You many very well recognize my name. I hold the honor of being the first female to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. Spending time on the court allows me to have influence on some hard hitting cases and has given me the opportunity to uphold the Constitution.

I come from a humble beginning from a ranch in El Paso, Texas. I spent my childhood outside riding horses. I have faced adversity through every step I have taken in life. I attended Stanford University and received my degree and law degree in 1952. I fought to find employment, but the field was saturated with men. I got my first taste of a career when I served as a civilian lawyer in Frankfurt, Germany two years after graduation.

After coming back to America in 1957, I moved to Arizona and dabbled around in many political and judicial careers until I was appointed to the Arizona Senate in 1969 and eventually the state’s court of appeals in 1979. Finally, in 1981, I was appointed by President Ronald Reagen to serve in the U.S. Supreme court. I received across the board approval from the members of the Senate.

I can be identified as a moderate conservative. I have been faced with allegations of not adhering to party lines in terms of abortion, and the liberals are sometimes upset at my stance on several feminist issues. People were at first discontent at my lacking experience and lack of constitutional knowledge mastery. I have shocked them all though when I overcame this adversity and proved to take all of my cases thus far carefully and uphold the law and the Constitution.

The case I am now presented with is Associated Press v. United States. From what I have gathered from this case so far, it appears as though the struggle is between privacy and national security. The government claims that they acquired private communications to promote national security and to make sure that no plotting against the government was occurring when whistle blower Edward Snowden broke alleged information of the government’s surveillance programs.

Jewel v. National Security Agency definitely sets the precedent for this case. Although the case was dropped, it shows the struggle between government and personal privacy.

I am curious to see how this case is decided. I certainly am formulating my own opinions on what I am seeing and reading thus far, but in the end of the day I will uphold what is deemed right by the supreme law of this land, the Constitution.

http://www.biography.com/people/sandra-day-oconnor-9426834

http://www.oyez.org/justices/sandra_day_oconnor

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/justices/oconnor.bio.html

I would like to preface this response to the questions pertaining to the Rolling Stone’s coverage of an alleged rape cause on the University of Virginia’s campus. Whether this story is accurate or not, rape culture on campus is a prevalent issue throughout the nation and the subject should not be downplayed or devalued based on the statements made by one person claiming to have been abused.

Many things went wrong in the coverage of this story. The most glaring issue with this piece is the lack of fact checking and careful eye of the editors. A basic error that was made is checking the date in which Jackie claims she was assaulted. Through a quick search, it is easy to find that the alleged fraternity did not hold any social events that evening. This should have been the beginning of many red flags to the magazine.

If this story was a poor excuse for journalism, there where does the blame fall? Does it fall on the editors? The author? Or Jackie, the supposed victim? There is no single person to blame here. Unfortunately, the ultimate publication of a piece this faulty holds many people accountable. One person alone did not look at this story. Jackie could be held accountable for false accusations and providing dishonest information, if she did indeed fabricate the story at hand.The writer could be blamed for relying too much on her source and not fact checking information that was provided. This means that the editor could also be blamed, as a discerning eye was not used on the piece before publication. Personally, I feel like there are a multitude of people to blame.

The biggest journalistic errors apparent to me in this story are the fatal errors of depending too much on a source, not getting the other side, and becoming too caught up in the potential of the story. When a writer gets too involved with thinking how the story will better their career and reputation, or they are too focused on finally finding a piece that would be exactly what they are looking for, errors will usually appear. No matter how enticing a lead for a story, it is imperative to check both sides and fact check the information you are receiving, even in the delicate case of a rape accusation.

I make all of these statements and observations as a very amateur journalism student. I by no means understand the full situation, the manor in which data was collected, the true way interviews were conducted, or the all the toil that went into the production of this article. From my novice standpoint I would offer one piece of advice: This story is not fit for publication. Until the facts are confirmed, the sources checked, and the opposing viewpoint obtained, this story is much too weak to stand under the pressure of the media limelight.

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