Conservative and Liberal Interpretations of Freedom

Catchy, sometimes powerful, ideas that compete to stick in your mind are called memes – a term coined by scientist Richard Dawkins.

One of the menes most strongly associated with the United States of America is the meme ” Freedom” or “Liberty”, heavily emphasized by our Founding Fathers during the American Revolution and invoked again and again throughout our history by politicians, preachers and presidents. “Freedom” is a word that can be found in use across the American political spectrum.

An example of this can be found below in the “mash-up” video “Freedom 101”

Lectures on the Political Spectrum – Slides

The first lecture is primarily on the origins of forms of government and it concludes with the emergence of the modern political spectrum after the French Revolution. The second slideshare is dedicated to explaining each point on the political spectrum.

Finishing Up Forms of Government

Students have a Quiz on Tuesday.

This week, students took a look at deceptive political advertising in the last forty years of presidential campaigns, read a primary source on the nature of government, Ibn Khaldun and compared his ideas to those of the Greco-Roman historian Polybius and on Friday did a short project on describing forms of government.

Vice-Presidential Debate

Tonight is the Vice-Presidential Debate between Governor Sarah Palin (R) and Senator Joseph Biden (D).

Students are to watch at least 30 minutes of the Vice-Presidential Debate tonight.

If you, for some reason, cannot watch the debate then you must read a news article at a major news website (CNN, ABC, FOXnews etc.) afterward that summarizes what happened at the debate and be preapared to discuss on Friday.