PoliSci Reflekshawwnn

Some memories I will take away from this course are: the Branches of Congress (535 members) plus the Vice President, the Speaker of the House - powerful rep of House from party in power, 8 roles of the President (all this time, I thought it was only one), politics can be funny (SNL), the list goes on...

Some skills I will take to future classes and definitely college are: speaking in front of live audiences - soap box and debate, preparing notes for my papers before writing them (organizes and saves time) - debate, moodle quizzes - however, I may not need that skill for long.

Forwardist Party

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: forwardist party)

Election Reflection

This election has monumental change written all over it, symbollically and politically.  Having an African-American man lead the country, has immense symbolic value on the nation and the world.  Within the United States, we have seen that President-elect Obama has won the hearts of many Americans.  He gained voter support through expression of his plans of action and his personality.  Just the fact that he came from a poor family shows that he understands what it means to struggle.  Because he has come from this less-fortunate family to become a successful Senator and soon-to-be President, he has shown great character.  People like a President with character.  Also, his race plays an enormous role.  The fact that he is the First "non-white" President shows that 1) the country has changed greatly and has focused on the candidate's plans, and 2) it is possible for anyone to make a difference in the country.  Globally, most of the leaders in other countries look forward to his presidency, feeling he will steer the country in the right direction, like in the video below, in which Shashi Tharoor, Indian author, former UN official, politician -  promotes Mr. Obama.   

A major factor of this election was the votes of young people, aka "youth vote".  Although not minors, they are the youngest voting-eligible group of citizens.  Young people - voters of ages 18-30, have changed the outcome of the election so immensely that if they did not vote, McCain would have won the election.  To think that of 23 million voters, 15.3 million of them voted for Obama, is astonishing.  That is a 2 to 1 ratio of Obama to McCain.  This age group made up 18% of the voting population in this election.  This Obama-favored group is largely because of his emphasis on the economy.  Most people of this age are attending college or some further educational pursuit (medical, grad school, law school) or are trying to pay off their student loans.  On the top of their minds when thinking about politics or the election, they think of the economy and how they will be affected.  

I am convinced the constitution party is the most radical of them all

The Constitution Party has now brought a new level of radicalism into the election.  First, Chuck Baldwin claims that both candidates Obama and McCain are taking the country in the wrong direction, and that their values and beliefs are completely wrong.  Then he claims that McCain has no chance against Obama in the Presidential Election.  While this may be true, he also claims that the Constitution Party candidate will have a better chance in winning the election than John McCain.  More radical still, he wants to eliminate the IRS, the nation's system of taxes, take out the Federal Reserve, remove the United States from the United Nations (a great source of much needed allies), and the list goes on.  The Party believes that citizens planning to vote for McCain should give up on him and vote for a real candidate- Chuck Baldwin. 

Chuck Baldwin, the current Presidential Candidate for 2008, talks about what he would do as President in this video.  

Politics1.com indicates that Baldwin has qualified for the Presidential ballot in 37 states and counting.  Granted this was last updated 9/28/2008.  Nevertheless, Baldwin is doing quite well compared to other Third Party candidates.  

This picture explains quite well the fundamental beliefs of the Constitution Party.  Republicans and Democrats recklessly riding down a raging river with deadly rocks in the path, representing the direction in which the country is going.  Once again, the Constitution Party just may be the most radical of them all.  

Blog Post #3- how are professional blogs different?

------This blog is about the Constitution Party, one of those little political parties that essentially no one cares about. It claims that their party is making a comeback on the big dogs of Republican McCain and Democrat Obama. Chuck Baldwin, Presidential Candidate, even calls McCain and Obama "die-hard socialists".
------This blog is different from other blogs because it provides legitimate information to back up their viewpoints. The site includes videos and other sites to people that support the Constitution Party, and is updated fairly frequently.
------Baldwin claims that taxpayers (our parents) are being charged too much money through taxes to fund the buyouts of the big businesses. He says AIG is an enormous global entity with $1.1 trillion in assets, explaining to us that it does not need our money. However, is it not the constant borrowing from other countries and spending money that we do not have the force that got the country into trillions of dollars of debt in the first place? I think it is. The only logical explanation for us (USA) to escape from debt is to pay it off now. How do we do that? Taxes. Where will they come from? the people that make up almost 300 million bodies. We can pay it off. It will not be easy. Mind you, we still have our own economy to fix. This will also come from our pockets. But if we all suffer, then what is the big deal? Prices will go down and the value of the dollar will go up. I think the best thing for us to do now is to do the exact opposite of what we have been doing. We need change. We also need to work together.

Response to Constitution Party News

If you watch the video at the top of the page for the week of 9/28-10/05, you will notice that the man speaking, Mr. Darrell Castle, is a boring speaker. He is the Vice President for Chuck Baldwin, of the Constitution Party. Castle sees both McCain and Obama as extremists. He believes he has a chance in the upcoming election against the two main candidates. I think it is unlikely that they will even be close to either one of them, and that voting for this party will have no effect on the outcome of the election.
Basically, the Constitution Party is extremely conservative. It advocates sticking to the roots of the original Constitution and the Bible. Constitutionists also believe George Washington was our greatest President. This may be true, but also note that he lived over 200 years ago. He is outdated, out of context, and would not function the same way if he lived in today's society.
Baldwin contributes some thoughts to the blog also. It seems as though he is pessimistic and cynical, and that everything the government and Congress is doing is completely wrong. No offense to the Constitution Party, but I can see why more people are Democrats and Republicans.

AIDS

World Aids Day is coming up in December! Each year, Americans search about AIDS on Google the most on December 1st, and each year since 2004, there has consistently been less searching for it. This is disappointing to the blogger at http://blog.aids.gov/2008/09/a-picture-is-wo.html because he believes searching for info on the internet will make Americans more aware of the danger of the epidemic. He says if we research it, we can help prevent it from spreading, which is most likely true. However, the decline in searching for AIDS on Google could be because as more people are aware, fewer people search it because they already searched it or they heard about it from someone. At any rate, this is a good effort to mitigate AIDS infection and spreading. sorry this is such a late post, pete