Thursday, August 26, 2010

Political Debate For Political Minds

International Politics is a significant study in political science. With the help of engaging International debate, you can sharpen your knowledge and understanding regarding this field. You can get all those required expertise using such type of politics.
In International politics, only two types of tenets constructivism theories are accepted, if we take the first, the primarily shared ideas and notion rather than the material forces determined the structures of human connection. It represents an idealist approach to the social life and gives new directions to the life and living style. Second one is related to hoist or structuralism, they just emphasize on the emergent power of social structures.
If you want to get something from politics then you had better understand above-mentioned two basic theories because these two theories revolve around the main theme of politics. It will be useful for you to go through these mentioned theories in detail.
If you have dying need about discussing and expressing, your ideas for the future of your country and the entire world then you can take this simple way. With the help of politics forums, you can catch a chance to give your political opinion to the other people.
You can share your experience and feelings by taking part in the live online debate. Now, there are many chances to do so because this field has touched the bottom of knowledge and given people more sense about its usage.
Things come with various and different angles, while you start thinking about them politically
You will find that political talk is too different from other types of discussions because in it, you have to take control over all the latest issues and matter globally. It is important for a person to get through complete guides while learning politics. It is good for all of those who are going to take part in the International politics.
It is right, countries and their political behavior is not alike however, no one can deny the structural and social need of politics in the making of nations and countries integrity. Live programs are aired to bring awareness in the people about the working of it in the world.

Friday, August 20, 2010

Polls and Politics

Public opinion polling has evolved through time and has adopted different methods from data collections to the presentation of results. They have evolved so fast to level that the politicians are threatened that the traditional rule of judgment and decision making have been shifted from the government and is at the discretion of pollsters and public.  Results from the pollsters are keenly followed by the members of the public especially the presidential opinion polls that have a remarkable impact on the elections besides gauging the public opinion.  In no surprise that pollster opinion polls have had a significant impact on politics in Washington. In these question and answer essay, an analysis is presented from different pollster polls and how they portray the public view of different issues.


Why is a random representative sample (called a probability sample) important for getting accurate poll results?

A probability sampling method utilizes random selection which means all members in the population have an equal enhance of being selected.

 This reduces the researcher bias in sampling.  In carrying out a probability sampling, the researchers are therefore in position to make inference on the whole population because each member has an equal probability of being chosen. Random selection eliminates the probability of disproportionate number of respondents from a given group. The sampling variance in this case is more or less like that of the whole population which enhances the accuracy of the outcomes.  This sample gives the opportunity for an impersonal choice to take place rather than the researcher.

The accuracy the sample is further enhanced by its size.

 A high sample size enhances the accuracy of the sample statistic which will be as good as the parameter.  The accuracy of a random representative sample is not greatly influenced by the population size (William, 2006)
PART 2
Q1. Does the question posed by the pollster meet the standards for a good question? Why or why not?

The question posed by the pollster meets the standard of good question because they are objective rather than subjective.  They don't have the subjective forms like 'you' but are stated in the objective forms of for instance, 'should'.  There this eliminates the researcher bias in influencing the outcome of the questions (Gallup, 2007) (Holt, 2009)


Q2. What are the facts collected and presented by the poll?

The facts collected and presented by the poll range from the country's direction, the anticipated bill to bail out the economy with its expected impact includes the Federal government support for ailing homeowners, economy's condition, public perception of the government and political parties including Bush's approval rating and trust in the government (Holt, 2009)


Q3. Which response was given by the largest number of the respondents to the poll?

Nine in every ten American believe that the country is headed in the wrong direction. A whooping 93% believe that the congress is on the wrong path while a paltry 7% think the Congress is on the right track. On the economy, 89% of US citizens believe that the country is headed in the wrong direction.  On the Bailout bill, only 28% approve against 53% who disapprove with 34 % believing the bailout will change the economy and 38% believing it will not (Holt, 2009)


Q4. "There are few people who never trust the government in Washington." According to the poll's results, is this a valid generalization? Explain your answer

Yes, it's a valid generalization going by the figure that only 9% don't trust the government in Washington against 1%, 16% and 74% who trust the government Always, Most of the time and Some of the time respectively. The reason being that most of the house occupants especially republicans are pre-occupied with their own agenda apart from that of enhancing the lives of Americans. An example is the diversion of national resources to wars in the Middles East other than revamping the economy (Holt, 2009)  


PART 3
Q1. How many sampled adults say they would vote for a woman for president?

In the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll of September 8-11, 2005, 86% of the sampled adults said they would vote for a woman president.  The number of respondents was 86% of 533= 458.38 which is approximately 459 respondents (Polling Report, 2009)


Q2. How many respondents think vote-counting needs to be made more accurate?

According to the CBS News Poll of December 9-10, 2000, the numbers of respondents who think vote counting needs to be made more accurate were 80% of 1,114= 891.2 i.e approximately 891 respondents (Polling Report, 2009)


Q3.What percentage of respondents either strongly or moderately favor new federal laws limiting the amount of money that an individual or group can contribute to national political parties?

According to the CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll of March 9th-11th , 2001, the number of respondents that either strongly or moderately favor new federal laws are 76%(=51%+25%) of 1, 015 were 771 respondents (Polling Report, 2009)


PART 4

The public opinion was measured by conducting a random survey of 1, 112 adults in the whole nation among them 281, 416 and 415 were Republicans, Democrats and Independents respectively.  The poll was carried out by CBS News/ New York Times poll held between Januarys 11thand 15th 2009. The results of the poll showed that 22% of Americans approved the overall performance of George W. Bush with a whopping 73% disapproving his presidency.  Dialing of phone lines was done from RDD samples which included the cell numbers as well the land lines.  The findings were based on the interviews carried out by way of telephone where 1,112 adults either 18 years or older were quizzed. The poll had a 95% confidence level with a margin error (sampling error) of + 3%but the error among the subgroups was much higher (CBS News/New York Times Poll, 2009)


The respondents were asked whether they approve or disapprove George Bush's in the he handled his presidential job. Below are the historical results from January 2008 to January 2009 based on the poll conducted by Gallup Poll between these times (Saad, 2009)


Bush went home with a net approval rating of -27 percentage points only managing to beat Richard Nixon who had -42 in the poll conducted by Gallup in August 1974 shortly before he resigned because of the Watergate scandal. Bush received a bump of 9% between the Election Day and President Obama inauguration from the 25% recorded in November last year.  Bush has had a distinction of having received the highest approval rating of 88% after the success of the initial Gulf War and at the same time he goes down in history as the president with the highest disapproval rating of 13%.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Redefining Political Campaigns

Where in the world can a person check their mail, pay bills, check bank balances, book a vacation, and show support for their favorite political candidate all in the same place?  Simple - online of course.  Candidates and politicians are looking to cash in on the most impact for their time and what better way to become a part of that powerful trend than welcoming cyber space into their lives?  Who knew that a craze that started a few short years ago with social websites such as MySpace dot com would turn into a tool to be used so heavily in campaigns?

Barack Obama has enjoyed adding 100,000 friends to his MySpace page, and other campaigns are even adding other MySpace pages as well as joining into the Second Life craze that has struck recently, with many people looking to expand the internet as one of their major sources of advertisement.  Each candidate has their own website of course, with a great amount of information on their individual views, their position on the issues, and what they wish to see happen in the country.  Never before has the democratic process reached so close to home, now pulling in a new generation of voters to guide the future of the country.

Is this a good idea?  Should candidates really be losing that personal and physical touch?  However, this is actually one of the most prevalent ways to get information out recently, with websites popping up everywhere where political opinions can be viewed, and with sites such as digg dot com becoming popular it enables sites with good content that is full of information people find fascinating or helpful to rise to the top, and help spread the word to the masses.

 

Seems almost like a grass roots type campaign.  Yet it does not involve any physical interaction from the candidates.  This is the ultimate tool that can be used to spread the word quickly about progress and updates in their campaign without ever leaving their house or office and interacting with those they so desperately need votes from. This seems to be a bit of a strange position to be taking, but with the internet reaching so wide and far, it is a tool that many politicians are utilizing, and to great practical effect.

Many are even recruiting volunteers to manage their spaces in Second Life as well as MySpace so that their time is better spent and their ability to reach even more people is extended further.  Seems almost strange that volunteers are now able to help on campaigns that they never would have been able to work on before, but thanks to the internet, they are able to show support for their favorite candidate in a way never before seen.  

How much further can this really go, with the possibility of the internet growing into an even larger portion of the campaign, it is very much possible to keep track of all the happenings and events in almost every political campaign and race without ever leaving the comfort of your home.  Whether this engages the ordinary citizen on a more direct level will remain to be seen, and the outcome this will have on the voter demographic at the next election will surely be profound. Now if only the election voting could be handled online, securely it would truly be a virtual world...

Monday, August 2, 2010

cnn politics

Transformational activism is the idea that people need to transform on the inside as well as on the outside in order to create any meaningful change in the world.


 


One example of transformational activism is peacekeeping which, as defined by the United Nations, is "a way to help countries torn by conflict create conditions for sustainable peace." Peacekeepers monitor and observe peace processes in post-conflict areas and assist ex-combatants in implementing the peace agreements they may have signed. Such assistance comes in many forms, including confidence-building measures, power-sharing arrangements, electoral support, strengthening the rule of law, and economic and social development. Accordingly UN peacekeepers (often referred to as Blue Helmets because of their light blue helmets) can include soldiers, civilian police officers, and other civilian personnel.


 


Another example is encouraging choices to live in racially diverse communities.

Such communities may literally "transform" communities by opening the minds of residents to new ideas, new cultures, new historical perspectives, and a broader view of life that ultimately can benefit social relations.

 


Another example of transformational activism is transformational economics. This is the idea that you can change the way resources flow in a society by doing inner work. People examine their emotional reactions to what their needs are. This may allow them to see that things they felt they needed are not really needed.

This then alters the flow of goods in a society because of the underlying change in needs.

 


Transformational politics is the field of guiding people to look inwardly what they feel is true power. They may discover that real power is seeing the deep connection of everyone with each other and of being able to tap that place. In this case power is not power over someone, but rather power to unleash collective creativity in creating a new society.


 


Transformational activism is about looking for the common values underneath, and then working from there so that both parties are able to get what they want. In the process one or both parties may find their inner landscape and paradigms changing.


 


Transformational open-sourced activism is the idea that you can tap into the power of mass collaboration and collective creativity in a way that transforms the people involved into more loving, peaceful, compassionate states.