A Conflictual Government

A Conflictual Government

The United States of America is very much conflictual.  Every decision that is made is based off of one's political party.  The political parties control the government, through the conflicting viewpoints, and the strong opinions that are created through all of the issues the country faces.  This has too been brought into the electoral college, which is very undermining. When going through a presidential election, many people focus on the map of the country that’s covered through every news channel, watching it closely to find out who will be the next leader of the country.  While watching, everyone's eyes are glued to the tv, awaiting the states borders to be covered in either blue or red. Depending on which color the state turns, says a lot about the citizens that make up the state, and depending on the overall color of the country after the election also tells a lot about the issues facing the country.  Every issue that the country is faced with, there are always conflicting viewpoints on how such issue should be solved. For instance, one side may want to protect the second amendment by any costs, whereas many others may believe abolishing the amendment wouldn’t have any harm. These conflicting views are what make up the government and the political society of the United States.  

Each election is a basis for how the citizens feel the government is being run and what change is needed.  However, as shown in the “Bad map we see every election” video, when the country is voting, the map isn’t necessarily the best basis.  A state such as South Dakota, that has a fairly big surface area on the map, does not mean anything to the election with its 3 electoral votes, especially compared to New York with the 29 votes it has.  Further, when looking at the map, it is covered in red, assuming that the “red states” are taking control, but when looking further into the issue, the democrats won the popular vote overwhelmingly. This further proves that even the process of being elected is conflicting, the republicans won, yet the democrats take the popular vote by over 2 million.  

Not only is the process of how the president is elected is conflictual, but the definition of each red and blue state individual is conflictual.  Brooks goes over the stereotypes of each state. Blue states being very educated, starbucks loving, rich people; and the red states being less educated, walmart loving, poor people.  Although this isn’t necessarily all true, the united states is very divided in the sense of social class, and traditionalists. Many people who live in the confederate states, or in the south feel as though the constitution should not be touched and the country is just fine, especially when it comes to protecting guns.  Whereas the blue states feel as though there is always room for improvement and the ability for citizens to gain more equality. This separation has a major conflict between the two separate parties, and as time goes on, it only gets worse. In this day and age, with technology, politics is becoming an increasingly bigger topic in society and culture, and it causes much conflict among people.  Between the facebook debates, the twitter wars, and old fashionshed debate at family parties, politics is becoming much more prevalent , and with people having a plethora of places to state their opinion, it makes all the issues all the more enhanced. That’s why with each election, whichever party takes the majority is a look into the issues that the country is facing, because the majority party is equal to the majority opinion.  Which is why this next election is the biggest in recent history, and is going to be extremely telling.