Final Project Video Presentation

Here is a link to my video presentation: I found the easiest way is to copy and paste link and it should directly take you to the video! https://drive.google.com/file/d/1h9r6RxonG9HZg2c1TbvD1HmfI59xEX0G/view?usp=sharing

Foreign Policy

Foreign policy is defined as “a systematic and general plan that guides a country’s attitudes and actions toward the rest of the world. Foreign policy includes all of the economic, military, commercial and diplomatic positions that a nation takes in its relationships with other countries”. The American Constitution does not clearly specify exactly how to split foreign policy between the president and Congress. The President is Commander and Chief and therefore assumes much of the decision-making power when it comes to foreign policy making and members of Congress help shape the president’s decisions and still have the ability to limit the president’s powers. In regards to foreign policy, The Constitution gives the President the power to make treaties with other countries (these need to be approved by ⅔ the senate) and to make executive agreements with other heads of nations with no approval from the senate. Another way the President affects foreign policymaking is that the President is a symbolic head of our government and represents the face of our country to the rest of the world. The Cabinet helps recommend foreign policy decisions however the Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense are the only cabinet members that work on foreign policy full time. There are multiple agencies that work with foreign policy such as: The Department of State, The Department of Defence, The Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, The Agency for International Development, The Peace Corps, National Security Council and the Central Intelligence Agency. The Department of State is the government agency that works the most directly with foreign policy and maintains diplomatic relationships with almost two hundred independent nations. A part of the Department of Defence is The Joint Chiefs (chief of staff of the Army, the chief of staff of the Air Force, the chief of naval operations and the commandant of the Marine Corps); the job of The Joint Chiefs is to be key military advisors to the President including military decisions regarding foreign nations. Historically, America’s foreign policy has shifted dramatically in response to attempting to preserve national security. Initially, the founding fathers used isolationism as the foreign political policy. A policy of isolationism meant America avoided political involvement in world affairs in order to preserve American interests. As America began to trade more with a number of Asian countries, it slowly shifted to interventionism. Interventionism is defined as a country being directly involved with the affairs of another country. Once the first World War broke out, the United States tried to shift to a policy of neutrality in order to stay out of the war. However, the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941 during World War II forced the United States to abandon their policies of neutrality and isolationism and join the war in order to protect America. After World War II the United States continued to follow the policy of interventionism and spent a lot of money and policy making trying to prevent the spread of communism (The Cold War) . The spread of communism was a major threat to democracy and started at the end of World War II in 1945 and continued to be a foreign issue that drove American policy making till the 1980s when the Soviet Union declared independence and the Communist Party lost almost all its power. After the Cold War the United states had created a reputation of being the defender of the “free world” and at this point U.S. foreign policy makers had to reevaluate America’s forign policy goals. In most recent decades, the foreign policy decisions that are being made have the same goal as our founding fathers, to protect America’s best interest. The horrific event of September 11, 2001 where America experienced a terrorist attack that killed 2,996 people, the United States foreign policy has focused heavily on The War On Terrorism. There are different types of terrorism: Local / Reginal terrorism, State-Sponsored Terrorism and Foreign Terrorist Networks. Local/reginal terrorism is often committed by extremists that desire to be freed from an oppressive government. State-sponsored terrorism is planned and sponsored by governments and foreign terrorist networks are nongovernement, hierachical terrorist organizations that plan terrorist attacks and members of the organization are dispersed globally in small units. As stated before, a lot of America’s foreign policy goals in the last decade of been directly a result of the war on terrorism. The Bush administration was resolved to hunt al Qaeda members and stomp out all its members immediately after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. This not only led to the war in Afghanistan but also a war on Iraq. United States Policy makers at this point were so focused on national security that they chose to engage in a preventive war which is not sanctioned by international law. The war on Iraq was a preventive war and the resolution created by the Bush Administration as reasons to go to war were allegations against Iraq that were later proved untrue. Many criticized the Bush administration’s decision to go into war with Iraq because it distracted the government from America’s primary threat -- al Qaeda. Another aspect of foreign policy that the United States has focused on is weapons and international policy around them. Countries have had to address the threat of nuclear weapons, biological weapons and chemical weapons. There have been many treaties regarding these weapons; these treaties are known as the United States Arms Control Treaties. The goal is for these treaties to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction. A third foreign policy aspect the United States has focused on is trade and its direct connection to human rights. Globalization has caused the diffusion of commodities as well as ideas on a global scale. A lot of America’s commodities are outsourced from other nations. The World Trade Organization (WTO) was created to establish an arbitration panel that is responsible for dealing with international disputes over trade issues. An issue with international trading is that human rights are not treated equally by every government. What happens when America outsources clothing made in a country where children are being forced to work in factories to produce the clothing? Even though America has ruled child labor illegal, how does America handle trade in regards to countries with different ethics or has a government that opppresses its citizens rights? These are all questions that foreign policy makers have to answer. The United Nations was established after World War II and it’s job is to promote international cooperation and world peace. The General Assembly of the United nation is composed of representatives from every nation that signed the charter and each nation is entitled to one vote regarding decisions being made by UN policy making. Though many Americans are not fans of the UN because the conflicting political cultures and diverse views on human rights issues has made it difficult for the UN to reach a consensus on international problems; the positives of the UN is that even though it needs reform, the United States has been able to help the UN achieve world successes such as help eradicate smallpox globally. The United States history of foreign policy has always centered around trying to protect America's best interest and protect national security.

Politics and The Media

The media has always been a part of influencing American politics however over the past decades media's role in politics has become increasingly noticeable. When our country was first founded, politicians would write pamphlets and articles to inform citizens of their political agendas. Candidates even back then might slander each other if they had opposing opinions. However, technological advances have significantly changed how politics is influenced. In addition to newspaper and printed information, first the invention of television changed how Americans absorbed politics and the internet followed. These forms of media impact what Americans think about politics or reflect what Americans think about politics depending on who you ask. I argue though that the media does both. Television, newspapers and articles posted on the internet by well known, reputable sources are assumed to inform the public on political information or take a stance on a political view. Having reputable sources publish political news in my opinion is the media telling Americans what to think. The internet however is also a space where anyone can post their views or create a blog which is referred to as citizen journalism. Citizen journalism is Americans posting media that reflects what Americans think. Citizen journalism is a form of democracy because it supports the first amendment and allows space for the voices of citizens (whether their political stance aligns with majority or minority opinion) to be represented. However, the drawback of citizen journalism is that there are no enforced professional or ethical standards that are required before citizens publish information. Therefore most information posted on the internet has to be read with skepticism and not taken at face value. Fact checking is very important because the lack of standards means a lot of political news can potentially be inaccurate or unverified. However, I would also say that even political news on television can be manipulated even though it comes from a political source. As the text mentions, television has influenced politics because it brought to life political issues and exposed Americans to politics inside their living rooms. This took away a level of detachment Americans may have felt by just reading the news because Television is a visual experience. Many candidates have spent millions or billions of dollars on TV campaign ads or ads that are posted on media. This is because Americans spend an increasing amount of time using technology. Anything an individual spends time on becomes a part of their reality and political campaigns use this to their advantage. Political advertisers use different strategies; positive advertising, attack ads, issue ads or even negative political advertising. In my opinion, these television acts impact America's politics not because of the content in the ads but the emotional reactions Americans have to these ads. Politics in the media is more about manipulating the emotions of voters rather than objectively focusing on political news. This brings me to the point that media has always been subjective however I do believe that especially over the last decade confidence in the media has decreased a lot. Once it is realized that more often or not there are biases that heavily influence the political news being publicly reported, the harder it is to believe the information being relayed (you would hope). For example, you can watch ABC News and Fox news the same day and still hear different headlines as well as different information about the same headline. In the recent election, the candidates used many campaign ads and media played a huge role in the months leading up the election. Candidates not only publicly attacked each other and had their own televised ads but the news sources also seemed to take very biased sides. For example, fox news glorified Trump and if fox news is the only media source an individual watched, they would have a whole separate understanding of Trump, his policies and opinions and national crisis’ (like the COVID 19 pandemic). Media is growing and becoming a mixture of not only professionally researched political news but bias political news and though it supports the idea of democracy where minority and majority voices can be represented equally, it does make Americans vulnerable to being manipulated or given false news if they do not fact check the media.

Bureaucracy

A bureaucracy is a complex administrative system to organize and manage a country or a company using a pyramid-like hierarchy. This means that in a bureaucracy each person reports to a person of higher position and that this form of organization always each person to focus on a specialized expertise. In regards to the American government, the federal government’s head of bureaucracy is the President and the executive branch is the bureaucracy. Within a bureaucracy each position has a function and the power to act is granted to a position rather than a person. A bureaucrat describes an individual that is an official member of a bureaucracy and works for a department within the bureaucracy. There are four major types of structures within the bureaucracy of the federal government: executive departments, independent agencies, independent regulatory agencies and government corporations. Every department within the executive departments were created by Congress and met a government need that arose and required a department to focus on a specific policy area. An example of one would be the Education department that focuses on federal programs and policies as well as policies to aid education and coordinate educational research. Agencies that are independent have a single function and are not a part of a department. An example of one would be the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). There are also independent regulatory agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency ( EPA) that have a specific function to create, implement and regulate a specific public policy to protect the public’s interest. The U.S. Postal Service is an example of a government corporation and is the largest government corporation that exists. Government corporations do similar services handled by the private sector and do charge for services however taxpayers foot the bill if the government corporation loses money. In regards to elections, our country depends on bureaucrats to do their jobs in order to have a successful election process. For example, in the election, mail men/women had to effectively do their job in the U.S. Postal Service in order to allow mail-in votes to be voted accurately. An important ideal of bureaucracy in our government is neutral competence --- where federal bureaucrats use their skillset to fulfill their job without being influenced by political issues. This ideal is imperative to having a successful election. This past election was very heated for many political issues not only tied to traditional political ideologies but issues also directly linked to humanitarian issues. If federal bureaucrats let these issues sway them from doing their jobs, the election would have not successfully happened. An unsuccessful election would mean that democracy would have not been upheld if the majority’s will was not reflected in the outcome. Many americans were aprehensive this past election because the liberal and conservative parties seemed more poloarized than ever. Our federal bureaucrats that continued their vital day to day jobs, without being swayed politically especially the days after the election when our country was anxiously waiting the outcome of the election should be acknowledeged.

Interests Groups

Interests groups have formed historically in response to change. These groups are created and organized by people sharing a common objective and can indirectly or directly influence American government policymakers. The American Constitution protects the right of groups to organize themselves, peacefully assemble and petition the Government to reconsider grievances. There are many types of interest groups that exist in America. There are interest groups that represent particular industries, environmental issues, labor interest, agriculture interests, consumer interests, senior citizen issues, professional interests, business interest and labor interests. These interests groups can represent private good as well as public goods. The difference is that a public good does not diminish the rest of the citizen's use of the good. A private good is defined as a good that once one person consumes them, no one else can consume the same good. For example, national defence is a public good and just because one citizen is protected doesn't take away protection from other citizens. An example of a private good would be a phone, when you are using your phone it means nobody else can use it simultaneously. This is important to understand because some interest groups advocate for policies or issues that will benefit others that do not participate in the interest group. There are also interest groups that seek policies that may only benefit the people in the interest group. For example, the oil industry may have a interest group that advocates for better policies that specifically benefit the development of oil as a energy resource in order to protect their own profits. While an environmental industry group may advocate for policies that protect an area from pollution but in the big picture, all citizens of the area will benefit from a healthier environment. Oftentimes, interest groups have a bad reputation because historically lobbyists from specific interest groups have used financial power or powerful political connections to influence congress members. This is concerning because regulating lobbyists has proven difficult and leads to many citizens feeling that interests groups do not have a equal voice. This is more a fact than a concern because the power of an interest group not only is determined by the issue they are advocating for but the financial support they receive. However, interest groups are also a form of representation where ideally anyone regardless of profession, gender, race and economic background can organize themselves in a way in which they can participate in the government system. In other words, average people are given the opportunity to join a interest group that reflects their interests or concerns. By joining an interest group, citizens are given a platform in which they can voice their views on policies to government officials. Not only are interest groups specialized on a particular issue, they also can bring public awareness to a policy issue and address detailed information about a policy that public officials can use when making policy choices. Another benefit of interest groups is that they are not apart of political parties. Political parties are generalized organizations focused on winning elections, operating the government and creating policies. In contrast, interest groups are focused on specific policy issues and are unlikely to divide divide the nation. Pluralist theory views interest groups as an aspect of a decentralized structure of government and makes space for each individual's interest to be presented in the policy making process. This theory also believe that interest groups can't dominate the political process because there are so many interest groups within America. The goal of a democracy is for the voices of the people to be represented in the government system and interest groups are a form of representation for the voices of average citizens to be heard.

Congress

The US congressional representation is organized in a unique way because it has a bicameral legislature. This means there are two separate chambers that make up Congress, The House and The Senate. This ideally balances out power between The House which represents the people as a whole and The senate that represents the states. The number of representatives in The House from each state is determined by the state’s population, therefore larger states have more House seats. Every ten years the U.S. The Census Bureau takes a census of the population in each state and this census determines if seats need to be reappointed. Every state regardless of population receives at least one house seat. The goal of this is that the population of each state is represented accurately in congress. The Senate is organized differently and each state only has two senate seats to fill. Popular representation of people is ideally reflected in The House and state representation is reflected in The Senate. Both The House and The Congress are a part of the legislative process. If legislation is introduced separate committees (usually subcommittees) the House and the Senate review the bill and if the bill is not pigeonholed and instead approved it will be reported to the full chamber. The idea is that the subcommittee can approve, add new amendments or draft a new bill before it reaches the full chamber. Floor debates are conducted differently in the House than the Senate because there are many more House members than members of the Senate. The bill will get voted on and if the bill word for word is passed in both chambers, the conference committee will create the final compromise on the bill before the bill is sent for presidential approval. The goal of this process and having both popular representation and state representation when creating new legislation. Ideally this would mean that any bill passed serves the interests of the American people (or the majority of people) as well as the state’s interest.

2020 Election Week

Election week of 2020 was filled with a lot of emotions such as doubt, fear, bewilderment, frustration and ultimately some relief. As I was looking at the votes being counted during the poles for each presidential candidate it was interesting to see how many voters (a small percentage) chose to vote for third party candidates. In Chapter 7 of the text it talks about the United States perpetuating a two-party system, a precedent that is believed to be a result of the first major political division that happened between the Federalists and Anti-Federalists. The two-party system that continues to prevail and prevailed this past week is also influenced by election laws and institutional barriers. This election week was not different from previous elections in the fact that the focus was on the democratic candidate and the republican candidate. The shocking part to me during the election this week was how close the popularity vote percentage wise were between the two candidates especially in the swing states. To me it was shocking because for me this election was beyond politics, it felt like to me people’s votes were also a reflection on how they felt about sexism, systematic racism and honestly human decency. I was relieved by the results. Historically, this election was a big deal because our first woman Vice President was elected and she is also the first person of color to be in that position. Her speech last night was amazing and all I can say is she opened doors for lots of future girls. She also brought hope to women such as my grandmother that the future will be brighter. My grandmother is an immigrant from India who has dedicated her life to making a better future for her own three daughters and six grandchildren. After hearing Kamala Harrris speak last night, she cried with happiness seeing a half indian, half aftican american woman be elected Vice President. When it comes to California state props, I was thrilled that prop 17 passed and that felons can vote once again. I do not believe in stripping human rights away from criminals. Felons in particular never made sense to me because once they have served their time in jail or prison there is no justification to continue to be punished once “justice has been served”. I was disappointed to see prop 22 pass that allows Uber and Lyft to classify employees as independent contractors. This was very frustrating to see because it allows the companies to be exempt from California Labor Laws and not give their employees health care benefits etc. I was not surprised by the outcome because this prop was backed by business oriented liberals and the commercials for this prop blasted every tv channel and media suggesting prop 22 was in the drivers best interest. The commercials advertised that if the prop passed it would allow drivers to continue to “work on their own time” but the truth is that was just a distraction. These commercials were funded by companies that had a personal interest in not having to provide benefits to employees. The five topics I would like to talk about in my final project for this class would be: The electoral vote and how it works Systematic racism within the history of our government Separation of church and state regarding the public school education system Why the United States is a democracy (historical information) What is federalism?