Presidential Powers

The powers of the President have strayed very far from the original Constitution but I believe that they would still be comfortable with their current state of power.

With President Nixon and the Watergate Scandal, I believe that he did have to give up the tapes although everything said in the oval office is supposed to be secret because of the severity of the scenario. He told CREEP to break into the Democratic Headquarters and spy on them which is completely unethical and probably illegal. He did not have the right to do this or keep the tapes.

Another example is when Eisenhower brought the Military in to help the Little Rock Nine. This was a good example of the Executive Power because if Eisenhower did not use this power then schools might have never been desegregated. This was a key moment in American history and is shown by how many books and movies have been made on the subject and how much importance is put on it during history classes and the Founding Fathers would have been proud.

Lastly, George W Bush used the executive powers when it came to the war in Afghanistan. He used his executive power to kidnap people, use warrant-less wire taps, and use questionable interrogation tactics. He did all this to "Keep America safe." This seems like it has gone a little far from what the Founding Fathers would've wanted, but it was all important in keeping our country safe and therefore is normally helpful and successful.

In short, the Executive Power is exactly where it needs to be right now, there is no need for an increase or decrease in Executive Power and it has no strayed too far from the original content of the Constitution.

Congress and the Budget Proccess

After playing the simulation game I learned how hard it truly is to reach all of the goals of the union and lower the national debt. Every choice that progressed us as a nation just seemed to make the country more and more in debt. A congress member must truly think through every decision to make sure that it will not make the nation too far in debt and will help the nation in the long run enough so that the cost is worth the product.

One example is when I tried to make us self dependent on oil instead of relying on other countries to help us. This process cost us a fortune but in the long run I believed that it would help us as a nation and help our citizens and hopefully lower the gas prices for all.

In another example was when I tried to up the National Security. Everything I did seemed to have a negative effect tagged along with it which would cost America as a country a ton of money. If I wanted to seal up some of the borders, then we would not be able to import as much and then would not be able to export as much as well which would greatly hurt America which survives on.

In the final example, I tried to make America "Go Green." This was just an all around awful decision due to the fact that it just made someone angry no matter what the decision was but the decisions I did make seemed to cost about 1/4th the amount of the other decisions. When attempting to go green i wanted to increase funding for wildlife foundations which only costed $5 billion but that was less that we could use for  business and development.

In short, you can never truly win because it is completely impossible to make everybody happy at one time AND by lessening the national debt because decisions cost money and change costs money.

The Perfect Amount of Rights

As Americans, we are told that we have freedoms. These include the freedom of assembly, the freedom of press, and  privacy from unreasonable search and seizure. Many Americans claim that they do not have enough rights, while others claim the opposite, but there is no reason to complain when they truly have the correct amount of rights.

One example of this, is the right to the freedom of assembly. Groups of all kinds are able to assemble in public and hold meetings. These include the Westboro Baptist Church and the KKK, both which are widely disliked. The first amendment gives these groups along with the well liked groups and all in between. Some might ask why are the bad groups allowed to conjure together and meet in public? These groups are allowed to meet as long as they do not practice or directly discuss violence in public. Groups are allowed to meet but are not allowed to be violent which is the perfect equilibrium for groups every where.

Another example of the perfect amount of rights is also within the 1st amendment, the freedom of press. People have the freedom of speech but can exercise it in writing form. There are restrictions to this though, such as libel or slander. This is shown through the Supreme Court case Kuhlmeier vs Hazelwood where 2 articles written by students for a school newspaper were denied access into the paper because of their content. The articles were written about touchy subjects and the school did not want that publicity. They had the right to do this because it was an accredited class. This further pushes the argument that you do have freedom of the press but there is restrictions that can be taken when writing for certain things. This is the perfect amount of rights for this right and should not be changed.

Finally, Americans are protected from unreasonable searches and seizures. But if there is reasonable suspicion then certain people, such as school officials can search a student when a police officer would need reasonable suspicion to be able to search that same student. If a school official was told that a student had something illegal then that student could be searched but a police officer could not search that student unless something is seen. This is shown in the case TLO vs New Jersey, where a 14 year old student was found smoking in the bathroom which created reasonable suspicion to search for cigarettes, when searching for cigarettes they found rolling papers, this created reasonable suspicion to search for marijuana. The student was found guilty correctly and the school demonstrated that people have their rights but only up to a certain point. Once you create reasonable suspicion you lose some rights which is completely reasonable and shows that Americans have the perfect amount of rights currently.

In short, Americans have the perfect amount of rights and most of the rights have been changed or justified so far as they see fit and so that America can be as good as possible