Other people have addressed the EU question, so I'll focus more on politics in general. There's some decent BBC media which covers current politics, it can sometimes be a bit tedious, some shows are better than others, and I certainly wouldn't recommend rigorously following all of them, but it's pretty good for familiarising yourself with the current state of affairs. Some TV and radio shows to follow -

Daily Politics - daily show analysing politics, which often gets high profile politicians on.

This Week - weekly show, airing after Question time, with a slightly comedic approach to political analysis.

Andrew Marr Show - weekly show, the one which senior ministers (the prime minister, the chancellor, the home secretary, etc) are most likely to appear on.

Question Time - weekly topical debate program, with questions from the audience directed towards politicians.

Any Questions - radio version of Question Time. Often not quite as annoying as Question time.

Today in Parliament - daily radio show covering news from parliament.

 

Parliament.uk and gov.uk are both great resources for learning how parliament and government functions, and learning about legislation. If you'd prefer a less fragmented read, such as a book, then Exploring British Politics by Garnett and Lynch seems like a good introductory source, though I will add the disclaimer that I've only used it occasionally as a reference book, and it is fairly pricey.

 

It can sometimes be difficult to understand the significance of things in politics without a basic grounding in the historical context, so I will recommend some more books to help with that (although much of the info can be found online). Two of the most important figures in recent British political history are Thatcher, and Blair. Charles Moore's Margaret Thatcher: The Authorized Biography, Volume One is a good book for starting to understand the political context of the Thatcher era, although it is obviously quite biographical too, and being the first volume it only covers roughly the first third of her time in government. The comprehensive tome on Blair and his wide-ranging effect on the functioning of british politics is surely Seldon's Blair's Britain, 1997-2007, although I will warn you that is it most definitely a tome - incredibly thorough and a bit of a slog. The best way to approach this is probably to read the sections on things you are interested in, like the NHS, and leave the rest until you feel you want to learn about them. Sections of Seldon's Cameron at 10 are definitely worth a read if you want some more insight into the first Cameron ministry, and the coalition years.

 

I can't really recommend any comprehensive histories on the political parties (although what I've read of Tim Bale's The Conservatives Since 1945 is pretty good). One I would recommend is Goodwin's Revolt on the Right, which offers a fairly original analysis of the phenomenon that is UKIP. There's a more up-to-date follow-up to that, (UKIP: Inside the Campaign to Redraw the Map of British Politics), which I imagine is also pretty good, but I haven't read it. Familiarising yourself with general political ideologies (to rattle off an incomplete list: one nation conservatism, high toryism, classical liberalism, social liberalism, libertarianism, social democracy, democratic socialism, etc), how these relate to each other, and how they have manifested in the various 3 main parties over time is a must for understanding the parties and the political tensions within them. Wikipedia should suffice in filling in the details there (and in other places), for now.

The Russia Probe: What Did Trump Know and When did He Know It?

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> The one question that has been upper most in the minds of millions of Americans in the aftermath of Russia’s proven meddling in America’s 2016 presidential election is: What did Trump know, and when did he know it? In a penetrating hard-hitting, wide ranging look at the events surrounding the scandal, The Russia Probe: What Did Trump Know and When did He Know It?, noted political analyst Earl Ofari Hutchinson asks and seeks to answer that compelling question.

>In the process he examines and debunks the major lies and myths that Trump, Trump administration officials, Trump family members, GOP investigators, and Trump apologists have put forth to the media and the public to make the issue go away.

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>This book contains no swear words, so you won't have to hide it from your kids. And its many one-liners are easy to remember, easy to tell at parties, easy to use to spice up your conversations.

Depends on what you're looking for:

• Grammar approach: Wheelock's Latin. If you like grammar and syntax (which I do), you'll be right at home here. This is a rather popular college textbook.
  
• Reading approach: Ecce Romani - want to read a story and learn the language more inductively? Hit up this textbook. It does have a decent grammar backing, though you may want some more explanation at times. Very useful with cultural and historical explanations. A high-school text.
  
  
• Immersion Approach - Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata - want a book that is purely in Latin and will slowly teach you how to read Latin? Choose this. Like Ecce, tells a story, but no English explanations whatsoever. Immersionists and oral Latin folks are big fans of this. I'm told this has been used at the American Academy at Rome.
  
  
• Grammar-Lite Approach - Jenney's Latin - a bit off-put by the enormity of Wheelock? Still want grammar? This is a high-school level text that is grammar-centric, but won't smack you over the head with it. Note: hasn't been updated in a while, might find this one in older Latin programs.
  
  
• Immersion-Lite Approach - Cambridge Latin Course - not a big fan of total immersion like in Lingua Latina? This text will have the story and English explanations of Ecce, but with much more Latin around. This textbook probably does the best job of teaching history, culture, and mythology as well. You might also be an Anglophile if you choose this book, as it's huge in the UK.
  
  These are the big ones that I know of. I'm sure there are more out there, so other folks, please comment! I'm also sure that some of my own biases might have come out in the post. I've personally used all of these in my classroom (high school Latin teacher here) to some extent except for Cambridge.
  
  Best of luck to you in your pursuit of learning!
  
  edit: clarity

Would you trust a doctor paid by the pharma industry?

Would you trust a corporate university that sells degrees?

Would you trust a hospital run for profit?

Would you trust a politician owned by pro-Israel donors?

Would you trust a media run by Comcast?

Would you trust a military spokesman about spying?

Would you trust think tanks paid by foreign countries ?

Would you trust an anti-union "non profit", an anti-environnement "non profit" and a pro-tobacco "non profit" all actually run and paid by big corporations ?

The goal of a business is to make as much money as possible.

I'm not surprised.

Believe it or not, the same phenomenon exists on reddit. As soon as you bring up certain topics or certain corporations, you will have a ton of people that will come to reddit to defend them. Sometimes they create fake accounts to look more honest. Lying is a huge industry.

Never trust shit you see online if you don't see who is behind it.

I only trust democratically run and independant organizations like community-funded consumer unions and community-funded medias

>So, maybe it’s not just those pesky Russian Robots infiltrating our brains that are destroying our Democracy. It’s Corporate money – born and bred in the good ole USA. Sorry, baseball, hot dogs, and apple pie, but nothing is more American than big money shrinking great minds to small. I’d certainly recommend looking through Beth Lynchs’ masterful series on how this transformation occurred at MSNBC.

>The Democratic Party has now descended from a marketplace of ideas into a cult-of-personality. It’s not about ideas. These churn regularly. Democrats are passionate about people. The vision of Hillary Clinton as a divine infallible savior has taken over the party of small minds – long after her embarrassing loss to an asshole. This has broken down people I once respected, admired, and cared for- broken my heart. This lifelong Democrat is mourning the loss of intellect from Democratic Party circles:

>The moneyed interests know: While you can’t fix stupid, you can sure buy their votes!

Edit to add link.

>whats your end game with these poasts about how this is all normal. or that what russia did is fair game because democrats do it too?

Not just the Democrats. The GOP too. The GOP actually employed Steele first. Reagan had a sit down meeting with Iranian officials before his election. Enormous amounts of money flowed in from Russian nationals like Gazprom leading up to drilling rights during the election. In 2008, when even a blatant loophole in the law which allowed foreign private agents to donate money was cited, and McCain attempted to close it--bipartisan support from both sides killed it in comittee

I'm side skirting nothing. I'm telling people that someone walking out at night is not a witch--because witchcraft does not exist. What I don't want here is for politicians themselves to feel like they can selectively use hysteria to force out populists; that they have ultimate control. It's the antithesis to the consent of the governed, and it's a dangerous precedence to set.

>did russia delegitimatize the outcome of our election or not?

No. Americans should not feel like transparency, or finding out the truth, negatively impacts legitimacy. You could make the argument that propaganda affects legitimacy--but if American institutions lack trust to the point that facebook posts carry more weight, than pointing to the facebook posts is looking at the symptom, not the cancer.

Which adds to my reasoning in all of this. By focusing on Russia, we don't focus on..

1.) The fact that the emails revealed the truth about DNC election tampering and bias.

2.) There is a reason why the media couldn't combat 'fake news' (Because its credibility is in the shitter--and no one helped it get there more than they did themselves.)


3.) Russia is one of many foreign and foreign interested actors who attempted to curry favor with the American public, in order to affect foreign policy--by indicating it is even POSSIBLE for one of these state actors to have such a profound effect through simply misinformation, we put the power of every election in the future in the hands of the media and the elite. All someone has to do is find a country who spoke highly of a candidate and whip up another witch hunt. Because as I said before, this is far more normal than anyone is taking into account. If we don't change the laws, and instead continue to just be outraged--then any candidate who does NOT accept the HUGE amount of aid flowing in from foreign governments will absolutely lose. However, if we ALSO allow aid to be something the media/political elite can use to destroy a candidate? We've literally granted a backdoor into our democracy for a rather small group of people to torch anyone that doesn't toe the line.

Not sure if I linked it, but if you want to see how much money and power comes into watching, read the book Foreign Policy Auction He analyses revenue streams for 2008, 200 million came in, and that was separate from media campaigns by countries meant to persuade Americans to send our troops, resources and foreign aid to other nations. In the end, the U.S. is Rome--we're the global hegemony, all trade (Roads) go through us, and our legions (Aircraft carriers). All nations, if they want to be successful, especially their private interests (Companies/Business) WILL come here to lobby. It's essential. Which means what's being called out here is normal, and it will persist unless there are some dramatic shifts in the laws. Until then, all you're doing, as said, is giving power to a small group--or to the foreign powers themselves (Imagine the power Putin has right now--if he simply said "I supported X candidate" next election? ANd he can show he REALLY did, because as I said, the connections are prolific because that's the nature of a global economy. I mean, hell, most people I talk to don't even know about 96 Chinese election issues We actually had testimony that Chinese government was actively working with the DNC to fund it, and yet no special council was called, and the DoJ actively blocked investigations, and somehow there was no need to yet obstruction. Trump's interlude with a lobbyist isn't even in the same ballpark, and yet the media and investigative storm is far more aggressive....why?)

This doesn't mean you do nothing when there is a focused intelligence campaign btw, but it's the reason why learned the lesson long ago that the proper way to counter foreign intelligence is with counter intelligence. It's why counter intelligence investigations are not made public. It was an unprecedented mistake for this to be made public, and the culpability of that can be shared among Obama, Comey, HIllary and Trump.

>you post about authoritarianism of the left, can you list some examples?

Well, it depends on what setting you're looking in. I mostly post about academics. Examples there include no platforming speakers, language restrictions on the campus, an almost mob-just mentality toward Liberal dogma that is eerily reminiscent of Family Values conservatism of 14 years ago (One family values organization, actually, rebranded itself into a feminist/women's organization, and almost all of its anti-sexuality rhetoric carried over--kind of funny. I'll try to remember the name.) If you want specific examples, I can give them to you, like microaggression monitoring, or Ayasn Hirsi Ali (For example) being named a 'hate speaker' by the SPLC, and being no platformed in multiple college campuses? The Left is losing its way, unfortunately--and I say this as someone who believes I am decidedly left.

But you'll have to be more specific, in what sphere? For me its so ubiquitous it's like calling out moral majority shenanigans; it's represented in most institutions, on many levels, but it's not nearly as extreme in some as it is in others.

Lol, I totally understand. Still, I think there's considerable value in his works, particularly from the 80s. When he's working to synthesize the experience of socialism and advance its theory, it's pretty good stuff. When he's trying to convince people he's the only hope for the world, not so much.

Some other sources I've found useful:

A World to Win magazine had a number of important articles which are well worth digging into.

Corrigan, Philip, Harvie Ramsay, and Derek Sayer. 1979. For Mao: Essays on Historical Materialism. Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey: Humanities Press.

Starr, John Bryan. 1979. Continuing the Revolution: The Political Thought of Mao. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

(These are from academics and focus more on the theoretical aspects. They're the best academic works I know of on Mao though and are very nice overviews.)

Another academic work which has an excellent chapter on Mao (though the bulk of it deals with other aspects) is Martin, Bill. 2008. Ethical Marxism: The Categorical Imperative of Liberation. Open Court.

Badiou has a nice analysis of the GPCR in Badiou, Alain. 2008. The Communist Hypothesis. Verso.

(Some journalistic/historical accounts of Maoism in practice/development in China):

Belden, Jack. 1949. China Shakes the World. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Han Suyin. 1976. Wind in the Tower: Mao Tse-tung and the Chinese Revolution, 1948-1975. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.

Hinton, William. 1966. Fanshen: A Documentary of Revolution in a Chinese Village. New York:
Vintage.

Horn, Joshua S. 1969. Away with All Pests: An English Surgeon in People’s China, 1954-1969. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Hunter, Iris. 1986. They Made Revolution Within the Revolution: The Story of China's Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Chicago: RCP Publications.

Milton, David and Nancy Dall Milton. 1971. The Wind Will Not Subside. New York: Pantheon.

Myrdal, Jan. 1965. Report from a Chinese Village. New York: Signet.

Finally, Li Onesto has good book on the Nepalese revolution which unfortunately was betrayed by the leadership.

The reason it's always Texas has more to do with your size than your politics. Well, it's partly your politics. However, the liberals do the same thing with California. California and Texas are the largest buyers of text books in the country. No text book company wants to produce a Texas version, California version and Rest of America version.

So California and Texas set their requirements very stringently in order to buy text books because they know what they put in their textbooks will be the guide for the rest of the nation. They also allocate much more funding to make sure they're loyal customers in return for getting their ideology in text books.

The thing is, California is joke when it comes to managing money. Their liberal state government just wastes and wastes money. Texas is more organized and sees much more success because they're dedicated.

That's really the lynch pin of GOP success. They're much more organized because they have only one ideology. They cater to wealthy whites. To a certain extent it's wealthy white males.

The liberals get all the overflow. A white gay couple will have a much different agenda than a black heterosexual woman. Although, some gays are starting to vote for the GOP. This is both due to the fact that parts of the Republican party (mostly young) are accepting of marriage equality and partly because there are many gay couples now in their thirties and forties without children who have an interest in maintaining the status quo.

If you're homosexual and already got the right to marry why wouldn't you start voting for the GOP? You're less likely to have children. You both likely work. Why would you want higher taxes? Why would you want to care about abortion? Granted, it's far from a pronounced trend. However, the GOP is winning over hispanics and homosexuals a lot faster than they're winning over blacks or women. The Hispanic thing is mostly because many of them come from strong Christian backgrounds. So they agree with the GOP when they say Christianity should be part of American life.

This stuff is really interesting. At least to me, but not so much at cocktail parties.

Further reading:

America's New Swing Region: Changing Politics and Demographics in the Mountain West


http://www.amazon.com/Americas-New-Swing-Region-Demographics/dp/0815722869

Red, Blue, and Purple America: The Future of Election Demographics

http://www.amazon.com/Red-Blue-Purple-America-Demographics/dp/0815783159/ref=pd_sim_b_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=115CNAB7JTFY76W1ZE9Y

In political science most of the literature on vote choice, at least in contexts with stable party systems, builds out of the loyalties people have to political parties. Partisanship creates what the authors of the seminal work The American Voter call a "perceptual screen" which filters information in ways that reinforce these ties. In other words, people first identify with a political party, then interpret the world in ways that support these views (think confirmation bias and motivated reasoning). This identification, moreover, typically [comes from parents](http://press.princeton.edu/titles/654.html] or other early social experiences.

Vote choice and candidate preference then follows from these loyalties. Loyalties to a political party is symbolically and psychologically meaningfully, much like supporting a sports team or adhering to given religious tenets. That's why you'll see people sticking by candidates regardless of information, among many other political phenomena.

See this in the NYTimes for a quick overview.

Typically you vote the way your parents voted. National leadership of the Republican Party worked to integrate libertarians into the party throughout the mid-20th century, taking advantage of growing concerns about corruption stemming from the New Deal and from the economic alternatives to Keynesianism that began to blossom following the then-shocking success of a little-known, mostly-theoretical economist named F.A. Hayek (the link is to a really fun podcast detailing the rise of Hayekian thought in the US). Modern American libertarianism largely coalesced in its infancy around critiques of the theory and practice of the public policies put into place by the Democratic Party, which enjoyed uninterrupted rule for twenty years prior.

Libertarianism had been around in the United States a long time before this but not as a serious part of party politics until the mid-20th century. So essentially you get a generation of libertarians welcomed with open arms into the Republican Party. They came to conflict with pretty much every other wing of the party soon ( though they were mobilized as Republicans a whole generation before, say, Evangelicals ), but mostly I would say the momentum starts from there. The first generation of modern Libertarians were Republicans, and so their kids naturally will be, too.

> Which is exactly what they’re doing now, the flat earthers, the anti vaxxers, the climate change deniers, the rise of Trump and how many of them seem to sit in the same political camp. There is absolutely a trend to push back against science which is likely fueled by social networks, the internet and the massive exchange of ideas. Every fool has a loud soapbox now.

You are blaming this on the rise of "freedom", when in reality it's the result of the lack of such. Let's take the US as an example. Much of the anger that led a lot of people electing Trump was precisely the neoliberal policies of the last 4 decades, which has devastated all forms of just, and to some extent egalitarian, welfare policies in the US, and basically transferred the resources in to the pockets of the few. Inequality has never been as big as it is now, and it continues to rise. The wages of the middle class has stagnated or gotten worse since the late 1970's, the poor class has grown ever larger and even poorer, and the concentration of wealth for the top 10%, even more the top 1%, has massively increased. People's opinions aren't being recognized, as the bottom 70% of the population are virtually disenfranchised from policy-making (as evidenced by Gilens and Page' excellent study). Between the two major parties, both of which are heavily pro-business, almost all laws being passed have overwhelming compliance with the rich 10%, and even more so 1%, and very little conformity with the bottom 70% (the less the further down you go). In other words, the system is essentially plutocratic, more than it is democratic.

Sure, we can argue that Trump doesn't exactly provide an alternative here. But Obama did (or claimed to do), and he turned out to fail the people. Sanders tried as well, but he had virtually no financial backing, and it was quite astonishing how far he even made it. That brings us to another issue, which is that elections are basically bought (every president candidate that has won or made it the furthest, has also recieved the most financial support from the private sector), another result of neoliberal policies. Obama no less than Trump.

So, yes, Trump came along, propping up a lot of fear in the population, claiming he would fix everything. In reality he's just making everything worse. But he's only an alternative because everything else is more or less suppressed; Trump, or rather the far right, is the last refuge of the capitalist elite. They don't like him; but rather him than someone like Sanders, who's "socialist". That's why Sanders got next to no large campaign donations, as opposed to Trump. And you see this even in Europe, with Corbyn now campaigning to reverse his Labour party's neoliberal policies since Thatcher, and re-introduce social democracy as it used to be; he is continiously being demonized by British mainstream media, with one hit-piece after another.

Which brings us to yet another issue for why people vote how they do: information. Most mainstream media is concentrated in the hands of a few huge conglomerates, and therefore reflect their values and ideas. That's not just rational sociological and market analysis, but also very much proven through careful studies by people like Pilger, Edward S. Herman and other . In a democracy, people's opinions matter way more than in, say, a dictatorship; therefore control of thoughts and ideas, or propaganda as it's called, is of utmost importance. And when you have almost all of mainstream media owned by rich corporations, what values do you think they will present?

So I'm sorry, I completely disagree with you in claiming that this is the result of "freedom". Rather, it's the result of the exact opposite, of less freedom and less influence of people in policies. This is what a mixture of a lot of disinformation, regressive social policies and effects for the majority of the population (despite economic growth) and continious private power (which the leadership of many of the religous groups are tied to, btw) leads to. And it's not exactly an undesirable effect either. Neoliberal policies were imposed with a pretty good knowledge of its effects, and also with a lot of it being policy goals. The report "Crisis of Democracy" by the Trilateral Commission from 1975 says as much. It said democracy was in "crisis" due to too much influence in policy-making by people at the time. And this had happened due to many progressive social policies from social democratic welfare policies, that had resulted in more popular participation of politics (in other words, more democracy). This was deemed negative by the report, and it was understated it needed to be reversed.

> This creates a lot of stability for families, larger communities, governments, and so forth. It allows for growth/improvement, but forces it to move gradually so there's isn't an unexpected implosion.

This is a really important point and one that's very well made. A well-understood part of the lifecycle of any person (and entire generations) is a natural and human desire to overturn previously held traditions. However, overturning traditions in service of genuine progress and overturning them simply for the nihilistic glee of it isn't as easy to parse in practice as one might hope. While "tradition" isn't a particularly good justification for continuing with the status quo, it's not an automatic argument the other way, either. Often times, institutions calcify and traditions form because there is a very real utility to them.

Maintaining the status quo can be suffocating but progress can be very destructive and in the meantime, a lot of real people have their lives destroyed underfoot of that same progress and never get to enjoy the fruits of the supposedly greater world that was created from the ashes. As Keynes said: "In the long run, we're all dead."

That's a really good question. Most of Chomsky's political books are on US foreign policy, not inequality. (Use caution when reading Chomsky.)

On inequality and politics, I think of there being two separate tracks: books by economic observers which talk about the rise of inequality since the 1970s, and books by political observers which talk about the breakdown of the American political system since the 1970s, including the dismantling of the social safety net.

Some suggestions:

George Packer, The Unwinding (2013). Review.

Roger L. Martin, Fixing the Game (2011). Interview. Martin traces sky-high CEO compensation back to the idea of maximizing "shareholder value" (i.e. the stock price), and in particular an influential 1979 paper on stock-based compensation. Also looks at similar winner-take-all ideas in other fields, like entertainment (Star Wars), sports, and hedge funds.

Anthony King, Running Scared: Why America's Politicians Campaign Too Much and Govern Too Little (1997). Essay that the book is based on. In the US, politicians have to spend a huge amount of time fund-raising instead of governing.

Rick Perlstein, Nixonland.

Thanks for doing this legwork. I appreciate it.

The Wikipedia page on this guy alone is a big read. I've skimmed some of it, and here are the sections that I found alarming:

> Carr argued that within the context of the Soviet Union, Stalin was a force for the good.

also,

> In Carr's opinion, if a historical event such as the collectivisation of Soviet agriculture in the early 1930s led to the growth of the Soviet heavy industry and the achievement of the goals of the First Five Year Plan, then the collectivisation must be considered a progressive development in history, and hence all of the sufferings and millions of deaths caused by collectivisation, the "dekulakisation" campaign and the Holodomor were justified by the growth of Soviet heavy industry.

and

> Labedz noted it only after 17 years after the first volume of the History of Soviet Russia series was published did Carr criticize Stalin in volume 8 of the series, albeit only once and in a veiled form.

also

> In A History of Soviet Russia, Carr paid more attention to relations between the Soviet Union and Outer Mongolia than to the Kronstadt mutiny, which Carr gave only a few lines to under the grounds that it was unimportant

I'm having trouble finding it, but I may be able to slip into a local college library and have better luck. Also his book "What is History?" sounds like an interesting read. I guessing that's where the predominance of people describing good as "progressive" and bad as "reactionary" comes from. I'm interested in understanding Marxism better, and that looks like a good place to start.

I've done some research, and this statement

> Labedz went on to argue that Carr's decision to end the History of Soviet Russia series at 1929 reflected not the lack of documentary material as Carr claimed, but rather an inability and unwillingness to confront the horrors of Stalin's Soviet Union.

Suggests the reason I can't find the volume that deals with the Holodomor (1932–1933) was because he didn't write one. He did write The Twilight of the Comintern, 1930-1935 - is that what you were thinking of? It looks like I can get it used for less than five bucks with shipping. I'm still going to be disappointed though if it doesn't give the Holodomor more than a few sentences.

Legislatures polarize. People do not.


And yes, legislatures (and the congress) have polarized substantially. DW-NOMINATE data on legislative voting behavior demonstrates a recent trend towards a highly polarized congress. Not all state legislatures are as polarized (see Shor-McCarty) but nationally this is certainly the case. DW-NOMINATE has put out this great video (you can see it on youtube here) that demonstrates the ideological movement of legislators in congress over time (from the 1st to the 111th legislature).

What we see amongst the voter however is maybe more of a faux-dealignment. Which is to say that people claim to identify less with either political party thusly, reporting themselves as being "independent". We can see this trend clearly in the surveys (see 2015 Gallup Poll).

However the prevailing models of electoral behavior cast a great deal of doubt on this being anything more than the electorate signally displeasure (perhaps over legislative polarization) while otherwise doing what they've always done. Campbell et al.'s The American Voter (which is the seminal electoral behavior work in contemporary american political science) argues that partisan identification is so stable that it is essentially inherited via a process of socialization and from one's own parents. They then go on to point out that all political preferences and decisions are then viewed through that inherited partisan lens. So while we see people self-reporting less affiliation with either party than we did before we don't see people behaving any differently. In fact, when we consider partisan leanings amongst independents (meaning: whether independents "lean democrat" or "lean republican") we don't see any added likelihood of the voters "switching" parties. In fact, we see most independents consistently vote for one party or the other based on their leanings in precisely the way Campbell's model suggested they would.


Sources:

DW-NOMINATE - national polarization data

Shor-McCarty - state polarization data

Campbell et al. 1960. The American Voter

Additional reading:

V.O. Key. 1966. Responsible Electorate

Could you link the original studies here? I'd love to take a look since I spent a ton of my undergrad researching this exact topic. One variable I noticed that was interesting was education (I.e. eurosceptic in France for example were overwhelmingly the most educated (Masters/Phd's by in large. I also would reccomend these two books, i've read both and while they are focused primarily on Britain and UKIP the first is a good primer while the second is riddled with data, graphs, number sets, trends, and scatter graphs!

1)Revolt on the Right: Explaining Support for the Radical Right in Britain (Extremism and Democracy)Mar 18, 2014
by Robert Ford and Matthew J Goodwin

http://www.amazon.com/Revolt-Right-Explaining-Extremism-Democracy/dp/0415661501/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1462988605&sr=8-1&keywords=revolt+on+the+right

2) UKIP: Inside the Campaign to Redraw the Map of British Politics 1st Edition
by Matthew Goodwin (Author), Caitlin Milazzo (Author)

http://www.amazon.com/UKIP-Inside-Campaign-British-Politics/dp/0198736118/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1462988668&sr=8-1&keywords=ukip

SpyGate is the name given to the attempted coup of President Trump that is becoming public more and more each day. It's a very, very complicated topic but also probably more fascinating than any spy novel because it's not even believable how stupid, wreckless, and emotional the people involved were throughout.

I would suggest picking up a copy of Dan Bongino's book on the subject. It's pretty much the definitive book on the subject for anyone who is new to it, and even those who are well versed. Bongino is a former Secret Service agent who served under several Presidents as well as being a former NYPD officer. He so far has yet to be wrong about anything on this subject and he is about to publish his second book on it which I can't wait to read.

https://www.amazon.com/Spygate-Attempted-Sabotage-Donald-Trump/dp/B07HXKL3V3/

I'm more than happy to provide more information and sources if you're actually interested. This is going to go down in history as the biggest political scandal in America's entire history, by far.

Good thing downvoting won’t change reality. You folks are in for a rude awakening.

>that’s why they’ve denuclearized like 3 separate times now right?

How many times did they denuclearize in the last 50 years?

>Trade wars with our allies is objectively one of the fastest ways to piss off our allies. Guaranteed.

I don't care about our allies if they can't handle reciprocal tariffs. Same way they can't pay their shares of NATO or rise up to the Paris Climate Accord they all agreed to

>Trump winning the RNC isn’t a measure of his political negotiation skills. That’s just appealing to the largest portion of the stupidest population in the country.

So if it was so easy why didn't 16 of the RNC candidates do it after being in politics their whole lives? Your logic is only consistent in that it's completely inconsistent.

>Blaming Obama by citing a quote. Neato.

Correct, a quote where Obama claims that there's no way to rig an election, right before he flip flopped and began accusing Trump of rigging an election. Who was in control of the intelligence at the time Trump was still a candidate? (hint: It was Obama)

>If that were even remotely true, start your own investigation. You could have done that at any point in the last 2 years, that it hasn’t happened should tell you that they can’t. But that would require logic.

Why would Trump do that when he can wait for Mueller to come out with the report finding Trump didn't collude, and then start doing his own investigations? Meanwhile while Trump has come out on top of you clowns every time, there have been people doing that investigation. Although I know how people like you work, and you'll simply refuse to accept new facts that go against your views.

https://www.amazon.com/Spygate-Attempted-Sabotage-Donald-Trump/dp/1642930989

Oh and there's a sequel coming up

https://www.amazon.com/Exonerated-Failed-Takedown-President-Donald/dp/1642933414/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=EJCR20TMJYACQC2EJFGQ

Oh look that same ex-secret service member who wrote the books on the collusion between the Obama admin and foreign/domestic intelligence also has a daily podcast where he covers these same topics. Bet you will never allow yourself to listen to it

lol

>Not hard to win a game rigged in your favor

Hahaha how you say that with a straight face is beyond me.

Almost everything government does restricts freedom.

Taxation restricts your financial freedom.

Speed limits restrict your freedom to drive fast.

Consumer Protection regulations restrict the freedom to produce and consume the goods you want.

Etc.

> In my opinion governments are good because the government is the voice of The People

Not really, because our current plurality voting system is terrible. The politicians who fight dirty and have lots of money tend to win, even when they aren't all that popular with the people. See the book Gaming The Vote by William Poundstone.

There's also no guarantee the elected officials will do what the people want, regardless of the voting system used to elect them.

Best seller on amazon already lol

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Presidents-Keepers-Those-keeping-prison-ebook/dp/B076YBL1WS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1509738955&sr=8-1&keywords=The+President%27s+Keepers

Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:


amazon.co.uk

amazon.ca

amazon.com.au

amazon.in

amazon.com.mx

amazon.de

amazon.it

amazon.es

amazon.com.br

amazon.nl

amazon.co.jp

amazon.fr

Beep bloop. I'm a bot to convert Amazon ebook links to local Amazon sites.
I currently look here: amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, amazon.ca, amazon.com.au, amazon.in, amazon.com.mx, amazon.de, amazon.it, amazon.es, amazon.com.br, amazon.nl, amazon.co.jp, amazon.fr, if you would like your local version of Amazon adding please contact my creator.

I'm not sure I'm getting through to you, son. I'll try one last time. The left is being hypocrites about Trump pulling troops out of Syria. They've wanted to pull out troops from Syria for a long time. Trump did it. They should be happy but aren't because Trump. They obviously think it's the correct move due to their defiance of their beloved president who deployed the troops in the first place.

It's pretty straightforward. I might suggest some intro reading if you're still confused because that's as plain English as I can lay out for you, sorry.

https://www.amazon.com/Spygate-Attempted-Sabotage-Donald-Trump/dp/1642930989

There you go, I've gone down this road too many times with people who are too entrenched in their beliefs. If you think the Obama admin was capable of something like that I encourage you to check it out, if not then I will never be able to sway you.

Believe it or not, there are books that can help you.

Start here:

https://www.amazon.com/Politics-Dummies-Ann-DeLaney/dp/0764508873

Looks like a really good book.

Go here and watch some videos. This channel has playlists for US history (which you will need to know to understand politics) and civics/government/politics:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yK90u3DQIK0&list=PLSQl0a2vh4HAmesA2mzILc6gghrr4jl5L

Well, the interesting part of the story is John Yob. He traveled with his wife Erica, and another couple (Ethan and Lindsey Eilon) from the mainland to the US Virgin Islands in late December or January. John, Erica, and Lindsey were elected as delegates, so they comprise half the delegation. John Yob is a Republican party campaign guy who worked for the presidential campaigns of Rand Paul, Rick Santorum, and John McCain, along with various statewide campaigns in Michigan. He has a lot of experience working conventions in Michigan, and just published a book called "Chaos: The Outsider's Guide to a Contested Republican National Convention." Being a delegate doesn't just let him hang out in Cleveland and cast his vote, it lets him put motions on the floor, try to organize other delegates, and so forth.

There's a court case about whether Yob's people fall under the 90-day residency requirement to be able to vote and serve as delegates, and whether that restriction is even constitutional. It will be decided on March 22. If those 3 people are removed, then the alternates would replace them and Rubio would pick up a pledged delegate. But like I said, I don't think Yob wanted to be a delegate just so he could vote for his preferred candidate and hear a bunch of speeches.

gaming the vote


^^
an awesome read detailing the advantages that numerous voting systems (including instant runoff) have over the plurality voting system that is commonly used in elections

http://www.amazon.com/The-American-Campaign-Presidential-Campaigns/dp/1585446289 (this will supplement your textbook)

http://www.amazon.com/The-Imperfect-Primary-Controversies-Representation/dp/0415995779/ref=pd_sim_b_6 (Most recent, and pretty dang good)

http://www.amazon.com/Presidential-Primaries-Dynamics-Public-Choice/dp/0691022836 (Still a classic despite the age)

http://www.amazon.com/Unconventional-Wisdom-Facts-American-Voters/dp/0195366832 (not specific to presidential elections)

http://www.psqonline.org/APSBooks.cfm?idbook=12121 (Selections of articles concerning the last few elections)

http://www.press.umich.edu/titleDetailDesc.do?id=22213 (Best work on presidential third parties that exists)

I believe the image is pulled from a book “Gaming the Vote” by William Poundstone, using results from a 2000 paper by Warren Smith, hopefully someone can provide better links than I was able to.

It seems to be on Amazon as well, if you're into Kindle reading like I am.

https://www.amazon.com/Presidents-Keepers-Those-keeping-prison-ebook/dp/B076YBL1WS

Based on his Twitter feed, he seems to lean more Trump than Cruz, but honestly I think he just wants to be at the RNC because he lives for the idea of a contested convention that sticks it to The Man. He literally wrote the book on it.

Well, that would be a longwinded reply.

If you have a half hour, listen to this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aevtHHULag

Read these two books with an open mind:

https://www.amazon.com/Russia-Hoax-Illicit-Hillary-Clinton/dp/0062872745

https://www.amazon.com/Spygate-Attempted-Sabotage-Donald-Trump/dp/1642930989

I understand these take some logical leaps as well, but I feel they're closer to the truth of the matter.

All I know is that this investigation impacted the mid-term results far more than any Russian interference impacted the 2016 election, and they better have something BIG for the damage that this has done to the country.

If you're really interested. That should get you up to speed.

https://youtu.be/cs6MaloWMpg

Check out his channel

Dan Bongino has been great and ahead of this more than any other that I have come across.

He's got a few books. This one is his latest

Spygate: The Attempted Sabotage of Donald J. Trump

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1642930989/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_5ZiWDbCDFCZC8

Man, the publisher, and author asked not to share this online or pirate it. They are going to have massive legal fees fighting that poes Zuma and his cronnies about this book. Please for the love of ending corruption in SA, go and buy a digital copy.

I doubt Ben realized Email for Dummies is real, he just wants to go for potshots because Hillary is a dummy with EMAILS.

That said, since Ben Garrison is aware of the "...For Dummies" series, I'd like to recommend him this book, and this one, and of course this one.

If you wanna know the truth

Spygate

Does he like to read? Maybe you could get in a subtly political informational book. Maybe his lack of interest roots from lack of knowledge about the matter.

Or you could go right for the kill

He doesn't have shit, if he had he would've released it BEFORE the midterms. He's hoping for a blue wave which is not coming because the figureheads of the left are all either incompetent, corrupt, or both. Meanwhile on the trump side of the court we have this. Also don't forget the real collusion.

This was an amazing overview. I need to read his book.

I think this is the one he refers to:
Spygate: The Attempted Sabotage of Donald J. Trump Post Hill Press https://www.amazon.com/dp/1642930989/ref=cm_sw_r_sms_awdo_t1_uJf.BbABPDKE2

Spez: link

for you

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0764508873/ref=rdr_ext_tmb

[here] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Politics-Dummies-Ann-DeLaney/dp/0764508873) read this so you can understand what you are saying next time.

Here is a link to the Kindle version of the book on Amazon.

I'm not sure if I'd be more disappointed if the people upvoting this article did so based on the title or actually read the article and thought it was worth upvoting.

Every single source is in his book Spygate.
But you don't really care about sources do you?

Spygate: The Attempted Sabotage of Donald J. Trump https://www.amazon.com/dp/1642930989/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_QJU.BbD9W0QEC

They do. But look to the FBI and IG's report which confirms everything I am saying. Dan Bongino did a good job of cataloging all public releases from the FBI in his book. The obama admin engaged in textbook crime and they are getting a pass. They shouldn't. Not to mention a constitutional crisis. 4th Amendment violations.

​

https://www.amazon.com/Spygate-Attempted-Sabotage-Donald-Trump/dp/1642930989

Are you positing the premise that most voters select a candidate based on the relationship between their views and the policies the candidate espouses? In fact, only a tiny percentage of people vote this way. Most people vote strictly along party lines, even if they claim to be "independent," and during primaries respond only to name recognition and one or two valence issues, which are typically very abstract (e.g., small government, gun control reform, lower taxes). In addition, they are often wrong about their chosen candidate's actual opinions on these valence issues.

Academic sources:

Baldassarri & Gelman, "Partisans Without Constraint: Political Polarization and Trends in American Public Opinion"
Fenno, Senators on the Campaign Trail: The Politics of Representation
Jacobson, A Divider, Not a Uniter: George W. Bush and the American People
Mair, Party System Change: Approaches and Interpretations

This view, that issues have very little impact on the decisions of individual voters absent a rare systemic shock (such as the Great Depression, the Civil War, etc.), is called the Michigan Model, after its origin in the National Election Studies at the University of Michigan and the seminal text The American Voter. Some modern scholars have attempted to criticize this model, but statistically, it has generally held true. For a look at some of these attempts, one decent source is "Choice, Context, and Consequence: Beaten and Unbeaten Paths Toward a Science of Electoral Behavior" by Paul Allen Beck, excerpts from which are available on Google Books here.