I’ve made some slight additions and modifications to my syllabus this semester. The biggest addition was some more text about plagiarism and what is not acceptable. Would you believe that last year I actually had students who copied and pasted full paragraphs from Wikipedia and thought it was okay? Further, they left the footnotes and endnotes in the copied and pasted text! Yeah – go back and re-read that last sentence. I’m not joking about it either. It was pathetic. Naturally, I had to add some more text to that portion of the syllabus.

The other area that received more text in the syllabus was the fact that cell phones need to be turned off or to vibrate during the class. The new language talks about how all forms of electronic communication including texts, picture messages, IMs, and e-mails are not permitted to be sent during the class session. It’s really the texting that can get under an instructor’s skin, so if you’re a student and you do that stuff – cut it out!

I’m looking forward to a great semester, but if anything crazy happens you’ll know about it!

For me, though, I like this time of the year because I get to prepare my course that I teach at the local college. Since it is an “American National Government” course, I always have new information to put into my PowerPoints and new documents to make copies of for handouts. And, given the age group of the students that I’m teaching, I always get a lively discussion no matter what the topic. New topics for extended discussion this semester will include healthcare and paternalistic governments versus those governments that take a more hands-off approach.

I also enjoy getting a reading from the students on where they fall along the political spectrum. The reason why I enjoy this is because most of them consider themselves to be liberal, but once we start talking about an issue they advocate for traditionally conservative positions – a clear example that many of our young minds today are focused on doing what everyone else is doing…or what the loudest voice is doing. From the last couple of years teaching this course, I’ve discovered that most of the vocal students lean left, but that the best written papers are from those who lean right. Pretty odd occurrence, I think.

This semester I’ll also be teaching an online course for one of the oldest online colleges in the nation – Thomas Edison State College. TESC pioneered the idea of having older folks receive their Bachelor’s Degree via submitting a portfolio of their professional experience and receiving credit for it instead of actually having to go to class. Plus, they were the first online-only college (and they’re highly regarded, too).

The class that I’m teaching at TESC is an undergraduate course in nonprofit leadership. I’m looking forward to that one since it ties in directly with my own academic research as well as my day job. Should be a lot of fun coming up in the next few weeks!

Halloween was yesterday, but this is a frightening proposition.

Now settle down my little extremist minded readers. I am not suggesting that this is scary because the majority of our government will be Democrats. Rather it is scary because one party will have complete control of the American government (the Supreme Court ideologies do not count). That’s not right. Of course, the Republicans have had this coming to them for a while now. The Republicans took over the American government and did not bring the change that the people wanted. It’s funny, though, how in the wake of President Bush’s second term the nation forgets about the Democratic scandals of the last two decades. It’s even funnier that this country is dominated by a vicious, disgustingly biased media. But I digress…

What will the Republicans do if they fail as miserably this coming Tuesday? Frankly, it’s time for the GOP to go back to the drawing board. They had their opportunity to make a difference in American government and they failed. I see two paths for the Republicans in the wake of a pending disaster on Election Day.

First, they can choose to take up a truly moderate position on all of the major issues. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has a think tank called American Solutions. This group has taken a variety of polls showing how 80% – 90% of Americans agree on certain issues. For example, polls show that 87% of Americans support English as the official language of the United States. Another example – 81% support greater use of domestic energy sources to fuel America’s future. Great.

The Republicans can choose to be the champions of these bipartisan issues and use this stance to win back some of the good graces of the American public.

The second direction the party can go from here is highly unlikely, but still a possibility. In short, the party can break up into various factions. Let’s face it, John McCain is not the same Republican as is George W. Bush; just as Elizabeth Dole is not the same type of Republican as Arnold Schwarzenegger; just as Christine Todd Whitman is certainly a different type of Republican than John Ashcroft. The fact is that there are too many different “types” of Republicans and this is a bad thing. Why is it a bad thing? Look at the current election cycle. There will be Republicans who lose Senate or House seats because there is an “R” after their name on the ballot. Sure, they may disagree with all of the policies of the current administration, but they’re about to get punished anyway.

Why not have a Conservative Republican party? Why not a Constitutional Republican party or a Traditional Republican party? Trust me, I understand why the power structures at the top of the Republican party would never allow this to happen (ca-ching!), but it might be time for the candidates (present and future) to take this party into their own hands. If you’re running as a Republican in San Francisco, guess what? You lose. But what if you ran as a candidate in a Liberal Republican party? What if you could disassociate with the stigmas and stereotypes of a nationwide organization?

With all of this being said, I have to say that I believe if Obama wins the election it will be very hard for him to win re-election. My reasoning is exactly the same as above. If the Democrats win the big majorities in the Congress, then it doesn’t matter who sits in the White House because the Senate Majority leader will rule the legislative agenda of the country. I believe that this country will experience a major shift to the left in the coming years and it might be too big of a swing for many to take. Obama needs to watch out for that if he’s sitting in the White House…but first he has to win the election.

Yet when Congress first confronted the issue early in the week and decided to do nothing, the vote told us that beyond Washington many Americans just didn’t see it that way.

The president, Democratic leaders, the two presidential candidates all called for immediate action. Yet some members of Congress told me their phone calls and e-mails were running 90-to-1 against the rescue plan.

Get it? Americans did NOT WANT this bailout plan! Everyday Americans did NOT NEED this bailout plan! People working for greedy organizations on Wall Street wanted the bailout and because money talks while (apparently) everyday Americans walk, they got what they wanted. It’s bull.

Americans need to take action on this disgusting bailout immediately.

This means that you, as a taxpaying citizen, need to demand the best from your legislators. They just took $700 billion of YOUR dollars to give to gigantic, multibillion dollar banks. Hold them accountable. If you’re so disgusted with the bailout bill then vote against anyone in your district who voted for it. Send a message. If you don’t want to go that route, then stay in touch with your elected leaders and make sure that they are exerting the proper amount of oversight and that they overseeing the funds in a way that YOU want them overseen.

Americans need to become re-engaged with their government. This is definitely the election year to do so. This bailout bill was unnecessary – greedy people had what they had coming to them and the government bailed them out. Where’s the bailout for student loans? Where’s the bailout for the Americans who CAN make their mortgage payments, but just barely? Why would ANYONE continue to make mortgage payments now that they know the government is there to pick up their slack?

Disgusting.

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