.  As it is libraries already charge late fees and fees to use the computers.  One person in class said the fees might go up if it were to be privatized.  If this is true, then perhaps by doing this, all libraries can have new and improved technology centers, better and newer books and even a better facility.

The library in my hometown, Sunnyvale, Calif., is a little run down and out of style.  A few blocks down from the library is Downtown Sunnyvale.  The one block downtown area has just been re-vamped and has an upscale look; with the two story Target and massive parking lot being the focal point.  Ritzy and modern housing is being built in the opposite direction of Downtown.  The library is just a reminder of the old Sunnyvale.

Maybe if my hometown library was privatized, it would have a lot more community members checking out books there, or more children taking an active role in bettering their education.  It would be as live and happening as the Downtown area just a block away.

Now, Sunnyvale, Calif. is a middle to upper class town, and so is Santa Clarita; the focus of The New York Times article.  Are the corporations privatizing the libraries targeting middle class areas or are urban areas also going to be affected by this?

I think it would be an interesting turn if corporations went into the slums of America and fixed the libraries and other infrastructures to better the community.  Now that would be a good thing to do!

Such communities in Chicago, New York, Atlanta, Detroit, etc...These big cities have plenty of corporations that make easily billions of dollars a year.  I'm sure they write a check once a year as a tax write off to different organizations that help the underrepresented.  If they would actually go into the communities that they want to help, this would put a face to their good doing, and maybe it would have a better impact.

I can envision the members of the community, being proud to have such a nice and technological savvy library in their neighborhoods.  I can envision single mothers and fathers taking their children to the library after work to help their children with their homework.  Or even, children using the library as a safe haven from the criminal activity in the area.

Maybe corporations should focus on those types of neighborhoods instead of middle to upper class areas that already seem to have full functioning library, that seems to fulfill its purpose.