Archive for September, 2008

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, let me come clean and admit that I am one of the 47 million Americanswithout health care. Yes it is true; I am a part of the 14.2% of New Jerseyeans, 1,265,000 people, without insurance. Not because I don’t want it, or don’t care about my well being, it’s just that I cannot afford coverage and it’s difficult to find a doctor that will take me as an uninsured patient.

I can’t remember what the inside of a doctor’s office even looks like or recall the last time a doctor poked me with a cold finger and told me to “Cough!”. And the worse part, my health is “Not so good!” (Said with an Italian accent). So if you happened to guess correctly whether Universal health care is on my political shopping list …then DING! DING! DING! DING! You’re a winner, step right up and pick out your prize!

The 18 percent of uninsured Americans is just a small piece of our country’s’ huge health care mess. Premiums for health insurance have sky rocketed 35% in the last four years (8.5% per year). An individual health insurance policy averages about $4,400 a year, and a family policy costs $12,000 or more a year (the Links are my Sources). The 25 million Americans with health insurance are struggling to pay their medical bills. And here is the kicker, while insurance premiums are going up; the quality of the care is going down. This in combination with higher co-pays, deductibles, and prescription medications has left most Americans (including myself) out to dry. Our next president will have to face several challenges to overcome our nation’s health care crisis: cost, quality, and availability of care.

We live in a country where we are judged by our past, and our history is used as predictor of future behavior: i.e., when you apply for a credit card, the store checks you credit history, and when you submit an application for a job, the employer checks your references. The same should and must apply to a presidential candidate. One must sort through all the pre-election hype and considers who to vote for in a presidential election. One can usually tell where a candidate stands by analyzing his/her voting records on important issues, watching past interviews with the media, and critically thinking about the choices the candidates have made.

A thousand pardons for going over the allotted “two article maximum,” (I promise that it won’t happen again) but these extra sources are essential to the issue at hand and will help clarify how each candidate’s plan will affect you personally. Because Health care is a personal Issue!

Articles

  1. Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s Plan Quality, Affordable and Portable Coverage for All : (Healthcare Full PlanHealthcare FAQ)
  2. John McCain and Sarah Palin’s Straight Talk on Health System Reform a “Call to Action”
  3. The New England Journal of Medicine (Video) Perspective Roundtable: Health Care in the Next Administration

References

PBS.org, The Online News Hour’s Health Beat Article: The Uninsured in America:

The debates will begin to heat up as the Democratic and Republican presidential nominees engage in a Tag-Team like match over the important issues facing our country. This election is important for all Americans, the outcome will not only affect our future but our nation’s overall legacy, this election is a turning point in our nation’s history. So with this in mind, it is our duty, as Americans to Vote in this election. Because a Vote not cast is a Vote for the candidate you don’t want as President.

Even though, on occasion, I’ll take a jab at a candidate, or use a joke or sarcasm on positions taken on issues, I am serious about the process. I use this as a way to keep my interest alive and to participate. So with that said, on with the sarcasm…

First up, The McCain/Palin plan:

“In this Corner hailing from the state of Arizona…, the man with more houses that he can remember…, Senator John ‘I was a POW’ McCain, McCain, McCain… and his very intellectual VP pick Sarah “Caribou Barbie” Palin…..” (Said like a boxing announcer)

The McCain/Palin “plan” (and Kid-glove approach to the insurance-market) promotes individual purchased insurance. To fund this so called “plan” the McCain/Palin team proposed to tax the health insurance premiums that workers currently do not pay. McCain and Palin’s vast economic knowledge guesstimates that the use of the $3.6 trillion, over 10 years, will pay for refundable tax credits for Americans to use to obtain private insurance: $2,500 for individuals and $5,000 for families.

I am a just a wee bit reluctant to believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is sincere about health care reform (I have my reasons). Their “Straight Talk” is just that… TALK! It sounds as if McCain wrote it on the back of a napkin and decided he would use it as a campaign issue (Oh boy!, I would give my left foot to see that napkin). No thought out plan, or track record to back it up, of course McCain has to appease his true constituency: the insurance and pharmaceutical companies (Which become obvious when you read his plan).

However given the insane cost of health insurance premiums’ many lower income individuals and families,according to the Dr. Epstein of the New England Journal of Medicine, will not be able to afford coverage even with McCain’s propose Tax Credit. And most uninsured Americans would most likely remain uninsured under the McCain/Palin Napkin err “plan.”

Now on to the Obama/Biden plan:

The heart of the Obama/Biden health plan is choice. It requires employers, some small business are either subsidized or exempt, to either offer their employees health insurances or pay a tax to help finance coverage for the uninsured. This plan will create two options both of which would be open to Americans without access to group health insurance, including income based subsidies to help lower-income Americans afford coverage. The first is a government health plan, similar to Medicare, and the second is the creation of a national health insurance purchasing pool, insurance exchange, which would offer a choice of private insurance options. Small businesses that want to buy coverage for their employees are also permitted to participate in these plans.

The Obama/Biden plan prevents private insurance companies from denying coverage based on preexisting conditions or charging higher premiums to sick enrollees, effectively ending medical underwriting on the basis of a person’s health.

The Obama/Biden ticket plans to finance the $50 billion to $65 billion asking price by repealing the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003. And this is where Republicans grumble and complain. It is ironic that republicans are opposing a plan that takes every American into consideration because of a high price tag particularly when you consider their response to our current financial-market crisis. And take in account that we’re spendingspending $12 billion to $16 billion per month in Iraq and Afganistan. Funding then seems to be a moot point, and the petty bickering from republicans on something that will improve the quality of life for millions of Americans is political suicide (republicans are losing seats in Washington).

Before I get into the QnA section of this post, I want you to ask yourself these questions with hopes that it will give you a solid foundation to base your choices on:

Are you uninsured, underinsured, or comfortably insured? Do you or someone you know have health issues that need to be addressed but haven’t due to cost, quality, or availability of care? Have you been denied health coverage? If so, Why? This issue personally affects every American, more than any other.

Questions:

Barrack Obama and John McCain both have made a campaign promises to address our health care issues. If you had to pick a candidate based solely on this issue, and take into account their senate voting records, accoplishments, and attitues then…

  1. Which candidate would you vote for? Why?
  2. Why do you think their plan will work?
  3. What are the differences between Obama’s plan and McCain’s plan that are imprtant to you?
  4. How do think they will intend on paying for thier plan?
  5. Do you think that the cost of Universal Health care should be an Issue?
  6. Will McCain’s Tax credit or Obama’s plan cover your health care expenses?

The winner of this Tag Team match will be decided in November. The impact will be significant. Are you ready for a McCain or Obama Presidency? I am not a religious person, but (all athiest please forgive me as I put my god-goggles on for a few seconds)  I pray that Obama wins.

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The American Promise: A Compact History 3rd Edition Vol 1: To 1877

Introduction.

This chapter begins with a description of Captain John Smith’s capture by the warriors of Powhatan, the chief of about fourteen thousand Algonquian peoples who lived along the coast of Virginia. Smith believed that Powhatan had been ready to kill him by smashing his head with rocks but that he was fortuitously saved by Powhatan’s daughter, Pocahontas. However, it is far more likely that she was playing a part in a ceremony designed to express Powhatan’s power of life and death over a subordinate chief. Relations broke down between English settlers and the Algonquians though. Captured, Pocahontas eventually married John Rolfe, had a son, and moved to England where she was celebrated with a great deal of pomp and circumstance. Powhatan’s world of hunters and gatherers was gradually replaced by one of settlers with weapons, tools, and ideas foreign to the Native Americans. As a thriving tobacco trade grew between the Chesapeake Bay colony and Europe, Native American lands were usurped and their ways of life irreparably challenged.

An English Colony on the Chesapeake, pp. 71-80.

In 1603, King James I of England, impressed by Spain’s successes in the New World, was eager to establish colonies of his own in North America. England’s success in defending itself from the Spanish Armada suggested that England might now succeed in defending new colonies in North America on land claimed by Spain. Thus, in 1606, the king granted a charter to the Virginia Company of London, a joint stock company of adventurers, authorizing their occupation of over six million acres in North America. These men and other proponents of colonization hoped settlements would benefit the empire, both by yielding goods and by providing a convenient destination for masses of unemployed English people. Virginia Company investors dreamed about the quick and easy profits they could reap, but they failed to appreciate the difficulties of adapting European desires and expectations to the New World environment, particularly in regard to Native American peoples. Within twenty years the Jamestown settlement somehow managed to survive, but the English government replaced the private Virginia Company, which was never profitable.

The Fragile Jamestown Settlement.

In December 1606, 144 Englishmen sailed for Virginia aboard three ships. In May 1607, the survivors of the journey put ashore on a small peninsula in the James River in the heart of Powhatan’s chiefdom. They hastily built a fort as protection from the Indians and Spanish and named the settlement Jamestown, but skirmishes with the Indians were frequent. The settlers soon discovered that disease and famine were greater threats than the Indians’ spears and arrows or attacks by the Spanish. Despite Powhatan’s eventual overtures of peace and delivery of much needed foodstuffs and John Smith’s forays to trade with the Indians, by January 1608, only 38 of the original settlers remained alive to welcome the Virginia Company’s supply ships and 120 new colonists. Although the Virginia Company sent hundreds of new settlers each year to Jamestown, few survived these early years.

Cooperation and Conflict between Natives and Newcomers.

Given the colonists’ vulnerability, it is surprising perhaps that Powhatan did not attack Jamestown and drive the English out of the Chesapeake. Several factors probably contributed to his hesitation. The Indians were impressed by the English God, whom they felt must be very powerful, and even more by English goods. They were eager to trade corn to get these valuable items. Moreover, Powhatan and his werowances probably concluded that such powerful strangers would make better allies than enemies, especially in regard to other Native American tribes. Notwithstanding, more than once the Indians refused to trade their corn to the settlers, but the English brutally broke that boycott by attacking the uncooperative Indians, pillaging their villages, and confiscating their corn. Despite receiving or taking food from the Indians, Jamestown failed to thrive not only because of the settlers’ weakened physical condition, but also because the majority were gentlemen and their servants, who considered cultivating the land beneath them. Nevertheless, over time, the colony slowly expanded. Its continued existence changed Indian society, introducing new tensions over resources as well as European diseases that decimated Indians in epidemic proportions. In 1622, after fifteen years of an uneasy truce, Opechancanough, Powhatan’s brother and successor after his death, launched an all-out assault on the colony, killing 347 settlers— nearly one-third of the English population. The attack failed to drive the English out. From this point on, the colonists no longer deemed the Indians necessary for their survival; instead, they concluded that their settlement’s existence depended on the destruction of all Indians in the vicinity.

 From Private Company to Royal Government.

The shocking mortality rate and evidence of mismanagement led to the Virginia Company’s dissolution in 1624; Virginia became a royal colony governed directly by the crown. The king now appointed the governor, but most features of local government established under the company remained in effect, such as the House of Burgesses, first convened in 1619. By 1624, it was evident that English settlers were in Virginia to stay: New settlers were still arriving, the crown was committed to the colony, and steady progress was being made in the cultivation of tobacco. 

A Tobacco Society, pp. 80-87.

Tobacco grew wild in the New World where Native Americans had been using it for thousands of years. During the sixteenth century, Spanish colonists in the New World sent tobacco to Europe where it was an expensive luxury but, during the following century, English colonists in North America sent so much tobacco to European markets that it became quite affordable and was used widely. In 1612, John Rolfe’s experiments with West Indian tobacco seeds showed that the plant could be cultivated successfully in Virginia. The first shipment of Virginia-grown tobacco arrived in England in 1617 and sold for a handsome price. Ironically, the same Virginia colonists who could not or would not grow food for themselves quickly learned how to harvest as much tobacco as possible. Tobacco cultivation proved a crucial turning point for the Virginia colony, as the crop changed the aimless settlers into a community of dedicated planters.

Tobacco Agriculture.

A demanding crop, tobacco required close attention and a great deal of hand labor year-round. Primitive tools and planting methods made this intensive cycle of labor more taxing. Fields were cleared by girdling trees, and the tree-stump-studded fields were hoed instead of plowed. Colonists also had to grow food crops in the midst of the tobacco production cycle, leaving little time for idleness. But in spare moments, they enjoyed the fruits of their labor. English settlers, however, were willing to work hard because they could expect to do much better in the Chesapeake than in England. A hired laborer in a Virginia tobacco field earned in one year what it took his counterpart in England to earn in two to three years. More important, land was so plentiful in Virginia that even laborers could hope to obtain it. New settlers to the area who paid their own passage received fifty acres of free land known as a headright. This policy, begun by the Virginia Company, was continued by the royal government to attract settlers.

A Servant Labor System.

The seventeenth-century Chesapeake was fundamentally a servant society, with about 80 percent of new arrivals working as indentured servants. As indentured servants, English workers contracted their labor for a period of four to seven years in return for passage to Virginia and the chance to acquire land and wealth. The planter paid the cost of transportation and provided the servant with food and shelter. As many as half of the indentured servants died before their servitude ended, but those who survived were likely to acquire their own farms. More than two-thirds of the servants were young, unskilled males between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five. Only about one servant in four was a woman because employers preferred men for fieldwork. Servant life was very harsh by the standards of England and the Chesapeake. Servants who ran away or female servants who became pregnant had additional time added on to their contract. For some servant women, premarital pregnancy was a path out of servitude: The father of an unborn child sometimes purchased the indenture of the servant mother-to-be, freed, and married her. Notwithstanding, indentured servitude was not an easy road for those who chose to work it.

Cultivating Land and Faith.

Dispersments of the Chesapeake settlements were determined by the demands of tobacco. Because tobacco exhausted the land of its nutrients quickly, farms consisted of cultivated land surrounded by virgin forest. Moreover, planters preferred land on navigable rivers to ease transporting the tobacco onto ships. Most Chesapeake settlers nominally were Protestants, but few were very observant. Even the colony of Maryland, which was founded by Lord Baltimore and intended as a haven for persecuted English Catholics, devoted more attention to tobacco cultivation than to religion.

The Evolution of Chesapeake Society, pp. 87-93.

Tobacco cultivation propelled the evolution of Chesapeake society. The varying degrees of success among tobacco growers created a hierarchical society, in which wealth and status among colonists were quite disparate. Social stratification led to political polarization that climaxed in 1676 with Bacon’s Rebellion. Amid this political and social change, tobacco cultivation remained a constant.

Social and Economic Polarization.

Until mid-century, societal divisions in the Chesapeake were less between rich and poor planters than between free farmers and indentured servants, and a rough frontier equality characterized free families. After 1650, however, three developments contributed to a growing social polarization. First, tobacco prices declined as production increased, making it more difficult for freed servants to save enough to become landowners. Second, as the mortality rate of freed servants decreased, the number of freed men seeking land increased. Finally, the drop in mortality also contributed to a rising planter elite class whose members were living longer, acquiring more land, and making more money. By the 1670s, Chesapeake society had become polarized: Landowners-the planter elite and the more numerous yeoman farmers-made up one group; landless settlers, mostly freed servants, made up another group. Each looked upon the other with mistrust.

Government Policies and Political Conflict.

In general, government and politics intensified rather than reduced socioeconomic distinctions. Discrepant laws governed masters and servants. Moreover, the planter elite dominated the government, from membership in the House of Burgesses to the governor’s council. In the late seventeenth century, the franchise became more restricted, with voting limited to landowners and householders. Colonial officials not only administered government but profited from it as well, especially through revenue collecting. Beginning in 1660, the Navigation Act allowed the crown to extract revenue from the Chesapeake, and subsequent acts would be applied to other colonies. These measures were designed to give English merchants, shippers, and even seamen a monopoly on the colonial import trade. The acts reflected English mercantilist assumptions— the idea that the colonies existed to benefit the mother country. Hierarchy and stratification defined not only the relationship between king and colonies but also that between the planter and the lower classes.

Bacon’s Rebellion.

In 1676, Bacon’s Rebellion erupted as a dispute over Indian policy. As the Chesapeake population grew, the land-hungry poor whites encroached on Indian land and violence between settlers and Indians erupted. The government tried to maintain the peace, but frontier settlers, led by the ambitious Nathaniel Bacon, wanted revenge. They saw the colonial government, headed by William Berkeley, as run by corrupt officials who were as much their enemies as the Indians.

Governor Berkeley pronounced Bacon a rebel, threatened to punish him for treason, and called for new elections of burgesses, which Bacon and his supporters swept. They passed Bacon’s Laws, which gave local settlers a greater voice in the government and cracked down on corruption. When the king learned of the turmoil in the Chesapeake and its devastating effect on tobacco exports and customs duties, he ordered an investigation. The royal officials replaced Berkeley with a governor more attentive to the king’s interests, nullified Bacon’s Laws, and instituted an export tax on every hogshead of tobacco as a way of paying the expenses of government without having to obtain the consent of the tightfisted House of Burgesses. After Bacon’s Rebellion, political stability slowly returned to the Chesapeake.

Religion and Revolt in the Spanish Borderland, pp. 93-94.

Compared to the English colonies on the Atlantic coast or the Spanish colonies of Central and South Americas?, the Spanish settlements in Florida and New Mexico were failures. Florida and New Mexico lacked both Indian gold and an obvious export crop, and therefore attracted few Spanish settlers other than missionaries and soldiers. Spanish colonists coerced Indians into building churches, paying taxes, and performing labor. Angry at this harsh treatment, native peoples set aside their own disputes to fight Spain. In 1680, Popé led the Pueblo Indians in a revolt against the Spanish colony in New Mexico. The Pueblo Revolt temporarily ended Spanish rule. When Spain returned to New Mexico late in the seventeenth century, its agents decreased missionary work and cut back on labor exploitation. Although Florida witnessed no uprising comparable to the Pueblo Revolt, Spain’s colony there also had limited success attracting settlers or converting Indians. 

 Toward a Slave Labor System, pp. 94-98.

African slavery was introduced to the New World by the Spanish and Portuguese during the sixteenth century when European diseases decimated Native American populations. In the seventeenth century, West Indian English planters followed the Iberian example and developed sugar plantations with slave labor. However, in English North America, African slavery was not adopted until the last quarter of the seventeenth century. Beginning in the 1670s, slavery slowly made its way out of the English Caribbean and, by the end of the century, slave labor systems were found in the Chesapeake as well as in the Carolinas.

The West Indies: Sugar and Slavery.

England’s most profitable seventeenth-century colonies were established not on the North American mainland but in the Caribbean. English planters developed a profitable sugarcane industry that, by the end of that century, had exported nearly 50 million pounds a year to the mother country. Sugar plantations demanded a large initial investment; poor farmers could not afford the expensive machinery. The successful planters’ immense profits came from the sweat and toil of African slaves. By 1700, the island of Barbados was literally a slave society controlled by white men. The plantation regime was extremely brutal for slaves, who were often worked to death. Although sugar plantations never developed on the North American mainland, the West Indies nonetheless exerted a powerful influence on the introduction of slavery in North America.

Carolina: A West Indian Frontier.

In 1663, a Barbadian planter named John Colleton and seven other men obtained a charter from King Charles II to colonize the region south of Virginia. The proprietors planned to siphon settlers from Barbados and other colonies and encourage them to develop an export crop. They established a permanent English beachhead in the southern part of the colony at Charles Towne (later Charleston) in 1670. The Barbadian immigrants brought their slaves with them, thus establishing African slaves in South Carolina. During the first generation of the colony, Carolina served primarily as an economic colony of Barbados, exporting everything from livestock to timber back to the island. In the mid-1690s, the colonists hit upon a hardy strain of rice that thrived in the region; thereafter, rice became the industry that dominated Carolina.

Slave Labor Emerges in the Chesapeake.

By 1700, more than eight out of ten persons in England’s mainland southern colonies lived in the Chesapeake, and one out of eight was black. In 1650, slavery was still a relatively minor institution in Virginia and Maryland but, beginning in the 1670s, tobacco planters began a transition from servant to slave labor that portended slavery’s full adoption and institutionalization in the American South. Africans were favored over indentured servants as laborers for a number of reasons. First, because they and their descendants would be slaves for life, they constituted a potentially never-ending and self-perpetuating labor supply for planters. Further, unlike indentured servants, African slaves could be controlled politically. Whereas servants came to the Chesapeake with expectations of eventual liberty and ownership of land, slaves had no hope of attaining the privileges of freedom. Unlike the previous labor system divided between landless colonists on the one hand, and planter elites and yeoman planters on the other, this change from a servant to a slave labor system polarized Chesapeake society along lines of race and status. Although there were still large economic differences among whites, the rights enjoyed by poor white farmers made them feel that they too had a stake in the existence of slavery, even if they could not afford to own slaves themselves.

Conclusion: The Growth of English Colonies Based on Export Crops and Slave Labor, p. 98.

By the end of the seventeenth century, the English colonies of Virginia, Maryland, and Carolina were established firmly in North America, producing staples such as tobacco for export. Export crops made a handful of colonists wealthy and provided a livelihood for many. Southern colonial society differed significantly from that of England, yet the colonists considered themselves English subjects, claiming the rights and privileges of English citizens. The English believed themselves superior to Indians and Africans; thus colonists did not hesitate to deny these groups English rights and privileges. The English colonies differed from New Spain as well. The English did not seek to convert the native population to Christianity, the Chesapeake did not harbor gold or silver mines, and the encomienda system did not develop because Indians were too few and too hostile and their communities too small and decentralized to be organized effectively. However, the Chesapeake developed its own system of forced labor and racial distinctions. Only a remnant of Powhatan’s powerful confederation existed by 1700. The English colonists were in North America to stay.

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The reason for exploration was born out of simple human desire to pay less for goods and eventually evolved into other rationalizations all of which shared a common objective: the procurement of wealth and opportunity. The Renaissance had a profound effect on exploration and gave Europeans that little extra confidence they needed to embark on voyages into a dangerous ocean. The Reformation also had an effect on exploration and in its beginning was affected to some degree by exploration as well. The Spanish settlement of the New World and their subsequent exploitation of the natives were justified in the minds of Spaniards through the dogmatic belief in their superiority and captured in the well-known aphorism “Gold, Glory, and Gospel.”

The primary reason why Europeans ventured out into the unknown was to find a trade route by sea and establish direct trade with Asia, India, China, and Africa (Roark). Essentially cutting out the middlemen, the Italian bankers and merchants, who dominated the trade in goods carried overland since the twelfth century. The items they sought (satins, silks, spices, and exotic fruits) were expensive and cost much more than the hides, furs, tin, lead, wool, and leather products they had to offer (Reilly). This created a trade imbalance, combined with the fact that much of  their wealth to buy these goods were filling the pockets of middle easterners, did not sit well with them, “Muslims, heathens, and non-Christians were benefiting from this trade, and it bothered them” (Reilly). Europeans were fed up with making the heathens in the east rich and decided to find a route by sea to the Indies.

The Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Plague, was the catalyst for another potential reason for exploration. This deadly disease killed many Europeans, causing the surviving two-thirds much misery and hardship. Exploration provided some with an opportunity to escape the death and despair that haunted their recent past and gave them a chance at a better future. In some ways the bubonic plague encouraged some to take risks and so they set out on these voyages and to improve their lot and secure a place within society (Roark).  Their courage was fueled by technological advances and increased navigational knowledge sparked by the revival of classical culture.

The cultural and religious spirit that flourished between the 14th to 16th centuries, known as the Renaissance, brought the Middle Ages to an end (”Renaissance”).  This “classical revival” marked the beginning of modern sciences and the expansion of geographic knowledge (”Renaissance”).  This new found understanding catalyzed exploration and inspired Europeans to chase after their dreams. It convinced many to embark on voyages to find alternative routes to the Indies in an attempt to stake out a better future, discover new opportunities, and to procure wealth and security. The Portuguese were the first to make the trip out into the unknown, and would accumulate the knowledge that Christopher Columbus would later use to discover the New World.

The effect in which the Protestant Reformation and had on exploration began on October 31, 1517 when Martin Luther, a Catholic priest, published his Ninety-five Theses. Luther introduced two theological ideas that not only outraged the Catholic Church but caused the foundation of Catholicism to crack (Robinson). These two ideas became the reformist battle cry. The first became to be known as sola fide: the belief in justification by faith alone (”Martin Luther”). The second was sola scriptura: the belief that the church should be based on scripture alone (”Martin Luther”).   Luther openly challenged the pope’s authority, condemning the sale of indulgences; and preached that participation in church rituals would not put anyone closer to salvation (”Luther, Martin”).  Charles V, the King of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor, committed a portion of his new found wealth from the exploration of the New Spain towards the annihilation of Luther’s Protestant heretical doctrine (Roark 47).

However, Lutheran beliefs spread to England by the 1520s and took root in 1534 when King Henry VIII asserted his dominance over the Church of England, essentially breaking away from Catholic ideals. The Reformation strengthened further when Henry VIII’s daughter, Queen Elizabeth I, sought to end religious disputes in England, “Her Act of Supremacy of 1559 established her status as ‘Supreme Governor’ of the church and mandated the use of the Book of Common Prayer” (Robinson). This led to the Puritanism movement, the aim of which aim was to reform the church and find a common ground between Roman Catholicism and the ideas of the Protestant reformers” (”Puritanism”).  However, the Puritanism movement in England was unsuccessful. In 1620 Puritans separatist immigrated to North America and founded the Plymouth Colony and with desire to separate church and state, cut all ties with the Church of England.

After Christopher Columbus discovered the Bahamian islands, in search of a sea route to Asia, the reasons for exploration began its transformation into a cataclysmic exploitation of the natives (”Voyages of Christopher Columbus”). “Gold, glory and gospel” was their battle cry and their justification for the conquest of the people of the “new world”. In their drive to gather riches, the Spaniards enslaved and decimated the natives in an attempt to quench their insatiable lust for gold (Mancall).  After the Spanish crown got its twenty-percent cut of the swag, known as the “Royal Fifth”, and men like Cortes and his officers took their loot, there was very little left over for rest of the Spanish conquerors.

In order to compensate the conquistadores for their efforts and to encourage settlement the Spanish government established the encomienda systems in New Spain (Frank). Under encomienda conquistadores and later Spanish commoners were given land, by the King, and entrusted with a certain number of Natives to provide labor (Frank).  In return for protection, Christianization, and assimilation into the Spanish way of life, the Indians would provide labor, work the land, and pay tribute to the encomendero the holder of the encomienda (Foster). However, the encomendero was more concerned with what they could get out of the deal and typically exploited and abused the Natives. Overtime the encomienda, and subsequent repartimiento, another system of forced labor, dramatically decimated the Indian population, and for the first time in New Spain’s history Indian laborers were in short supply. Spanish greed and inhumanity, as history shows, eventually caught up with them. Their plan for settlement was workable, if their intentions were to annihilate the natives, corrupt a culture, rape the lands, and transform it into a Christian European society.

Exploration was born from European desires to pay less for the goods they wanted. The reasons then morphed into a way for some to escape the aftermath of the Black plague. In its finality, the reasons for exploration transformed into an insatiable lust for wealth and power, which obliterated a people, replaced their religion, and stole their wealth. Europeans were encouraged to seek out a westward passage as a result of the expansion of geographic knowledge produced by the Renaissance. Reformation did not only effect exploration but was affected by it throughout the colonization and settlement of the Western Hemisphere. This can be surmised from the facts that Charles V used wealth from New Spain in failed attempts to squash Lutheranism; and from the fact that Protestant Reformation ideas spread to England by the 1520s, eventually leading to the Protestant colonization of North America. In the short run, the Spaniards plan worked, but as history tells us, it did not last.

 Works Cited

Foster, Lynn V. “Spanish empire in 16th century Mexico.” Mexico, A Brief History, Updated Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2007. Modern World History Online. Facts On File, Inc.  Union County College Libraries, Cranford, NJ. 8 September 2008. http://www.fofweb.com.

 

Frank, Andrew. “The New World.” The Birth of Black America: The Age of Discovery and the Slave Trade, Milestones in Black American History. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1996. African-American History Online. Facts On File, Inc. Union County College Libraries, Cranford, NJ. 8 September 2008. http://www.fofweb.com.

 

“Luther, Martin.” Modern World History Online. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2003. Facts On File, Inc. Union County College Libraries, Cranford, NJ. 8 September 2008. http://www.fofweb.com.

 

Mancall, Peter C. “New World.” In Mancall, Peter C., and Gary B. Nash, eds. Encyclopedia of American History: Three Worlds Meet, Beginnings to 1607, vol. 1. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2003. American History Online. Facts On File, Inc. Union County College Libraries, Cranford, NJ. 8 September 2008. http://www.fofweb.com.

 

“Martin Luther.” Microsoft Encarta 2007. 16 ed. CD-ROM. Redmond: Microsoft Corporation

 

 ”Puritanism.” Microsoft Encarta 2007. 16 ed. CD-ROM. Redmond: Microsoft Corporation

 

Reilly, Gretchen Ann. “American History before 1870.” Podcast. Dr. Gretchen Ann Reilly.
iTunes.  August 2007. Temple College Temple, TX, 2006. http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=212324657

 

“Renaissance.” Microsoft Encarta 2007. 16 ed. CD-ROM. Redmond: Microsoft Corporation

 

Roark, James L., et al. The American Promise: A Compact History, Third Edition. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2007.

 

Robinson, Martha K. “Reformation.” In Mancall, Peter C., and Gary B. Nash, eds. Encyclopedia of American History: Three Worlds Meet, Beginnings to 1607, vol. 1. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2003. American History Online. Facts On File, Inc. Union County College Libraries, Cranford, NJ. 8 September 2008. http://www.fofweb.com.

 

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The Behaving Brain is the third program in the DISCOVERING PSYCHOLOGY series. This program looks at the structure and composition of the human brain: how neurons function, how information is collected and transmitted, and how chemical reactions relate to thought and behavior.

The human brain is an extraordinarily complex organ made up of different regions and parts, each with its own function. Chemical molecules and electrical impulses constantly flow between regions of the brain, sending signals and messages to other parts of the brain and body. Much like an orchestra, brain functioning depends on many individual parts working together.

One example highlighted in this program is the brain’s role in our ability to remember. Psychologist Dr. Mieke Verfaellie studies the causes and effects of amnesia at the Memory Disorders Research Center in Boston. Her research draws on evidence of damage to the hippocampal region of the brain, the area responsible for laying down new memories.

Contrary to popular opinion, amnesia doesn’t result in the loss of all memory or identity. Amnesia affects our short-term, or anteograde memory, and our ability to learn and retain new information. What’s interesting and often surprising in amnesia cases is that other regions of the brain continue to function normally, such as long-term memory. But damage to even one area, such as short-term memory, can dramatically affect our ability to navigate through daily life.

Neuroscientists are learning from abnormal brain functioning, such as amnesia, to identify normal brain patterns. For instance, the interplay of brain regions and their role in thoughts, understanding, and behavior are now better understood.

For a more detailed breakdown of the human brain, go to the Brain Exploration feature of this site.

Dr. Verfaellie contributed to an article about memory distortions in amnesic patients, published in MIT’s Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, “When True Recognition Suppresses False Recognition: Evidence from Amnesic Patients.” http://mitpress.mit.edu/journals/JOCN/jcn10602.pdf.

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