Inverted Totalitarianism

 

Representative institutions no longer represent voters. Instead, they have been short-circuited, steadily corrupted by an institutionalized system of bribery that renders them responsive to powerful interest groups whose constituencies are the major corporations and wealthiest Americans. The courts, in turn, when they are not increasingly handmaidens of corporate power, are consistently deferential to the claims of national security. Elections have become heavily subsidized non-events that typically attract at best merely half of an electorate whose information about foreign and domestic politics is filtered through corporate-dominated media. Citizens are manipulated into a nervous state by the media’s reports of rampant crime and terrorist networks, by thinly veiled threats of the Attorney General and by their own fears about unemployment. What is crucially important here is not only the expansion of governmental power but the inevitable discrediting of constitutional limitations and institutional processes that discourages the citizenry and leaves them politically apathetic.

 

What this quote means?

Representatives who are supposed to represent voters are caught up into a system of bribery. Those who are of the wealthiest are in control of the government system. Elections have become one of the parts of government that is receiving a lot of financial support and that has grown in power. Many people don’t even notice how powerful the government is getting because the only source of information they receive is through the media. We citizens are being manipulated through the media because they pick and choose what they should cover. They mostly report outrageous crimes, terrorist attacks, and their own fears on unemployment. At the end of this quote it talks about not only is the expansion of government important but also the limits that people were given through the constitution is limited so it leaves them not interested in politics.

 

Why I picked this quote?

The reason why I picked this quote because it makes me think about the American government. This land that’s supposed to be considered the land of the free but in all reality we are not. The only way my poor communities will experience change is through representatives that I vote for. This quote talks about how they are also manipulated through this system of bribery and controlled by the wealthiest and major corporation. For my communities, many people don’t go to school so they miss out on being educated on what’s going on around them. Instead they are subjected to the entertainment of the media. To show the communities how bad our communities are because of our criminals. When in all reality the real criminals are those in office. For those who want to overthrow and fight the government because in our constitution it was built on that idea, we have also been limited to that right. So it leaves me with this question what can I do?  

The Judiciary

Brown v. Board of Ed

Yes. Despite the equalization of the schools by "objective" factors, intangible issues foster and maintain inequality. Racial segregation in public education has a detrimental effect on minority children because it is interpreted as a sign of inferiority. The long-held doctrine that separate facilities were permissible provided they were equal was rejected. Separate but equal is inherently unequal in the context of public education. The unanimous opinion sounded the death-knell for all forms of state-maintained racial separation.

The Supreme Court case that I’m going to talk about is Brown v. Board of Ed. Browns argument was to raise the legal issue of having separate school systems for black and whites. These separate school systems were unequal and unjust and also violates the Fourteenth Amendment that protects equality for free blacks. It was very hard for the Supreme Court to come to a decision because of that they were divided on the issue. Some wanted to keep the system but others wanted to change the system that was put into play from the Plessy case that continued to legalize Jim Crow and other form of racial discrimination. After many years they decided, “Separate but equal” was unconstitutional and the separate school systems were unequal and unfair to blacks.

The main reason why I picked this case is because I’m an African American who has graduated from an integrated public school. Those Supreme Court cases has changed the school system so that I could have a chance to be able to succeed from it. I believe that this case is important because at the time for many blacks this was a step towards segregation and even being looked as worthy enough to being the same schools as whites in an article called “History - Brown v. Board of Education Re-enactment” states “relying on sociological tests, such as the one performed by social scientist Kenneth Clark, and other data, he also argued that segregated school systems had a tendency to make black children feel inferior to white children, and thus such a system should not be legally permissible.” They were once taught to feel inferior to white children to being able to go to school with them. This case is what helped many blacks to advance in education.

Work Cited

 

"Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1)." Oyez. Chicago-Kent College of Law at Illinois Tech, n.d. Dec 5, 2015. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1940-1955/347us483

"History - Brown v. Board of Education Re-enactment." United States Courts. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Dec. 2015.

 

The Presidency

Barrack Obama quote

The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.

Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at its very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.

And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.

This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a March for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren.   

 

The meaning of this quote

The meaning of this quote is that the constant battle within this country has been slavery. For many centuries this country has been divided because many couldn’t come to term with abolishing it. Instead the founders who tried to create a united nation had left this battle to be fought by their children even though they had the answers right in front of them. In fact they wrote the answer in our constitution by saying “all men are created equal”. What Obama is saying is that “the ideal of equal citizenship under the law”. These founders had created a promise through the constitution that they will create a nation through unity, liberty and justice for all but it not enough to deliver slaves from slavery. To be able to make these changes would be Americans who would fight back through “protest and struggle on the street and in the courts through a civil war and civil disobedience” to be able to receive the promise the founders had once spoke about. He then talked about this being the reason why he is running to be the next president to continue on the long march for equality the only way we can do this is through unity to create a better future for the generations to come.

 

Why I picked this quote

Out of all the three presidents that was given I wanted to talk about Barrack Obama. I remember when he won the ‘08 presidential election. At my high school during the lunch periods they played his inaugural. At the time my principle was a big supporter of Barrack Obama so he wanted everyone to see. I remember my principle and many teachers being awestruck by this turning point in history. For many people who had voted for him focused more on the fact that America has made history with the first African American president. By his second term I think more people were looking for a movement from him and many people felt like they didn’t receive that. Many people felt like president Obama hasn’t done enough for the minority communities, to some levels I felt the same way. On the other hand we the people have to understand the way our government works to truly understand why President Obama hasn’t delivered on the things that he talked about in his speeches during his run. Yes, he stands for a great cause and he had many great ideas to help this country but in reality as the President he is limited as to what he can do, this process is through checks and balance. Any law that the president wants to pass it has to go through the other branches of government. Through the quote President Obama also in a way gives hints that everything in the government has to work in an agreement. That’s why when he says, the only way to continue on this march for equality, is through unity. We all have to work together for this better cause.  

Congress

America’s Most Gerrymandered Congressional Districts

Contrary to one popular misconception about the practice, the point of gerrymandering isn't to draw yourself a collection of overwhelmingly safe seats. Rather, it's to give your opponents a small number of safe seats, while drawing yourself a larger number of seats that are not quite as safe, but that you can expect to win comfortably. Considering this dynamic, John Sides of The Washington Post's Monkey Cage blog has argued convincingly that gerrymandering is not what's behind the rising polarization in Congress

What 60 years of Political Gerrymandering Looks Like

"Some of these goals run right up against each other," he writes. "While a compact district may be desirable, it doesn’t necessarily reflect how people live or what county and city boundaries look like." Or, as John succinctly puts it, "Representation is about people, not polygons."

In both readings Christopher Ingraham talks about how the Republican Party has lost site as to what gerrymandering is supposed to be. It was created so that both parties can have equal representation in a state. Instead the Republican Party has created this system so that they can have a larger number of seats that they can win safely and their opponents have a smaller number of safe seats. In the other quote he also talks about how there are many different situations that play a factor in each district. The Republicans are focused on the amount of seats they can uphold rather than the representation of the people. 

Gerrymandering plays a big part in the presidential elections. It can in some cases determine who will be the president. What I thought was interesting is the way the Republicans play the system so that they can have more seats. It also made me think about the 2000 election with George W. Bush and Ale Gore. Ale Gore won most of the popular votes, on the other hand George W. Bush won the electoral votes which made him President. Reading this article and from these quotes it shows me that he won unfairly and it also makes me think about the fact that the government doesn’t really care about fighting for me but rather on things that benefit them.

Citizenship and Social Class by T.H. Marshall

Citizenship is a status bestowed on those who are full members of community. All who possess the status are equal with respect to the right and duties with which the status is endowed. There is no universal principle that determines what those rights and duties shall be, but societies in which citizenship is a developing institution create an image of an ideal citizenship against which achievement can be measured and towards which aspiration can be directed. The urge forward along the path thus plotted is an urge towards a fuller measure of equality, an enrichment of the stuff of which the status is made and an increase in the number of those on whom the status is bestowed. Social class, on the other hand, is a system of inequality. And it too, like citizenship, can be based on a set of ideals, beliefs and values. It is therefore reasonable to expect that the impact of citizenship on social class should take the form of a conflict between opposing principles. If I am right in my contention that citizenship has been a developing institution in England at least since the latter part of the seventeenth century, then it is clear that its growth convinces with the rise of capitalism, which is a system, not of equality but inequality. Here is something that need explain. How is it that these two opposing principles could grow and flourish side by side in the same soil? What made it possible for them to be reconciled with one another and to become, for a time at least, allies instead of antagonists? The question is pertinent one, for it is clear that, in the twentieth century citizenship and the capitalist class system have been at war.

 

Everyone within a community is granted citizenship. With this status everyone is equal with respect to their rights and duties. Also communities that haven’t established an image of citizenship can work in the direction of equality. On the other spectrum, social class which is considered to be the opposite of citizenship is considered to be a system of inequality. Then he asks the question as to how two different principles can be considered “as allies rather than antagonists”. Then he answers it by saying “in the twentieth century, citizenship and the capitalist’s class system have been at war.” What I think he means by this quote is that citizenship is rooted on the bases that everyone is equal. Whereas the capitalist class system, is rooted on the bases that everyone is unequal. So these two opposite views will clash in many ways.

 

The reason why I picked this quote is because I don’t agree with Marshall’s idea that citizenship and capitalists class system have been at war. However, I do believe in order to be equal and be granted rights is through citizenship. In order to be protected by the laws of this country you have to be a citizen, and that’s one way that makes everyone equal. Granted, we are talking about England but within the lecture you talked about “many of the American ideas and institutions are influenced by the English institutions.” On the other hand, one of the most extensive system that was happening during this time, which was affecting many of the people within America was the slavery system. This system had an effect on many of the people who lived in America so the word “everyone” that Marshall used to talk about citizenship, rights, respect and being equal did not apply to them. So because they are not treated on the same level as “everyone” this act of being citizens and citizenship causes capitalists class system and social class. Marshall talks about citizenship and capitalist’s class system being on two opposite ends basically parallel to each other but are continuously at war. The way I view this is, I think of those who have the rights to citizenship and those who don’t which causes this social class of inequality.

Civil Disobedience

[3]    Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once? Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse. Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform? Why does it not cherish its wise minority? Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt? Why does it not encourage its citizens to be on the alert to point out its faults, and do better than it would have them?  Why does it always crucify Christ, and excommunicate Copernicus (2) and Luther,(3) and pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?

[5]    If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go; perchance it will wear smooth — certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter friction to stop the machine. What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend myself to the wrong which I condemn.

 

Thoreau believes that there are many unjust laws that the government has passed and the citizens have allowed them to pass these laws. The question is do we follow these laws? The way he see things is that, men don’t act and try to resist the government on things that are wrong or sinful. Instead they wait and persuade others to act with them. People fear the government and they fear the actions that the government might take against them if they try to resist. Thoreau says this makes things worse because, by not resisting the government we have given them more power. He starts to question the government and citizens for allowing its government to be able to push them into doing things unlawful and sinful. In the other quote he is talking about the citizens having the power of injustice. Since they have the power of injustice than they should let go of the machine (government). After a while the machine will wear out. So if we are standing as agents to stop the machine then we should break the law. So that we do not continue to allow the law to be unjust.

The reason why I picked these quotes is because Thoreau challenges both the government and the citizens. In his opinion the government is not measuring up to, as we talked about in the last class the higher power instead they are basically living in sin. The way he challenges the citizens is by saying they allowed the government to get to a point where they have power and control over them and they also allow the machine to scare them into not resisting. Another reason why I chose these two quotes is because he talked about examples in history where the people were manipulated by higher authority and did nothing even though they knew it was unlawful. He also uses religion as the bases, as the way the government should be run. If anything goes against that bases in his opinion it’s ok to break the law and I thought was fascinating because that’s exactly what he did.

 

Another Stab at the Constitution

We are a nation dedicated to liberty and equality. So it is a particularly tragic irony that America leads the world in imprisonment and that a large proportion of those serving sentences are people of color. Sometimes prison sentences -- even the most severe -- are a rational response to crime. But often, sentences are the product of a political process in which politicians are scared of appearing soft on crime so they do not even question the reasonableness of a proposed criminal law. It is the norm, not the exception, for politicians to reflexively push for harsher sentences without considering empirical evidence about what level of sanction is necessary for deterrence or what impact a sentence will have on communities. It is an environment long on rhetoric and short on reflection.

 

By: Rachel E. Barkow

 



America imprisons over two million of its population majority of these people are of color. America has this image as being the nation dedicated to liberty and equality but its actions says otherwise. Politicians are in fact scared of appearing soft on crime so they don’t question the unreasonable criminal law that is having an effect on half of our population. Politicians would rather push for harder sentences than rather consider the evidence or the impact that it has on a community especially the African American community.  

Why I picked this quote, is because it relates to a lot of the things that I’m learning and reading about now. I’m reading a book called The New Jim Crow and I saw a movie called The House I Live In. Both pieces are very insightful as to why America imprisons so many people of color. The book talks about there being roughly 2.3 million people in jail over 1 million are African American and over 500,000 are there because of nonviolent crimes such as drug related. The movie and the book talks about the reason why this is happening, because of the supposed war on drugs. At this time the government was spending a lot of time and money on this war. Which created more prisons, and more cops in predominantly African American communities. At one point the movie talks about, politicians who wanted to run for president or even have their voice heard by the public had to talk very strict on crime, to show that America did not fear this war. This supposed drug war is putting many blacks in jail and having a major effect on the communities. Which the government knows what they are doing but doesn’t seem to want to change it. That’s why I picked this quote by Rachel E. Barkow.