There’s also a very useful section on the various governing institutions, what powers they have, and so forth.
I also came across a section on the online archives on Mrs Thatcher. Lots of clips and Panorama interviews that I once stored on VHS tapes.
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My students are currently working towards sitting Edexcel Unit 4: Governing the USA in January, and in today’s lesson we examined the limits to the powers of the President, and how he must persuade Congress to act out his wishes. We talked a lot about the health care proposals, and how it is very much “his” policy agenda, but it still needs Congress to agree.
The article from political news site Politico is perfect in this respect, as it shows how Obama has been regularly phoning and meeting up with members of congress, and also how it has ‘ruffled a few feathers’ that his emphasis has been on the senate.
It has some great quotes too:
“Obama has had to be more of a shepherd than a CEO”
“the White House has had to strike a tricky pose — being omnipresent without becoming oppressive. “
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In considering the state of democracy in the USA it is useful to consider who controls economic and political power and whether this group is really any different from the one that dominated during the foundation of the country in the late eighteenth century.
I would say that there is a strong argument to suggest that a wealthy, white, male property owning and professional class forms an elite grouping in modern America to a large extent and that this is really no different from the conditions that operated at the Philadelphia convention.
Yes there have been advance by minority groups, but not to the degree which would suggest an even distribution of power. Blacks and women, for instance have made great strides, witness the development of a black middle class, and how female students now outnumber and outscore their male counterparts at university. But the proportion of people from these groups far outnumbers the number of places they occupy at the top table. That there are no elected African Americans in the US Senate is a far more accurate measure of the levels of political equality achieved by black people than Obama’s presidential success.
And there is the issue of class. In the article consider what has happened to median earnings over the past 30 years, and what help the federal government have provided for the millions of new unemployed and juxtapose this with the assistance given to Wall Street.
Ultimately power is dispersed more evenly in modern America than has historically been the case, but only if we discount the effect of the superelite. What does that say about America and the tools and processes available for citizens to change things?
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So says GQ magazine (of all places) in their much anticipated DC power 50. Believe it or not this was one of the buzz topics in the American capital when I was over there recently. Hardly surprising in the most power obsessed city on earth. To paraphrase Michael Heseltine who was commenting on the ranking order of seats in Cabinet, everyone says it doesn’t matter to them, but of course it does. Terribly.
Anyway, an interesting way to spend 20 minutes flicking through the slideshow...here
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Well that seems to be the message in relation to the House of Lords by the former judge Thomas Bingham in the Jan Grodecki lecture.
In short, Bingham argues that a way out of the constitutional impasse is to change the powers of the Lords so that it acts merely as a revising rather than reforming chamber.
The idea has some merit, I think. But perhaps only as a short term measure until Parliament can come to some sort of agreement about how to get the thing elected. A sort of Stage 2 as it were.
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I came across this incredible graphic which might help students understand the essential differences between “left” and “right"…
David McCandless and Stefanie Posavec from Information Is Beautiful have created this concept map to help explain the differences in political opinions across the globe. An impressive effort.
The larger version (not sure how it will print out) can be found here
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A neat pdf download from the Times which illustrates the current portfolios of nuclear warheads around the world.
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The Internet leak of the BNP’s 2009 membership list has had the newspapers scurrying to produce analysis of the data on the list…
A good example is provided here by The Times, which has produced a map showing the number of registered BNP members by parliamentary constituency.
Assuming the membership data is accurate (some have questioned it), the map provides quite an interesting insight into where the BNP membership is focused.
]]>Interestingly, however, the once lofty position of the columnist is being increasingly challenged and attacked, as the internet response to Moir adequately shows. Moir may not have to respond instantly to such criticism, and will doubtless have the luxury of her column to rebut her critics in a more leisurely way than will be afforded Nick Griffin on Question Time, but she has now had to make a response, via a press statement. And actually, that’s why the liberal society can go some way to tolerating intolerance. Because as long as it’s operating properly, with a range of alternate voices, such intolerance quickly runs into the sand of political debate. That it is the internet which increasingly provides the forum for such essential plurality is another reason for all liberals to praise the coming of the last great arena of free expression, good and bad.
The Moir furore is not the only liberal triumph for the internet either. Last week’s extraordinary attempt by solicitors Carter-Ruck to prevent the Guardian from reporting a parliamentary question about the company Trafigura, famously sparked off a host of blogging and twitter responses, all giving far more publicity to Trafigura than they would ever have received if Carter-Ruck had held off, and resulting in a retreat from the gag order imposed by the courts before the afternoon was quite over. So, whether challenging intolerance, or forcing freedom of the press, the internet is increasingly showing its use as a vehicle of the liberal society.
But who do you suggest we ought to invite for 2010? Is there someone who you’d really like to meet, but there just never seems to be an opportunity?
Please let us have your suggestions by completing this very brief online form. We will do our best to secure an acceptance from the most popular speaker suggestions:
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