The Rise of Democracy: MEXICO, by Shea Nolan

Mexico first declared their independence from Spain in 1810, but didn’t gain their full independence till 1821. After the revolution general Agustín Cosme Damián de Iturbide y Arámburu was appointed President in 1881, but his term ended in 1822. Though Iturbide only ruled for a year this demonstrates the political struggles before and after independence.  

The 8^th president of Mexico López de Santa Anna was a general, and eleven times president; his total presidency spanned over 22 years. Between being a general and a president Santa Anna greatly influenced early Mexican politics and government for 40 years. Even though he has been seen as a brave soldier, hero of the army, and a cunning politician he has been recognized as the reason why Mexico had lost over half its territory.

Seizing power in a coup in 1876 José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori was a soldier and politician, who served seven terms as president. Díaz ruled Mexico with an iron fist until 1911, where it took nothing less than a revolution to dislodge him. During his term, known as the Porfiriato, the rich got richer and the poor got poorer. Though there was such a large gap in social classes Mexico had become recognized as a developed nation in the world, but this all came at a price, Díaz presided over one of the most crooked administrations in history. 

The Institutional Revolutionary Party (RPI)

The Institutional Revolutionary Party was founded in 1929 due to the forces that had triumphed in the revolutions, also to give deliver stability to Mexico that had been plagued with violence. Though Mexico is a multi-party system, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), National Action Party (PAN), and the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), the PRI has governed Mexico with almost complete dominance from the day of the Mexican Revolution.

Miguel de la Madrid of the PRI was elected president in 1982. He had won with 70% of the vote; this was a much lower percentage from the past. In other words this showed that candidates from the right and left were gaining ground. Though he had made a number of economic gains in his term, the PAN started to demand for additional electoral reforms as well.

Following the electoral reform in 1986 the Chamber of Deputies added another 100 seats, and 200 of the now 500 seats were devoted to smaller parties. Though there was much reform there was still much political fraud in a number of elections, mostly in the election of 1986. With every election (every 6 years) the PRI was losing its political dominance and smaller parties were beginning to rise.

A new horizon

Known as one of the most historic election in Mexico the 2000 elections was the change of a new leader and a new political party. PRI, after ruling Mexico for 71 years; Vicente Fox of the Alliance for Change was elected. Vicente Fox, winning the election with 42% of the vote over Franciso Labastida of the PRI with 36%, this was a dramatic loss for PRI. After his inauguration on December 1, 2000, Vicente Fox promised the people of Mexico that he would promote free market policies, and to strengthen democracy and the rule of law in Mexico. But the terrorist attacks on September 1^st 2001 in America affected Mexico’s economy. This event limited government funding that was going to fund Fox’s health and education programs. In the 2003 elections to renew the Chamber of Deputies, the PAN lost seats, giving less support to Fox and his programs. Fox not having the majority in congress he was unable to approve any major legislation along with a purposed tax reform and a proposed energy reform.

Approaching the July 2006 presidential election, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador of the leftist PRD was leading, against Felipe Calderon for the PAN, and Roberto Madrazo for the PRI. Felipe Calderon of the PAN was able to take the 2006 election; this allowed the PAN to serve another term ruling. All of the political events that have happen thus far in Mexico have allowed the political system to grow more into a democracy.

Why Democracy is The Most Effective, by Cal Reeves

            Many governments today are democratic for a number of reasons, the help keep things in the best interest of the people of the country, it helps elect leaders, and it gives every person the chance to be heard. Democracies have been around for thousands of years mainly, because they work. They have tended to outlast most dictatorships and communist states. Many democracies have lasted over hundreds of years. For instance ours has lasted about 220 years. Some of the older ones like Greece where started by a guy by the name of Cleisthenes, who is noted for starting the democratic footing in Greece around 500 BC and lasted for over two centuries.

Dictatorships and Communist states just cannot compete with democracies or capitalist states on most levels. The democracies tend to be more equipped in the means of a military and self defense, they are also more generally funded because they stronger capitalist economies.

The reason why is because democracies tend to be more closely related with capitalist economies rather than socialist economies, which history has shown outlast and function more smoothly that socialist economies. Capitalist economies focus on privately owned goods and services, which are produced for profit in a market economy, rather than the socialist standpoint where the means of production is more of a co-op for the state, and most of the income goes back to the government rather than the people in most cases. If a country can afford to have a capitalist economy, because they have a large number of recourses and exports, they would be crazy not to go with this system. Plus with a democratic government on top of that the people and the congress can vote on what happens with the money.

Another great reason to be democratic is because everyone can be heard. People in these systems can have the freedom to vote for legislative, and executive power. So we the people pick who we want to represent us, and they can keep there best interests in the interests of the people. Also if we do not like an elected official then we can just remove them from their seat and a vice president or whoever is next in line can take there place. This also helps because we can also influence what laws we have abide by. If we want to pass a law we can vote on it, we can lobby during legislation, we can march on Washington to get the attention of our government officials to get them to vote a choose certain bills and laws. We can choose where we want our funding and money to be generated and focused on. We can decide if we want to invest in agriculture, education, defense, or certain industries. If certain industries in our country are not doing, our congress can decide if it’s right financially to bail this industry out.

Another reason why Democracies rain supreme is because it allows the government to not get that involved in the peoples day to day lives. Some say the government that governs the best is the one that governs the least. I believe there is a lot of truth to this because history has shown that governments that have many regulations tend to have more innocent deaths, protest, and rebellion. Then at which point the government is more likely to collapse. The way Dictatorships operate is, they have to put fear into the people to get the to obey the government and higher command, otherwise who wants to listen to everything one leader tells you to do? A majority of people I would say do not. The ways they put this fear into people is by large rallies, and killing innocent people, has history has showed. If there is a hell, I can picture Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin at the very bottom because of all of the innocent people they killed. I am sure they are still fighting with each other to. That’s beyond the point, but they are not the only ones. I believe that dictatorships are outdated and do not work because usually the wrong person somehow get elected to power and then the whole system will eventually fall.

I believe the perfect world would be one large democracy where there is no fighting and everyone as a say in exactly what happens. This will probably never happen in my lifetime but it is a very nice thought.

           

Works Cited

Picture is from www.samaracanda.com

Welcome to a new world of campaigning! by Michael Wermers

      Video Games have grown to a multi-billion dollar industry. Some people can't get enough of them.  Many spend thousands of dollars on them a year, some a few couple hundred a year, and it would be hard to find people who spend nothing on video games. Regardless of your viewpoint or whether or not you feel you have a video; chances are you have one.  That game could be on a computer, used through a video game console, or even on a tablet.  If the device is electronic there is a giant possibility that you can get video games on it.

There were three giant blockbuster games, made just for gaming consoles, that came out this year; Madden 13, Halo 4, and Black Ops II. Madden sold out in the first week and earned $95 million.  Halo 4 sold out in just 24 hours and made $200 million.  The Black Ops II numbers have yet to be published.  Increasing video game profits have been enhanced over the last decade, by video games companies finally clicking onto the idea of embedding and selling advertisements into their games.  The video console games have hidden advertisements as well as advertisements plastered everywhere.  It did not take iOS games long to jump on this bandwagon.  iOS games often provide two versions:  a pay for version without advertisements or a fee version with ads.  The free iOS games are littered with advertisements.

            With this year’s presidential election one of the candidates entered territory no other presidential candidate has ever entered.  Most people are used to seeing attack, get out the vote, and I’m the right candidate for you.    For decades candidates have been making appearances on MTV shows to attract the 18 to 25 year old voter.  Their goal is to promote themselves and to preach about going out and registering to vote. Even though television has been used to attract this age group of voters, they still are not reaching the level of audience they want.  What these candidates need to realize is that their audience is right there waiting for them.  They are the audience playing a video game.  As indicated above, two games alone sold out in a week, this creates a perfect marketing medium.  Through video game advertising candidates would have a great way to reach the 18 to 25 year old audience.  This year it finally happened, President Barrack Obama stepped into the untapped market.   In the 2012 president race Obama stepped up his advertisements, he placed ads on video games. Here is one of his ads:

This advertisement appeared in Madden 13.  Through this advertisement he not only promoted himself, he is encouraging people to register and then vote.  Additionally, he did not just reach the 18-25 year olds playing Madden, he reached everyone playing Madden.  If a player of this game had not considered voting important before this may have been all that was needed to get out the vote.  By the time the next elections roll around it should be anticipated that video games will be used as the vehicle to place attack, get out the vote, and I’m the right candidate for you ads.  Candidates will no longer have to depend on television, billboard, and newspaper advertisements.

Reflections on 2012 US Presidential Elections, by Jameson Goetz

On November 6^th, Barack Obama was reelected to his second four-year term as President of the United States. President Obama defeated former Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney with a final count of 332 to 206 Electoral College votes. Obama also defeated Romney 50% to 48% in the popular vote. As a supporter of President Obama, I was definitely pleased with his reelection. Still, considering what has happened in the past four years, I am certainly surprised. By nearly all standards, President Obama defied political odds by winning reelection to a second term.

This post from Barack Obama quickly became the most “re-tweeted” post in Twitter’s history.

Here are some interesting facts related to President Obama’s reelection:

·      President Obama’s margin of victory was significantly lower than in 2008 (53% to 46%). No president has ever been re-elected by a smaller margin than the previous election.

·      Obama’s popular vote majority was the lowest of any re-elected incumbent in the last century.

·      President Obama’s public approval ratings have averaged below 50%. No other incumbent candidate has ever won a presidential election with such low public approval.

·      Throughout most of President Obama’s first term, fewer than 40% of Americans believed that the country was “moving in the right direction”. The day after the election, only 43% of Americans believed the country was moving in the right direction.

·      Polls indicated that prospective voters favored Mitt Romney “as an economic manager” over President Obama by a margin of roughly 9%.

·      On Election Day, the unemployment rate in the United States had risen to roughly 7.9%, which is far higher than any time in the 25 years before Obama’s Inauguration in January 2009.

These statistics are pretty puzzling, as well as somewhat alarming. Do Americans currently have any confidence in President Obama? They seem to lack confidence in President Obama, yet they reelected him by a fairly convincing margin. Why did a majority of Americans vote for President Obama? Many people, myself included, point to changing demographics. The Sunday before the election, the Pew Research Center released its final prediction on the outcome of the election: President Obama would win, beating Republican Party candidate Mitt Romney, 50 percent to 47 percent. The Pew Research Center described what it called a “demographic transformation”:

·      Women favored Obama over Romney 53 % to 40%

·      Romney’s support among voters age 65 and older dwindled to just 9 percentage points.

·      Nationally, nonwhite voters made up 28% of all voters, up from 26% in 2008. Obama won 80% of these voters, the same as four years ago.

·      In Ohio, African Americans were 15% of the electorate, up from 11% in 2008. In Florida, Hispanics were 17% of the electorate, an increase from 14% in 2008.

·      Nationally, Romney won the white vote, 59% to 39%.

·      Nationally, Obama received “overwhelming” support from African Americans and Latinos.

·      Obama lost the independent vote, 50% to 45%. However, Democrats made up 38% of all voters while Republicans made up just 32%.

·      40% of white Christians voted for Obama.

·      20 % of voters claimed no religious affiliation while roughly one-third of Americans age 18-22 called themselves atheists, agnostics, or “nothing at all”. 70% of this voting bloc voted for Obama.

·      Pointing the future diminishing influence of voters age 65 or older, The Pew Research Center’s indicated that future elections will continue to be increasingly decided by women, young people, and minorities.

Voters in Washington and Colorado legalized the recreational use of marijuana. In Massachusetts, voters legalized the use of marijuana for medical reasons

I consider myself to have liberal views on social issues. However, I describe my views on economic issues as more moderate, not liberal. I believe the political views of my generation as a whole could also be described this way. In the 2012 Presidential Election voters ages 18 to 29 made up 19% percent of voters. 60% of this voting bloc voted for President Obama, while 36% voted for Mitt Romney. The Huffington Post addressed this generation gap in an article titled “Youth Vote Gap Suggests Republicans Risk Losing An ‘Entire Generation’ to Democrats”.

The increasing popularity of Libertarianism, an ideology that generally embraces socially liberal and economically conservative views, has grown increasingly popular with younger voters. This year’s Libertarian Party for President, Gary Johnson enthusiastically expressed his support for equal rights for LGBTQ persons and an end to the prohibition on marijuana.

Voters in Washington, Maine, and Maryland voted in favor of the right to marry for same-sex couples. Voters in Minnesota rejected a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage.

 I also believe that a significant amount of all voters, not just those from my generation, were alienated by Mitt Romney’s conservative views on a variety of social issues. In general, Americans have begun to view with skepticism the strict laws regulating marijuana. Americans views on civil rights for LGBTQ persons have dramatically changed. Most research indicates that nowadays a majority of Americans reject the idea of withholding basic civil rights (marriage, employment protections, the right to openly serve in the military) from LGBTQ persons. Americans also tend to view favorable granting more rights to undocumented workers, an overwhelming majority of whom are Latino.

This widespread rejection of social conservatism, partly a result of changing demographics in the U.S., may help explain why President Obama was reelected even though Americans favored Mitt Romney “as an economic manager” by a margin of roughly 9%.

I certainly do not see those Americans who embrace social conservatism giving up their fight anytime soon. I am curious to see how this political divide will play out in the future. Is it inevitable that we will grow even more divided politically?

According to recent projections, the amount of money spent on campaign advertising during the 2012 Election increased dramatically to roughly 6 billion dollars. The dramatic increase results directly for Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. In the decision, the Supreme Court held that the First Amendment prohibited the government from restricting independent political spending by corporations and unions. Political junkies expected that an increase in spending on campaign advertising would result from the Supreme Court’s decision. Many also predicted that the increased spending would significantly alter election results; however, those predictions proved to be wrong.

            Major Outcomes of the 2012 Election:

·      The Republican Party still holds a majority in the House of Representatives.

·      The Democratic Party still holds a majority in the Senate.

·      The Democratic Party’s candidate won reelection to a second four-year term as president.

So what changed? Not a whole lot besides a decrease in productive political discourse due to the substantial increase in spending on campaign advertisements. If anything, I think the 2012 Election (specifically the outcome of Citizens United vs. The Federal Election Commission decision) demonstrates a genuine need for dramatic campaign finance reform. The rise of the so-called Super PACs frustrated many Americans, regardless of political affiliation or ideology. I am hopeful, though somewhat skeptical, that we will soon see bipartisan action to appropriately address the issue. The Huffington Post recently published an article pertaining to the movement towards campaign finance reform. If we as Americans could ever come together, I would have to believe that it would be to address this outrageous spending on campaign advertisements.

“Youth Vote Gap Suggests Republicans Risk Losing An ‘Entire Generation’ to Democrats”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/12/youth-vote-gap-republican_n_2100155.html

“Campaign Finance Reformers Get Back To Work After Record Election Spending”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/13/campaign-finance-reform_n_2122811.html

Workhorses of Democracy, by Cole Meunier

 

Interest groups are thought to be the workhorses of democracy, and quite frankly they are. Without them, our voices would not be heard and we would not be able to sway politicians to our liking. One of the best cases for an interest group would have to be the National Rifle Association (NRA). I’m sure most have heard of them, hell some may even think of some fat redneck with an assault rifle. While that may or may not be true, the fact of the matter is that they stand for something. Interest groups are a group of people drawn or acting together in support of a common interest or to voice a common concern. Now the NRA does just that by lobbying Congress on gun control laws, and advertising based on gun laws.

                  Now you may be asking yourself how this involves me and why should I care. By sitting on the sidelines not doing anything makes it so easy for your voice not to be heard and well it isn’t. That’s why it is so important to get involved in interest groups or politics in general. With interest groups you are surrounded by like-minded people who have similar or the same views as you. With this your voice is much louder with thousands rather than just one. Now don’t get me wrong you don’t have to be in a group to have your voice heard, it just makes it easier.

                  In 1994 congress passed a law banning the ownership of certain assault rifles. The NRA tried to stop this from passing even with their roughly 3.5 million members (at the time, it is now 4.3 million). Unable to stop the law from passing they were set on ousting members of congress who supported the ban, mostly Democrats, and the current speaker of the house Thomas Foley (D). The NRA poured money into advertisements across the nation about Thomas Foley betraying gun owners across America. November 1994 came around, with the election results. Republicans took both chambers of congress from the Democrats. Not only both chambers were taken, but Thomas Foley lost his bid for re-election making him the first Speaker of the House since 1860 to be defeated. This is one way to show how powerful that interest groups can be, even though they didn’t convince Thomas Foley to change his mind on the gun laws right away, they were still able to influence politics in their favor.

                  This is just one way that one interest group was able to influence politics. Now imagine all the interest groups that exist in America today, now that’s a pretty large number, but they are all trying to do the same and get what they want. I believe this creates more of a Democracy by representation rather than just voting. The problem that I have with just voting is that when you vote for a Politician, that vote makes it seem like you agree with everything that they bring to the table in which you may not agree with. With voting and interest groups you can vote while interest groups keep the politician in check with what you want.

                   Elections just occurred last Tuesday, and say you voted but did not get the candidate that you wanted elected. Don’t worry, life will go on. Things may not be exactly what you wanted but you can still influence and make a change to the government by interest groups. Hopefully this article helps you with your thoughts on interest groups and makes you want to get involved. I would rather have people get involved than not do anything and complain about how they hate policies that the government made. Get involved.