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Politics and the learning there of
Mim
dead.Registered User regular
dead.Registered User regular
Hello PA,
When I started college I was thinking about being a political science minor, found it too dull and now I'm an art minor. Since then, however, I find that I like discussing politics as a hobby. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find out about the American government as a whole and who does what and where and why. I would like to post on D&D but the conversations are full of policies and knowledge of senators and aides and people are able to pull out concrete examples without relying heavily on their emotions (like I do).
So I was wondering if there were any websites that could help me with this. I would like them to be non-partisan because I feel that I should vote for who is best for the job, not who they're partied with. World politics would be interesting too. International affairs are fascinating to me.
Are there any websites that could give rundowns of everything that is going on? Say, maybe from 1960 till now? I know someone on D&D was making a politics google document, but I needed a special password for it, and I forgot who made it anyways so I can't PM him/her and ask for it.
Thanks!!
When I started college I was thinking about being a political science minor, found it too dull and now I'm an art minor. Since then, however, I find that I like discussing politics as a hobby. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find out about the American government as a whole and who does what and where and why. I would like to post on D&D but the conversations are full of policies and knowledge of senators and aides and people are able to pull out concrete examples without relying heavily on their emotions (like I do).
So I was wondering if there were any websites that could help me with this. I would like them to be non-partisan because I feel that I should vote for who is best for the job, not who they're partied with. World politics would be interesting too. International affairs are fascinating to me.
Are there any websites that could give rundowns of everything that is going on? Say, maybe from 1960 till now? I know someone on D&D was making a politics google document, but I needed a special password for it, and I forgot who made it anyways so I can't PM him/her and ask for it.
Thanks!!
BlueSky: thequeenofchaos Steam: mimspanks (add me then tell me who you are! Ask for my IG)
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When you see a name you don't recognize look it up. Ask questions and look through the internet to answer them. Read a little deeper into subjects if an article sparks your interest into it. Non-partisan is a little difficult to find. Just learn to be able to strip down the rhetoric and biased opinions to find the core information and any source is okay. Hell the hospitals that had Fox (right wing nuts fyi) running all of the time I was still able to think past their bias and gather a glimmer of what happened. The big 3 networks are generally good for nonpartisan stuff.
Mainly I listen to NPR while driving and that keeps me in touch with what happens. I have a few magazines that I read but they are biased. It keeps me informed what each side is thinking instead of being insulated, which you need to avoid. Being insulated, lacking information, leads to poorly thought out opinions. Mother Jones (socialist/liber), Economist (conservative), rarely I glance at Time but for the most part they don't have too much for me. My girlfriend loves NYTimes. Wall street journal is good. I glance at both websites maybe once a week.
The Big Book of Political Advice?
Gosling
is that who you are talking about?
YES! HIM! Thank you...anyone know if its good?
I would try and focus on just the USA before you try and get into international politics. You might want to start off taking issues one at a time. Look at an issue and then research the last 40ish years about it and then move on. It'll take a while but if you want to learn from 1960 to now that's gonna take a while.
I didn't take a look at it. From what I heard it was a bunch of witty jokes with allusions to the 2008 primaries to now. I wouldn't say it would be something to start from.
History is a good thing to learn while learning politics. Whenever you discuss politics the history of the thing being argued will always come up.
More advice: When I was beginning to learn about current events whenever a debate came up I would be less debating but more asking questions of my "opponent's" side and later look into the subject and using it as learning more of showing off intelligence.
Yeah, NPR is a great source. Its convenient and it usually has good articles.
I'd just like to note that the Economist is 100% not conservative. I read it every week, and its pretty firmly in the middle. I'd actually go so far as to claim that it is the most unbiased form of print media available to the general public.
Sowell is conservative, but the book itself is a very good objective primer for economics.
Are economics fundamental to learning about politics? and is there is an online website I could use instead? I'm strapped for cash :X
I don't think you would have to go through that book. I mean, any library has books about economics and really if you understand the basics you will have the general idea of what the politicians are talking about. And yeah, a lot of domestic politics is about economy. Even foreign policy is affected by economics but I don't think you need to know too much to understand what's going on. Now debating... it depends on how deep you get into that debate.
You're just starting out. I wouldn't recommend diving deep into one subject then jump to another to dive deep. You'll get burned out. Just get the general feel for what's going on by listening to NPR or reading the newspaper or other news sources. If you don't understand something look it up. If something sparks your interest by all means pursue it. Don't read something because you feel like you have to, read it because you enjoy being mentally stimulated.
Economics is important when it comes to understanding things like product elasticity, supply and demand, and cost/benefit relationships. It helps in understanding things like taxes, tariffs, government subsidies, etc. It also helps in understanding the schools of thought like classical theroy, keynesian economics, austrian theory, moneterism, etc.
And that book is available everywhere, it's seen as the best economic primer for a reason. It will be at any library or used book store. The one I linked to is just the newest edition hardcover.
Also, work (I'm not being snarky with that). There's a difference in working and being taxed a certain amount and not working and thinking what people should be taxed (or having a trust fund or family money to mooch off of).
The process stuff is also a very big deal in politics, which is often more the realm of political "hacks". There's a lot of the day to day strategic and tactical stuff here, and polls and messaging and so forth. Perhaps unfortunately, a lot of the mainstream media seems to focus more on this side of politics, and with the 24-hour news networks it is often treated rather superficially. That doesn't mean that you should necessarily have a complete aversion to this stuff, as it can be useful to see where the "conventional wisdom" is going with things, but just realize it for what it is and that the punditry often dips into the well of propaganda.
As for bias, a lot of the sources of political information will have some sort of bias, so in my opinion the best way to approach it is to try to figure out what the biases of what your sources are and to try account for them and remain skeptical. For example, the web blog Five Thirty Eight has a lot of excellent articles on polling, demographics, and the numbers behind politics, but keep in mind that the contributers are left leaning and see the world through that prism, which can potentially have some effect on their analysis, more so when they move outside of their comfort area.
You can't avoid it. Any aspect of politics that can involve a government program, even if it's just people to process paperwork, will need tax money to drive it.
However, it doesn't need to be your starting point. While many people will be familiar with many issues, that doesn't mean we all know them equally well or care about them equally. Starting by researching one aspect of politics that interests you and then branching out from there is how many people do it.
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Honestly unless you're looking for a literal "this is how american government works" type of thing (in which case, you really could just read a textbook or find stuff on the internet), I would read political blogs. They're mostly partisan, but for the most part they're written for the layman and give you a way to get right into the issues you are interested in.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
Every time somebody brings up a past event, organization, country, or name you're not familiar with, look it up. Wikipedia's not always the best source on political subjects, but you can get a reasonable outline of most stuff from there, and it's usually a good starting point anyway.
Know the difference beteen a pundit (Beck, Olbermann, etc etc) and an anchor. They try to look like anchors, and some of the better ones do spend more time on the news than on rhetoric. That said, watch them anyway - most of them replay once or twice through prime time, so even ones in the same timeslot like O'Reilley and Olbermann, you can see both. At least half of them will probably make you want to break your TV, but understanding politics isn't just the news, it's the political beliefs of the people involved, and it's also very much their attitudes, because getting elected is as much a PR game as a policy debate.
After you're done with them, try to squeeze in the Daily Show and Colbert. They're comedians, certainly, but they do a good job on current events, and they're relevant enough that people they go after regularly feel the need to set the record straight (and usually Stewart ends up the one setting things straight).
The rest is mostly bullshit. Anyone who claims any expertise in a government or political area that isn't also an expert on economics is completely full of shit.
Get a strong economic base before you even wade in too deep in politics. This will give you a very reliable bullshit filter.
Some might say that the book is liberally biased, and it does bash the Bush administration heavily, but really it's just a bunch of facts with very little opinion thrown in. Besides, reality is notorious for having a liberal bias anyway.
Game theory isn't really helpful to understanding the practice of government; it's way more helpful to understanding the theory of government, because most of the decisions made in government are too difficult to actually model via game theory; or, at the very least, too complex to gain anything from doing it.
As far as the basics are concerned, you should probably read the Wikipedia articles on the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate, POTUS (President of the United States), the cabinet, and the Supreme Court. That will give you a good overview of the government itself. For some of the theory behind it, I would suggest reading the articles on separation of powers. For probably the best idea of why the Founders made the government like they did, read the article on the Articles of Confederation.
I'll throw some more in here later as I think of it. Obviously, don't take Wikipedia as the gospel truth, but for those particular subjects, it should be pretty accurate.
A more interesting and rewarding way to get into politics is to follow your heart, and see where your interests take you. See if there are any issue based groups on campus that sound interesting to you, and join them. Or learn more about a particular issue that interests you. The political background will come to you gradually this way, as you get more involved, or follow your issues.