The internets impact

Youtube is the perfect example of how citizens have increased their participation in politics.  Youtube has many advertisements for videos where the president or runners for elections speak directly to youtube viewers.  That is the best example one could give, when officials speak to people not through a media, but through the internet.  A more specific example is:  many people are expressing their political views on this video.

 They do this because it's effective and they know many people become active online.  Many people comment and watch these videos in order to express their beliefs.  This is so much more effective because it's convinient.  More people will be drawn to this form of activity, because it's easier for them.

Obama and McCain Ad-off

Both of these are ads during the 2008 presidential election, and bother were over the radio.

This ad seems too critical, and although both ads are meant to attack the other runner, this goes overboard. Anyone would listen to this and think that McCain is getting too dirty. After the first few seconds it seems likely that one would zone out as the ad takes a tangent. By then end I'm not convinced.

This ad is of course critical of McCain, however, it is much more successful because it is to the point and it doesn't evade anything. It only goes for showing that McCain is a hypocrite. It is definitely the better of the two ads.

The e-commerce controversy

The government taxes everything sold.  The problem is that on the internet, the government has no power to find what has been sold, and they have no way of taxing it.  As the internet becomes a bigger way of purchasing things, the government is losing more and more money to it.  They want to tax these things but they can't.  They also have no authority of tariffs if people are selling things from one country to another.  These pose two problems in the same realm of commerce.  The government is caught on how to approach this since they don't have any real power to control it.  There are tons of examples to prove that people are making large profits and that the government is missing out.

Bush's censorship of the Media

After the 9/11 attack, Bush immediately put many censorships on the media, and retracted many democratic rights of the people.

Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer gave the signal with his well-publicized declaration that Americans should “watch what they say” about US military, intelligence and police operations. 

 Bush forced the media to not allow any opponents to speak out against him and his actions as he took away certain rights.  Much of the nation was under watch, and the Media could not report on it.  As a result of many bills the government was searching for any terroist activities, and the media could not report on it.  They were also acting out against terroism abroad.  The censorship has a reasonable use because there could have been terroists who wouldn't have been caught if they knew they were being hunted.  However, for the most part, Bush should not have done this.  Most people aren't terroists, and they have a right to not be seen.  The most important reason that the media should have been able to report is because, protesters were considered terroists at this time, and they didn't know it.  They should have been informed that that liberty had partially been taken away as the government saw it as an act against them, in some cases.

CNN on Obama's Annual Dinner

CNN covered Obama's comical speech at the White House.  CNN did a good job of ignoring some facts and appeasing the pop culture by saying who attended.  In doing so they detracted from informing the public about what happened.  They did not show any biased opinions, which is impressive considering the tense political war going right now.  They also did do some overviews of what happened, however, then only went over the basics of what Obama said.  It was a simple speech but there could have been more analyasis on what Obama was trying to express.  Thankfully, besides from appeasing the culture, CNN did support the public by giving them honest reporting on a casual matter.  The most important thing is that they did not show any biased at such a curcial time.  It helps the public in the end relax and not thing that there is only hatred in DC.

Fox News political Commentary

This is an actual Fox News report that wasn't so biased.  Most of the time I would say that Fox News does not support hte public's education. However, this particular interview was a very simple report on Palin's effect on McCain's campaign, after he lost.  It had little bias in it and it only gave the strict facts.  This one report helped the public's intelligence.  It supports the public because it gives true facts without a strong right wing opinion, or any opinion for that matter.  As a result the public was informed on possible effects Palin had on the campaign.

New York Times Co. v. United States

Ellsberg, a Pentagon worker, stole governemnt documents concerning the war in Vietnam.  He wanted to reveal the intentions of the government to the angry public.  He gave the documents to the New York Times.  They published it until they were forbade.  The case went to the Supreme court right away where they issued per curiam, where all judges wrote seperate opinions.  The Supreme Court had opposite views, but they ended up allowing the publishing of these papers.

    I agree with all of the individual judges and their opinions.  However, I would have to agree with the overall ruling.  I do think that the public needs to know the government's doings.  I also think they have a right to keep certain things secret.  This was not a case to decide the future of either of these ideas.  They only decided to allow this particular document to be released, which was appropriate.  A more secretive document that doesn't harm people but needs to be kept secret should be protected, though.

    Many people agreed with this ruling at the time, and it's generally accepted that the government should not keep anything like this secret.  Although this has no lasting effects, there are still controversies over what the government can and cannot hold onto.  Documents like these should be released, but anything harmful to the nation is widely considered something that should be kept a secret.