Ap_Government_Book_Report

AP Government Book Report “The Great Derangement” By Matt Taibbi AP Government Book Report “No voter wants to believe he doesn’t really matter, so he buys into that idea that there are two substantively different parties frantically competing for his attention, the ideological fate of the country hanging on this decision every few years. It flatters the average citizen to think that way. The reality is that the dominant characteristic of our political system is the unchanging nature of the political consensus – while the two parties agree about most all of the important things, they disagree violently about the inconsequential stuff, providing the fodder and the drama for an endless political “struggle” that plays itself out in entertaining fashion every couple of years.” Pg.129 “They voted in huge numbers, but they were voting out of loathing, against enemies and against the system in general, not really for anybody. The elections had basically become a forum for organizing the hatreds of the population” pg.20 “The problem started when our elected leaders started playing a different game from the one the people sent them to play. They corrupted the process, made it sick, and in the end created a new species of government, an organism that functions well to serve its own ends but is nonresponsive to the public needs. It’s a heart that beats but doesn’t pump blood.” Pg.28 “The party’s gift for this kind of abject political non sequitur has been a defining characteristic for about a dozen years now, but especially in the last five. Terrorists strike New York' We better repeal the estate tax, quick! Asian bird flu on the way' Millions will die – if the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 isn’t overturned!” pg.40-41 “The Rules chairman tries not to laugh, somberly nukes every meaningful amendment request with a pained, regretful expression, and then takes the bill behind closed doors, where it can be rewritten(usually in the middle of the night) to include all the shit the House leadership knew was way too evil to survive public discussion in the original committee of jurisdiction” pg.45 “Everyone in Congress knows what the real job of House members is: to carry water for their campaign donors. When you get $80,000 from Company X, you’re not being paid to vote your conscience.” Pg.44 “A classic isolationist and one of many members who occupy an essentially hereditary congressional seat, Duncan assumed his office after the death in 1988 of his father, John Duncan, Sr., who had been elected to office twelve consecutive times. Three hundred years from now, the city of Knoxville’s congressman will be a Duncan opposed to the extension of foreign aid to Pluto.” Pg.31 “The first is that the bill can again be completely rewritten here, rewritten from top to bottom, rewritten even so that it has a completely opposite meaning from the bills that passed the two houses – in a word, rewritten in such a fashion as to render the whole process up till now meaningless.” Pg.46 “Most congressional scandals end not when the investigation is concluded, but when it stalls in perpetuity, with the papers sealed to keep the press from fanning the flames any higher.” Pg.49 10.“Deregulation and giveaways, all of it – the currency of American congressional politics.” Pg.50 11.“In other words, Barton’s bill punished the owners of small individual mom-and-pop gas stations for price gouging but specifically exempted the large oil companies for the same offense.” Pg.50 12.“High-sounding meaningless bullshit: the currency of congressional public relations.” Pg.50 13.“…there is no technical knockout system in Congress, under which a bill dies if its proponents happen to admit in public to its being bullshit.” Pg.52 14.“...you might think this made sense, having some monolingual Georgia cop come all the way to Baghdad at a taxpayer-supported rate of nine grand a month to teach hand-to-hand combat techniques to Iraqi cops who’d be shot or bombed long before they got within a hundred years of an insurgent.” Pg.108 15.“An earmark, to the uninitiated, is the basic currency of congressional corruption. Also called “state items,” earmarks are simply budget items not requested by the administration and jammed into a bill during the budget process by an individual representative.” Pg.133 16.“Sirota, God bless him, kept haranguing Sanders to use the power of the filibuster to bully Harry Reid into keeping the timeline in. After all, apart from being able to get $500 million with an offhand conversation, each senator also has vast procedural power, and it seemed to be the judgment of the reporters in the room that Sanders should use that power on the war issue.” Pg 147 17.“Washington politicians basically view the People as a capricious and dangerous enemy, a dumb mob whose only interesting quality happens to be their power to take away politicians’ jobs. The driving motivation of all Washington politicians is to quell or deflect that power, and this is visible even in such a terrible emergency as the Iraq war, when one would think that some kind of civic instinct would kick in, for five minutes at least.” Pg.150 18.“…the lies that the American president told would always be the very best lies that science, computerized research, and Washington’s most devious spooks could produce.” Pg.187 19.“You don’t elect politicians to commit crimes; you elect politicians to make your crimes legal.” Pg.216 20.“When the government sees its people as the enemy, sooner or later that feeling gets to be mutual.” Pg.150 1.“No voter wants to believe he doesn’t really matter, so he buys into that idea that there are two substantively different parties frantically competing for his attention, the ideological fate of the country hanging on this decision every few years. It flatters the average citizen to think that way. The reality is that the dominant characteristic of our political system is the unchanging nature of the political consensus – while the two parties agree about most all of the important things, they disagree violently about the inconsequential stuff, providing the fodder and the drama for an endless political “struggle” that plays itself out in entertaining fashion every couple of years.” Pg.129 This is a true statement about the political ideology of Americans. We like to feel like our vote has a purpose. That we really are making a difference when we go out and punch in for the person we think will be the best. The truth is that most of the political world is unchanging. This quote explains that idea. We have learned in class that most people don’t spend a lot of their time thinking about political issues.So it makes sense then that people usually just take the party of their parents. People believe though that their choice in which party they come to join is some big dilemma. It even effects the friends they choose, or who they marry. This whole idea is completely unnecessary if you actually look closely at the parties’ ideals. This quote really illuminates the phenomenon and if anybody actually took the time to look they would see that there isn’t that big of a difference as this quote says. This passage from the story relates back to our text in that it summarizes the political party system and the way the people think about their roles in politics. “They voted in huge numbers, but they were voting out of loathing, against enemies and against the system in general, not really for anybody. The elections had basically become a forum for organizing the hatreds of the population” pg.20 Today’s voting system has really gone down hill. We’re no longer voting for the right reasons, the reasons are founding fathers at set up this democracy. The country in other words, was losing its mind. Our national politics is doomed because voters are no longer debating one another using a common set of standards. We as a country are not voting for the best anymore, we are voting for the best of the worst. This quote really makes that phenomenon evident. The people are now just voting out of straight anger, which in turn is ending up having mindless fools being elected to high powering positions, just to piss off the other end of the spectrum. Though we have no specifically learned about this in class, it is clearly evident in today’s political environment. What this does though is summarize the main point of the text. The point is that American politics really is not what it used to be. It’s sad that political parties are understanding of this and really complicit to the new system of things. This is shown clear when they spend $160 million on negative advertisement as opposed to $17 million on positive ads. There are no longer any viable standards left to go off of. All that is left is anger and distrust. “The problem started when our elected leaders started playing a different game from the one the people sent them to play. They corrupted the process, made it sick, and in the end created a new species of government, an organism that functions well to serve its own ends but is nonresponsive to the public needs. It’s a heart that beats but doesn’t pump blood.” Pg.28 This quote really emphasizes the phenomenon and overall theme of the book. Washington now is an organized kind of corruption, a corruption of the whole organism of government. It’s that corruption at the core of the American politics that’s transferred into the rest of the population, sending out waves of madness. “The party’s gift for this kind of abject political non sequitur has been a defining characteristic for about a dozen years now, but especially in the last five. Terrorists strike New York' We better repeal the estate tax, quick! Asian bird flu on the way' Millions will die – if the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 isn’t overturned!” pg.40-41 This is an important quote because “The Rules chairman tries not to laugh, somberly nukes every meaningful amendment request with a pained, regretful expression, and then takes the bill behind closed doors, where it can be rewritten (usually in the middle of the night) to include all the shit the House leadership knew was way too evil to survive public discussion in the original committee of jurisdiction” pg.45 This is a significant quote because