Lying Politicians: A Fact of Life by Brian Montopoli

Many people, myself included look up to individuals in an authoritative role such as; senators, governors, and presidents. We view them as being honest and sincere. They have to be right? They do want to run the country after all. Often our thoughts are “they would never lie to us or hide things from us”, but unfortunately that’s not always the case. One of the biggest political scandals to hit the United States of America was the Watergate scandal involving our very own President Richard Nixon. This scandal caused a lot of American’s to lose trust and hope in the presidency. The scandal received its name from the Watergate apartment and office complex that was located in Washington D.C., where a burglary took place on June 17, 1972 and five men were arrested. It then came to surface that the men’s intentions were to sabotage the opposite political party, when president Nixon was notified of this he order the Central Intelligence Agency to call the FBI to stop with any further investigation, that national security was at stake. President Nixon knew that it would come back to the White House and didn’t want to risk anything, even though he was never involved with the

The film Swing Vote is an American political culture film that relies heavily on film subtext to depict the negative attitude many Americans have towards voting, corruption inside a political election, and the spectacle of media frenzy. While the film gives a light hearted impression of a rare political snafu it is still consistent with the main themes of other political films of manipulation, money lust, and power hungry political heads that will stop at nothing for their own personal gain. We also see the political candidates merely as puppets while their campaign managers are the ones truly calling the shots. Swing Vote is a unique political culture film because due to the ordeal in the film’s plot, the politicians are at a disadvantage when they are usually the ones in power. With the tables turned we see how they construct their corrupt schemes and the direct effect it has on the character representing the American perspective. The strong symbols that convey the cultural norms in America’s political system are in need of a deeper analysis.

Then-current president Theodore Roosevelt was extremely active on the campaign trail, promoting Taft’s name with great fervor. Roosevelt and Taft’s alliance is one of the earliest and most significant examples of politicians working together to reach individual goals. Taft would benefit by receiving the Presidential Office, and Roosevelt would have his policies continue through the new administration. Over the course of American History, there has been a pattern of politicians collaborating for a somewhat secretive or deceitful goal. Throughout the entire century following Progressive Era reforms, corruption has found its footing again in American Politics; the efforts towards reducing corporate involvement or individual meddling in the political process have not accomplished their goal. Corruption continued, sometimes by the individuals who spoke so vehemently against practices of that nature. This essay will explore the triumphs and failures of Progressive Reform, using Roosevelt’s behaviour during Taft’s presidency

Ian Haney Lopez is a professor of Law at the University of California at Berkeley. He was raised in Hawaii as a biracial kid coming from an albeit white and Salvadorian heritage. Due to Lopez background, he has evolved into a critical race theorist. In the novel Dog Whistle Politics, Lopez details his initial reaction to his Harvard Law professor Bell’s theory. According to Derrick Bell, “black people will never gain full equality in this country. Even those herculean efforts we hail as successful will produce no more than temporary ‘peaks of progress’, short-lived victories that slide into irrelevance as racial patterns adapt in ways that maintain white dominance” (Lopez, x). Lopez describes the time when he stormed out of professor Bell’s class as a student because he was disturbed by Bell’s insistence on the permanence of racism in American society. However, despite the fact that Lopez is a liberal, he soon realizes that “professors Bell was correct: racism is not disappearing, it’s adapting” (Lopez, xii). Lopez is then honored to have been selected to give the lecture of the man whose ideas he had originally found so fraught. Lopez throughout the novel is set to prove that since the early 1960’s up to the present conservative politicians in the Republican party and the Southern wing of the Democratic party have used racial code words and images to invoke race-based fear and tension in White voters to gather votes.

War is often compared to a fog. A weary, unclear, scary life one must live while fighting a war. Tim O'brien falsifies the truth of his time in war. “Sometimes lies are truer than the truth” a direct quote from the story that symbolizes the idea that no matter what objective is planned and executed the truth isn’t definite, it’s a “your guess is as well as mine” situation. This is because in times of war the only clear headed people are those who’ve had their head hollowed out by a fmj. All fogs dissipate eventually, just as wars eventually cease but, while in the midst of the fog it is uncertain what is accompanying the clear off in the distance. The story The Things They carried is representative of this comparison in all aspects and calls

On March 28th, former cabinet minister John Milloy came into class as our final guest speaker. He told the class that the academic, political, and religious worlds were of the most interest to him. He then explained the hardships of combining both political and religious worlds together, and how this was just a small example of the many traditional worlds that are forced to come together through politics. For a large part of John Milloys visit he spoke on the persona of politicians today. At one point he said politicians are often seen as “A bunch of Liars.” Politicians attempt to sell a vision/platform that they often know is unrealistic, and the voters subconsciously know this. Near the end of his talk, he touched on the importance of media

For this assignment the video called "RP Roundtable: Civility & Politics" was viewed on the Responsibility Project website. The discussion was centered on the lack of ethics in political campaigning and how political organizations could be more ethical and less hostile to one another.

Specifically, in the last two years following the 2016 presidential election, a barrage of personal attacks, refutations of these attacks and release of contradictory information populated the political field and shaken trust in government. These documents and attacks like the Steele Dossier, James Comey memo, or alleged conversations with Anthony Scaramucci call into question not only the capability of political leaders to govern but also the legitimacy of facts and the reliability of media. Political factions across the spectrum have cast doubt on the entire field of politics, and this trend has shaken the credibility of media and government. Public trust in the ability of news organizations to report faithfully and accurately and in the ability of government to remain honest and help constituents drops because of how powerfully the doubt these documents motivated sentiment. These questionings of the legitimacy of these institutions may have defined their legacy in the years to

I have chosen a political meme that elucidates the character of the 2016 Democratic Presidential Nominee, Hillary Clinton. Schwartzman (2014) defines character as “a reference to perceptions of how honest a source is” (p. 268). While Clinton possesses competence in regards to her experience as a politician, which Schwartzman (2014) refers to as the knowledge or experience an individual possesses about a topic, her credibility suffered due to her dishonest character coupled with her connection to Bill Clinton. This meme featuring her Republican opponent, Donald Trump, targets Clinton’s reputation of spreading misinformation, particularly regarding several instances during her time serving as the Secretary of State under Barack Obama. Accordingly, the meme targets the long list of lies that Clinton had been caught promoting while alluding to Trump’s immigration agenda.

The practice of quote approval in interviews with politicians and their campaign officials is becoming more common as the constant need for information allows sources to dictate the terms of interviews. Case study 2-A presented by Patterson & Wilkins (2014, p. 37) is concerned with the ethical implications of allowing government officials use quote approval in their interviews and how quote approval affects the reliability of information. Quote approval is a practice that is relatively harmless when omitting parts of quote doesn’t change its meaning, but quote approval also sets a dangerous precedent that could lead to more governmental control over public information and the press.

This week’s case study has this author postulating if the use of subversive approaches to influence others align with an individual’s moral compass. Within this week’s case study, this author is asked to examine a situation where James O’Keefe, a conservative activist, meets with the senior fundraiser for National Public Radio (NPR), Ron Schiller, to discuss a potential donation of $5 million from an ethnic organization. Unbeknownst to Schiller, his meeting with O’Keefe was secretly recorded and after imaginative alteration, is released, causing a tarnished reflection on not only Schiller, but NPR.

“When trust in our institutions is low, we should reduce the corrosive influence of money in our politics, and insist on the principles of transparency and ethics in public service. “

The hypothetical scenario given for this assignment talks about a bill signed by the President that is approved by Congress. This law becomes known as the Protecting American Integrity Act, which addresses the issue of “fake news” in the media. The label of “fake news” is in reference to any published information that portrays elected officials in a negative manner. In contrast, any published information that portrays elected officials in a positive manner shall be labeled as “real news.”

In modern society is very popular to raise the most scandalous issues of the present, disclose famous politicians and high-ranked officials, we highlight the hidden truth of the power-driven machinations and governmental intrigues.

Politics is a bloodsport, one big game of corruption, muckraking, prostitution, and defilement, which is played by the politicians, the media, and the seemingly innocent public that tends to forget that politicians are humans also, no better than the masses except for one thing, the ability to play the game. Primary Colors by Anonymous portrays this fraudulent game perfectly, exhibiting all of the dark aspects of a political campaign: from the vicious media in their pursuit of scandals, to the traitorousness of opposing candidates to destroy each other, all the way to the secretive sexual interactions taking place during the campaigning process. Yet in this vice-corrupted novel, Anonymous also manages to let the human side of the tainted