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Okay, no matter what anything can be argued you just have to find out everything you know on that issue. Lets say you are a lawyer defending someone completely guilty is there a way to prove that person innocent? Why of course there is because there is always an argument. You can always find something on the other side of an issue. By defending a side you have to completely dig deep an use the other persons words and that it farther twist the words around. Because anything someone says can definitely be argued. You have to look at everything if your are going to argue something. Staying on one side means you cannot have a doubt in your mind you need to make yourself believe that what your saying is the truth if its not because if you can convince yourself knowing its not true you can definitily convince a lot of other people.

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The issue I am going to support is gay marriage no one should be told who they can and cannot be married to now that comes to an extinct but gay marriage should definitely not be a problem in any states. If gay marriage is legal in many states why not in all? We are always told to not discriminate against gays but not allowing them to get married is most definitely discrimination if two people are in-love why is that the governments problem? There is no difference in a Man and a Women and a Man and a Man besides the fact on having children but there is always adoption there should be no arguments on this why people who like different people discriminated against? We also have a Gay pride day to support who ever has those feelings but why do they even let people celebrate it if they don't accept it?

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We have two main parties and they have to compromise and come to consensus to make public policy. If something in the government is not compromised to be passed/ amended then it is not going to happen this is because an amendment would have to be passed through many different parts of the government and every singe person would have to compromise with the others or at least come to consensus for that one amendment to be passed.

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Supported evidence is going to be a lot better then just a belief system this is a proven fact because suppose you were scheduled a court date and you wanted to prove you were innocent over something as serious as murder well if your accused of that you are going to need some hard core evidence for the courts to believe you are innocent. Such as coming in there with messages, pictures, letters, etc. anything that is able to prove your innocence but think about if you came in the court room with just a simple statement "I'm innocent" how would that help you at all? It would not because there is nothing proven that you are innocent. Another example would be on a test in Chemistry so your told to write a summery statement on this answer and it's worth 8 points are you just going to write a sentence? No your going to provide examples and pictures to recieve your full credit.

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Public opinion plays a big role in government decisions such as voting, campaigns, etc. Public opinion is important that's why we have interest groups, political parties, etc. The government has to hear what the people have to say so if something is constantly being argued by the public that is going to cause the government to get involved. So we for the most part help the government with its decisions because if it wasn't for the public there wouldn't be decisions to make. The government is here to make our country's better so they need are opinion on what is best. For ex. in your class(Mr. Halterman) if things aren't going as well as they should you will come and talk to us as a class you want the majority's opinion to know what is best for the class and at the end of the day YOUR decision is going to be what happens to the class but you got that decision based on our opinions.

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The media has a big impact on swaying public opinion I mean most of the information we know or here about is through the media. Ads, commercials, news reports, etc. the media is good at getting you to believe what they want you to believe which means shaping public opinion. Even though media has an impact many other things do to almost anything can shape public opinion on things. The public is very gullible!!

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Public records, meaning the record is public so anybody can see it. People can find out about your past; what you've done before. For a lot of reasons I think public records are for the safety of people. For example my mom gets these mail cards about sex offenders if they are located in our area just to be safe so we are a where of this, that information could also be found online because that persons record would be public.

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The media can encourage civic participation in many ways but in one certain way I would say for voting on Presidential elections before the elections there will be so much news on the presidents running against each other constantly you will here about the election. The runners will say and do anything to get your attention, so you will want to vote for them and all of that is going to be processed and shown through the media. This then encourages people to vote because of all the publicity. Without the media nothing would really be known. The media can also discourage civic participation because the media shows and tells all public information so unless your doing research on it your only going to know and believe what the media says and that's how it is a lot of people just see the medias point of view and sometimes that can be a bad thing.

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Media plays a big role in shaping public opinion this is because a lot of information that we find out is through the media we don't know if its true or not we just expect it to be. Media can encourage a lot of things making it look or seem better/worse then it is. For example the media plays trailers of movies all the time on television making the movie usually look a lot better then it is so more people will come to see it, Another example is the commercials on fast food they make the food look so well prepared but when you actually get the food it looks nothing like it did in the picture or the commercial. The media for the most part stretches the truth and for the most part getting us to believe what they are saying.

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Different ways people can affect government actions are for one you can be involved with political parties which represents broad point of view that present people with alternative approaches to how the government should be run. Another way is Campaigns and elections people get to speak out and be reminded how powerful they are these campaigns and elections cause a lot of attention your voice will be heard. There are also Interest groups which they influence the government to support the peoples point of view. Then of course there is also the media most people find out all of the important information or the "crazy things" that go on in the world through television because of the media.

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Both are organized groups of people working toward specific goals in the government and both promote politicians and raise money to accomplish those goals. Despite their similarity, however, political parties and interest groups are different organizations that serve different purposes within a country's political system. Both of these groups play very important roles in the government. Political parties are actually a lot larger then the interest groups, they have different basis of organization and more similarities would be both are involved in the process of politics and both are organized groups

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An interest group is an organization whose members share common concerns, and try to influence government policies that impact those concerns. Interest groups are very important in the Government because citizens in the United States make their ideas, needs and views known to elected officials. Citizens can usually find an interest group that focuses on their concerns, no matter how specialized they may be.

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The comparison of the major and minor parties would be there party formation(how they are set up), there filling of party rules, they have the same ballot access, and similar nominating procedures. The systems compare by the way they are set up.

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A lot of the political party systems are similar. They compare because some countries also have a two party system like the United States. The political party system can be broken down into three broad categories: two-party, multiparty and single-party which shows that the systems are different but they have comparisons. Some other countries are federal systems, some also have written constitutions like us there are many comparisons but no two are exactly the same.

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Political parties play a role in politics because the parties conduct elections, help organize the government and help voters understand where candidates stand on issues. They also select candidates for many elected positions. Political parties play an important role in the government. But political parties are not the government itself and the constitution makes no mention of them; most people do not know that they play an important role in the government.

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The public policy process for some means that there voice will be heard they think their opinion matters(which it does). But some feel that it's not up to them they don't think there able to change anything and their opinion doesn't matter. The public policy allows people to get involved people can speak up and believe what they want to believe. Some want things to change in the government so they speak up and others don't really care on the fact to participate so they don't. We need more of the public involved.

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The Electoral College definitely discourages citizen participation in presidential elections because in the electoral college The President and Vice President isn't just determined by the voters instead they are elected by "electors" who are chosen by popular vote on a state-by-state basis which pretty much makes voters think that there vote doesn't matter and that it's not going to make a difference in the election so a lot of people are not voting. For a presidential election on a good day we only get about half of the people.

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People can participate in politics in many different ways. They can write their Representative or Senator, or work in for a candidate or political party. They can make presentations to their local school board or city council, or some citizens gather in groups to show that they support or don't support a particular idea or agenda, hoping that they will influence the political process. Partly because of our federalist system, people have many opportunities to participate in our democracy on federal, state, and local levels. Some forms of participation are more common than others and some citizens participate more than others, but almost everyone has a voice in government.

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Civic Participation and Skills