Final Material Flashcards
Abramowitz and Webster’s argument about “negative partisanship”
There is growing partisanship among voters too. Cuts through the traditional division of strong, weak, &; independent party identifications.
Each side holds really negative views of each other (supporters, party leaders: choosing not to associate with such people). Even independents tend to lean to a party.
Growing racial divide as Democratic party slays in minority votes)
Emergence of new, moral, & cultural issues (abortions, gay rights). Divide of cultural and religious values.
More white voters in GOP. Everything has basically changed since 1980.
STRAIGHT TICKET VOTING.
Just lots of negative sentiment for opposing sides.
Access (to politicians)
How is it that we reach politicians (influencing)
- Lobbying
- Campaign
- Contributions (PACs/SUPERPACs)
- Dark Money
- Revolving Door
- Outside lobbying (influencing public opinion, typically through media)
Adversarial Legalism
Adversarial system
- Two advocates represent their parties’ positions before an impartial person
- Enemies (prosecution from one side and another side)
Investigatory system (judge controls a lot of things - police) -Judge can ask for clarification (only ask question) - remain impartial
“Astroturf” movements
Outside lobbying (influencing public opinion by using the media) - Not really socially organised but planned by corporations to look like social movements - can influence the opinion of others)
- “Working families for Wal-Mart”
- Fake coal miners protesting environmental laws
- Antinet neutrality groups (Comcast)
Asymmetric Information (as a cause of market failure) **
When one group has more information than the other
ex. Producers having more information than Consumers or not providing them with the full information. Consumers cannot punish them
- Markets can only punish bad products if consumers have information
- Food, drugs
- Financial products (stocks)
ex. Facebook stocks, everyone bought them but the financial state/account did not accurately reflect the business’ actual state and so many stockholders were gravely affected. Better off with insider data/info but not all people have access to that
ex. Snake Oil (randomly sold- people dont know where it comes from)
ex. Great Recession: massive security fraud**
Biased Pluralism (Who Governs?)
Interest groups represent business and the wealthy (and interests are skewed towards these groups)
- The wealthy control the agenda.
- Problems of the poor and PoC (minorities) are never brought up to the table
- 2.0: wealthy groups use lobbying and media to influence politics
The idea that organized groups largely determine political outcomes, not individuals (voters).
Big business interests, or ideological orgs, or grassroots activists like Occupy Wall St. or BLM.
Big business groups are inherently better funded and organized, and have much better access to politicians, so if pluralism is correct, then the system is permanently skewed towards business and against other types of interests.
Blind retrospection (Who Governs?) *
Voters punish politicians for things out of their control. Shark attacks (NJ) and football losses and votes would drop for a certain candidate or would be criticized by the people
Voter memory: short term
Changes in mass media during the 1990s
-Rise of cable news (hence the rise of hyper-sensationalism** CNN’s Breaking News)
(technique to deliberately obtuse, appealing to emotions, being controversial, intentionally omitting facts and information, being loud and self-centered and acting to obtain attention. Trivial information and events are sometimes misrepresented and exaggerated as important or significant (gun control vs. breaking news Justin Bieber spotted in Mexico vacationing)
- Rise of Fox News and conservative talk radio (alternative institutions to “bias” of traditional “liberal media”) News was meant to be neutral
- Driven ideological news
- Construction of an alternate reality
- Connecting the GOP and rightwing interest groups to their grassroots/masses
- Easier to mobilize people
The media becomes much more biased and in a way personalised as people can choose to publish/show what aligns with their beliefs.
Chinese Exclusion Act (1882) *
Federal Law signed by POTUS in 1882. One of the most significant restrictions on free immigration in US history.
- Prohibited all immigration of Chinese laborers.
- Curb levels of immigration in CA (regulation)
- Tool against European empires as a way to establish American Supremacy
Citizens United v. FEC (Federal Elections Committee)
another Supreme Court ruling
Supreme Court ruling that states that SuperPACs (Political Action Committees) can receive unlimited anonymous donations and spend unlimited money (as long as the SuperPACs dont “coordinate” with candidates- a matter of free speech)
(SuperPACS vs PACs: SuperPACs are grand and can receive as much money as they can)
Super PACs one person can bankroll the whole national campaign
Conditions
- not giving money directly to the candidate
- giving money “nothing” to do with the candidate
- not allowed to talk to the campaign
- no one gets prosecuted for this
- how much can you give to the superpac- unlimited
-money doesn’t necessarily have to be disclosed
-can be from foreign sources and there is no need for documentation.
America is great.
- People’s vote to choose their representative diminishes.
- No transparency (anonimity)
Committee gatekeeping (i.e., committee’s ability to contract agenda)
Each committee in congress controls a separate area of policy, and those who sit on those committees tend to be experts about that policy, and/or particularly affected by it (e.g. someone representing rural Georgia might want to sit on the agriculture committee, given the number of farmers in her district). These committees get to prevent legislation from reaching the floor of the House/Senate if they so choose, so in this way they act as a gatekeepers. Important because if there’s a bill they don’t like, but know the rest of Congress would like, they can vote it down and keep it from ever getting voted on. They might do this to protect their constituents, or worse, they might do it to protect the interests they are supposed to be regulating.
-leaders guide the rulings
Committees in Congress
The different Committees such as the Agricultural, Defense, Education, Judicial, Veteran committees per say that focus on passing bills related to their committee’s interests and goals. Committee gatekeeping
Committees
Subcommittees
- Allows for specialization and development of expertise within the committees
- Having leaders that represent the people’s interest and problems
- Legislators try to get on committees that are important to constituents (eg, farming states = Ag Comm.)
- Get bills that favour their
Cross-cutting Cleavages (NO)
Spectrums/Platforms that help us understand politics. They are created through the byproducts of democratic characteristics and life experiences. (spectrum of religion (right) to race (left) which to choose)
During 1996 elections- Bob Dowle (R) was doing terrible and tried to cleave off the other party by priming/framing over an issue (praying in schools) that Dems in that time would agree to- something that they should consider.
No one group can align all of its members along a uniform cleavage based platform. Appealing to members of the group that tend to be more spread out on other cleavages (even D vs R) created/supported by other cleavages.
Confirmation Bias/Selective Perception
Choosing to focus on certain things… People will choose to pay attention to things they already agree with and they interpret these things according to their own predispositions.
The process by which individuals perceive what they want to in media messages.
Why people with right-wing views buy right-wing newspapers and why people with left-wing views buy left wing newspapers. In general people both:
- Want to be exposed to information and opinions that confirm what they already believe.
- Have a desire to ignore, or not be exposed to, information or opinions that challenge what they already believe.
- Even in cases where people do expose themselves to alternative points of view, it may be a form of confirmation bias; in that they want to confirm that the opposition is, indeed, wrong.
Zaller R-A-S model: kind of similar as thy only choose to receive and keep the messages that they want.
Democrats and Republicans (voters) believe in contrary beliefs
eg. Did Iraq have WMD (weapons of mass destruction) before the War?:
R: 47% yes
D: 8% yes
Level of Saddam Hussein / Al Qaeda ties:
R: 75% close ties
D: 30% close ties
Dark money contributions **
Group Political Strategies (Insider tactics)
SuperPACs ** (not PACs because SUPERPACs can receive as much from whoever with not regulation_
- No regulation
- No transparency
- Can use and spend limited
PACs can coordinate (Hillary for America runs campaign website, television ads are very similar- basically the same)
Direct (hard money) campaign contributions **
Political Action Committees (PACs) and individuals can contribute to campaigns
- There is a limit on how much you can give to a particular politician or party
- It is not enough money to buy votes, but enough to buy access*
- Can come from individuals or
- Must be in accordance with set guidelines
given money in such form because then physical cash would then be considered as …. that thing that is actually a crime/felony (FEC cannot regulate that)
Economic Inequality in the US
Rise in
- Automation
- Globalisation
Problems with: educational and occupational categories
Theories
- Policy (govt: taxes, regulation of industries, labour relations)
- Voters (large majority support sensible stuff that would benefit them - choose more liberal policies)
- Bartel’s reading Homer gets a Tax Cut: people dont think about trade offs - Organized groups (corportations) getting more involved. lobbying and self serving
Ethnicity vs. Race
Both are social constructs. Race tends to focus more on the physical traits and ethnicity of your background, but even so race is within ethnicity so it is once again largely defined through your physical traits.
Common culture, race, nationality, culture, food, shared history
Ex-ante vs. Ex-post control of bureaucratic agencies
ex-ante: before
• Congress writes bill to create or redesign agency
• POTUS: Veto power
ex-post: after
• Congress could pass law to eliminate or change agency
If you want to make sure an agency is doing a good job, you can essentially set up either “fire alarms” (ex post) or “police patrols” (ex ante) > protect agencies, quotas, regulations, inefficiency
Create auditors whose job it is to go around looking for malfeasance, and catch it before/while it happens, OR you can create systems by which affected individuals can report malfeasances after they have happened.
The problem with the first one is that it’s costly and time consuming.
The problem with the last one is that affected individuals might not “pull the alarm”, so to speak. CAP people struggle to do something about it
• Congress could pass legislation to eliminate or change an agency
– But collective action problems make this rare
– Better to trash talk a bad agency than actually do something about it (e.g., TARP)
IRON TRIANGLES
Executive (presidential) power
Presidential power that is restricted to the president but cannot be used to overpower what Congress does (checks and balances) so it can only be used to enforce certain things - such as choosing not to yet enforce healthcare for all business (strictly) as business have said it is difficult to comply with these regulation in short period of time.
- Veto (Checks and balances)
- Declare War
General of what the President Powers.
Executive Action/Order
Power of the POTUS to execute his power (without the “consent” of congress as they take too long). It can’t be something radical** but usually used to enforce (expand) or deforce certain regulations.
People complain Obama uses too much executive power. Bush used more executive power -Example: (class reading on executive power)
Filibuster
Action of holding the floor with a prolonged speech that obstructs progress. Can be used in good and bad ways- to emphasize a point or just to block one from progressing/getting voted on. Can lead to gridlock (government is divided and can’t come to a decision)
-Debate, procedural motions, debate, delaying or obstructive actions
- Block
- Media attention
- Threat of a filibuster (formidable)
Ex: Gun Control 15 hr filibuster (Senator Chris Murphy) “until Congress acts on gun control legislation”. Gun control by credential/background checks before allowing to purchase gun. “hold the floor to push for a vote on amendments to close the terror gap and expand background checks.”
Framing** /Framing Effects (Who Governs?)
Bias in public opinion
How can we have faith in public opinion when question wording influences answers so strongly?
The UK’s example for when there was a poll for Scotland’s independence - wording of the question.
Framing in polling for Bartel’s study on public opinion for economic inequality. Making people to focus on certain aspects
Heuristics/cues
Cognitive Shortcuts
We don’t have enough time to study all the issues, so we take cues from people and groups like
- Party (D/R)
- Politicians
- Groups
- Intellectuals
“Horserace” coverage in the media **
Campaign coverage tends to focus on “horserace” rather than policy stands
-Coverage of policy fights (eg. health care) focuses on strategy, likelihood it will pass (not substance)
-Coverage is focused on polling data, public perception —Instead of candidate policy, and almost exclusive reporting on candidate differences rather than similarities (fast paced action)
fails to display strenghts and weaknesses
Ideological and policy attitudes vs. Social/Group attitudes **
Ignorance Challenge: How can we learn about what voters want if they don’t know about politics?
Levels of political understanding
– Top level (few people): Ideological and policy attitudes (“I support tax policy X because…”) because
• Ideology = Internally consistent principles
• Policy = Specific principled attitude about policy
– Second level: Group/social attitudes (“He’s for helping group X, and I’m part of group X.”)
• Heuristics
– Rest: Personal or Non-attitudes (“He tells it like it is” or random answer)
• Political ignorance (random/arbitratry)
Ideological consistency/constraint *
Constraint (or consistency): Whether your policy positions tend to “fit together” ideologically and logically
Dragging on your ideologies to different topics
