Web Critique 15

Website Name:  http://amnesty.org
Operated By:  Amnesty International
Funded By: Donations

The website of Amnesty International is a very good resource to people who would like to have their eyes open to human rights violations around the world. I believe the best feature of the website is the ability to look, by country, at current human rights violations. There is also a downloadable PDF file titled “The State of the World’s Human Rights”. Amnesty publishes such a report each year outlining the state of human rights by region and by country. They offer the report in a good number of different languages. There are many fantastic education resources on the site, many of which are in other languages than English, such as “Human Rights Bingo”, education blogs, the link to Amnesty’s site www.respectmyrights.org which has two great interactive tools, the Poverty Trap, and the Housing Journey regarding how lack of housing affects human rights, and more. Overall, Amnesty International is doing good work. I don’t personally agree with all of their stances, but they are a loud voice for many many good causes and their website is a big part of their movement. 

Web Critique 12

Website Name:  Black Voices
Operated By:  The Huffington Post
Funded By: The Huffington Post- most likely advertising money

This website is a part of the larger Huffington Post website. They provide a plethora of different articles on things related to black people. I was impressed that they even include many articles on issues in other countries relating to the subject as well. With the typical amount of liberal bias that Huff Post exhibits, however, I wish they would assume a more balanced reporting style. Also I really don’t like the layout of any of the sub-sites on Huff Post. They put different posts into the page as smaller thumbnail pictures with a blurb and title, which in itself is enough to make my eyes strained after a while of scrolling through. In addition, they place thumbnail links to unrelated articles and advertisements on the page too, making it hard to focus in on what you’re actually looking for. They obviously are employing click-bait to get more reads on other articles and advertising traffic, but it makes their website more difficult to read. It also makes the page look disorganized and messy. 

Instructor Notes - Policymaking and Domestic Policy

Instructor Notes for Week 15 –Chapter 19- Policymaking and Domestic Policy The USA domestic policy is again being debated by the political parties and members of Congress. The country is at another critical point in the future of our vital domestic programs. If you have time to listen to this hour long debate, you will learn a lot about the issues involved. Here is a sample of what you will hear: “ . . . Now comes Wall Street's "third way" of hijacking the nation's wealth: it's trying to persuade Democratic supporters to support the dismantling of the social contract that has held our society together for 75 years. And it's using many of the same tactics -- and many of the same faces -- it used in its first two forays. If you liked Wall Street deregulation, an inequitable bank bailout, and a get-out-of-jail-free card for bank executives, you're going to love this. The Anti-Social Contract Movement The goal is to cut the popular and successful programs they describe as "entitlements."  Cutting Social Security benefits will reduce political pressure on the undertaxed wealthy, while creating new investment markets for Wall Street retirement funds. Directly or indirectly slashing Medicare and Medicaid benefits also reduces that pressure. It would be more effective, more humane, and more rational to reduce Medicare's costs by reducing the effects runaway greed at every level of our health economy - but that would be bad for their investments. . . .” HuffPost Hill: FIGHT! - Social Security Works' Alex Lawson and Third Way's Jim Kessler battle for close to an hour on Social Security and the social contract. (Lawson's for it.) It's that rare thing in Washington, an actual debate, played out here on Ari Rabin-Havt's Sirius show The Agenda.   (Links to an external site.) The Agenda with Ari Rabin-Havt: Alex Lawson and Jim Kessler debate (Links to an external site.) Read more about it here - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rj-eskow/wall-street-finds-a-third_b_2158836.html (Links to an external site.) ‎11/14/2012 Jim Kessler of the Third Way and Alex Lawson of Social Security Works debate on SiriusXM Left's The Agenda with Ari Rabin-Havt. ................................................................................................................................................................................. Minimum wage is another issue being debated at this time.

Instructor Notes - Equality & Civil Rights

Instructor Notes for Week 12 - Chapter 16 - Equality & Civil Rights It is amazing to many that the hard won civil rights we are studying this chapter this week are now being questioned by some in our society. Beginning with the issue of race, there is an excellent book entitled The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander, the former director of the Racial Justice Project of the ACLU in Northern California. She also served as a law clerk to Justice Harry Blackmun on the U.S. Supreme Court. In it she says, “Recent data shows, though, that much of black progress is a myth. In many respects, African-Americans are doing no better than they were when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated and uprisings swept inner cities across America. Nearly a quarter of African-Americans live below the poverty line today, approximately the same percentage as in 1968. The black child poverty rate is actually higher now than it was then. Unemployment rates in black communities rival those in Third World countries. And that's with affirmative action! When we pull back the curtain and take a look at what our "colorblind" society creates without affirmative action, we see a familiar social, political, and economic structure--the structure of racial caste. The entrance into this new caste system can be found at the prison gate.” An excellent synopsis of the book can be read athttp://www.econ.brown.edu/fac/glenn_loury/louryhomepage/teaching/Ec%20137/The%20New%20Jim%20Crow-from%20The%20Nation.pdf (Links to an external site.)  If you have not read it, I suggest you put it at the top of your list. If you don’t have time to read the book, watch this video - THE NEW JIM CROW Online Documentary   (Links to an external site.) During the 2012 election cycle, we heard and read about irregularities with our various state voting systems and the number of voter suppression laws that have been passed in numerous states. It was not really that many years ago that women finally got the right to vote in this country and now many are being disenfranchised by these new laws. Once again, the issue of affirmative action is before the Supreme Court of the United States. After integrating our schools with the famous Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case in 1954 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, we now see many of our schools walking back their integration policies used for years, i.e. here in the city of Wichita. The 2012 election cycle has also highlighted class wars between the top 1% and the 99% and the “War on Women” concerning equal pay for equal work and personal health choices for American women.   All of the above issues are still relevant today so pay close attention to this chapter this week and you will be better able to discuss these issues and make decisions about who you want to represent you and your family at the local, state and national levels. Finally, with the most recent issues being raised about local policing and our civil rights, I'd like to share this video with students so that you will be protected if you are stopped by the police. Most of our officers follow the rules and will not use undue force with the public. But, it is good to know how to behave in these circumstances and hopefully have the best possible outcome.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDptsf81lVc&list=UUV3Nm3T-XAgVhKH9jT0ViRg (Links to an external site.)

Instructor's Notes-Ch. 1 and 2

by Dr. Ramona Becker

Instructor Notes for Part One - PartOne in the textbook (Chapter 1 - Freedom, Order, or Equality &Chapter 2 Majoritarian or Pluralist Democracy) Two themes underlie The Challege of Democracy. The first is that contemporary government involves tradeoffs between three important political values--freedom, order, andequality. Keep these political values in mind as we study and discuss issues this semester.In the Overview each week, you will find a brief synopsis of the chapter(s) that should be quite helpful to you. When appropriate videos are available online, the links will be provided to you in this area. Each week's assignments will have the same basic format. Each lesson will have a Discussion Forum that is a critical part of the class. You may select the discussion question(s) that interest you the most. You will have a self-test that you may take as many times as you like until you achieve the grade you desire. It will be graded and should be an easy A most of the time. You will also have a Web Critique to do each week. You may select which website you want to critique from the choices provided. My students in past classes have truly enjoyed and appreciated these great links.