Election 2016: "Course Objectives"

 If this series were a college class, think of this as the syllabus. I'm not a professor in real life so this post will be loose of necessity and subject to revision. However, there are some goals we should be striving for so I will try to get some down.

First, there will be no assigned reading or papers. Though I might suggest some texts for further investigation and some applications or exercises you may want to try. There won't be any grades or credits awarded obviously, by the "end" of this series you should have a better understanding of our government and politics. 

Second, there will probably be a lot of history. I want this series to give you a very large perspective and that will require an understanding of where we came from. I especially want to discuss the intellectual history of the republic. 

Third, ideology. While I stated in the introduction that people have nearly infinite experiences and varied outlooks or expectations for issues and government, we can generally group them under common ideas. This will make parties and elections easier to understand.

Fourth, American government. Checks and balances, divided branches, and staggered elections. The organization of our Federal Government can be challenging but once you understand how and why this is so politics becomes easier to understand.

Fifth, reliable and unreliable sources. For good or ill, media has become very broad in the age of the internet. We will go over examples and guidelines for how to judge the veracity and relevance of a source of information.

Sixth, rhetoric. Politicians and political writers use what can seem like another language at times. We will discuss what certain common words and phrases actually mean.

This list will probably take a good amount of time to cover. It is my sincere hope that when this project is complete it will be of some use to you.