Category: Political science

Why is our Constitution vague? What are the pros and cons of having a constitution that is written vaguely? Pick a “vague’ portion of the US Constitution. Has this vagueness in terminology been problematic or helpful? Provide historical examples. Use evidence (cite sources) to support your response from assigned readings or online lessons, and at least one outside scholarly source.

Essay Number 1:

Write a paper that addresses the rise of Vietnamese Nationalism that creates the Viet Minh. How does the rise of Ho Chi Minh collide with the rise of the Cold War, the last gasps of French Colonialism, and military conflict in the 1940s and 50s to to create the American presence in Vietnam? Why does the US continue down the path to war in the 1950s? How are the ideas of American presidents consistent or different from Truman to Kennedy? What does Vietnamese nationalism mean to them? Use ALL of these questions to trace the development of the French-Indochina war into the rise of American support of South Vietnam. Use a thesis (a statement of argument) early in the paper (language like, “This paper argues…”) to help organize your paper.

Essay Number 2: Write a paper that addresses the escalation of the conflict between the two Vietnams and the increasing American presence in the conflict. How did the US go from advisors to direct combatants? How did that shift result in a war that wasn’t won in the mid 1960s? Given LBJ’s hesitation to commit, followed by a graduated commitment strategy to finally large troop deployments, what happened to create these changes? And why didn’t the commitment work? How did the failure of the warfighting strategy finally explode in the perceptions and misperceptions of success and failure in and around the Tet Offensive? What was different for US military commanders, politicians, and citizens by Winter/Spring of 1968?

Cite the readings in each essay. Use a very simple parenthetical citation method: (Karnow, pp. 45-46) or (Johnson, p. 6) within the paper, no footnotes needed. Use a very brief works cited page at the end of the total submission. Try to avoid LONG quotes, but brief quotes are allowed.
papers should be between 3 and 5 pages. Three and a half to four pages seems perfect.

Readings:
Andrew Rotter: The Light at the End of the Tunnel
Stanley Karnow: Vietnam, A  History (1997 edition) Textbook

Midterm Essay Instructions
In this country, we do not have a pure, direct democracy. However, we do have a government whose powers are divided among branches (executive, judicial, legislative), and levels (local, state, national) in order to limit government’s overall power and to grant more power to the individual citizens.
In a fact-based (not opinion based) essay, answer all of the bullet-point prompts below. Use your textbook and the online class videos. Do NOT use Google search to find the answers, as this assignment is intended to help me gauge part of what you have learned from this class. Write the paper in your own words. Copying any amount of text directly from the internet to answer this question will cause you to fail this essay.* (Also see the note at the bottom of this page.)
You also should not use long direct quotes (even from the textbook) because paraphrasing (using your own words) allows me to see whether or not you understand what you have read. There is no minimum word limit, but the essay prompt points should all be thoroughly answered. A-level papers in the past have mostly managed to answer in roughly 1000-1200 words. You should at least answer all of the items in the essay prompt, and are encouraged to add additional relevant information. Also see accompanying How your paper will be graded document.
Papers should be typed in 12-point Times-Roman font or 11-point Arial font, and should be double-spaced to allow room for my comments.
As this is a Level One (lower-division) course, you will not be graded for minor grammar or sentence construction errors, but if errors are great enough to diminish the overall readability of your paper, that problem will hurt your grade. Papers must be written with acceptable college-level style, accuracy and grammar.
Essay Prompt
In several paragraphs:
Explain why the founding fathers found it necessary to compromise and at least one way in which they did so. In order to correctly answer this point of the prompt, you will need to tell me points of two opposing sides of some issue that they faced, and then explain what ideas the resolution compromise included.
Explain (1) our system of checks and balances and (2) the separation of powers and, briefly, how each of these work. Note that these are two different, though related, thingsandsoeach shouldbeexplainedandseparatelydefined.
Tell me something about each branch of the federal government. For example, what are the powers of the presidency (and the other branches)? How is the
presidentspowerlimited? Whataboutthepoweroftheothertwobranches?
How is each limited by the other branches? How long are their terms in office? What is federalism? How does it relate to the separation of powers concept?
Paper must be submitted to the Assignment Upload button on BlackBoard, by due date and time.
* Note: Copying two or more sentences from the internet without citing the source will cause you to fail the entire class, as this is plagiarism. However, if you answer the question according to my instructions, you will not be citing sources from the internet because you will not be using such sources. If you use direct quotes, you only need to (a) put the entire quote within quotation marks, and (b) mention whether your information came from your textbook or the online class videos (and which ones). Do not use long quotes (more than one sentence). It is always better to paraphrase (restate in your own words). Paraphrased ideas that you obtained from your textbook or online class videos do not need to cite sources, as I will presume that you got the information from these sources, so long as you do not copy text from the internet or elsewhere.

Explain the relationship between a Sergeants Majors role in establishing and sustaining a positive and ethical climate and the role of leadership in the exercise of moral courage (think about your responsibility to establish a positive ethical climate and how this impacts moral courage).

Reflect upon the below questions before you begin:

-How does a Sergeant Major help to sustain and maintain an ethical command climate in war? The response should discuss how the Sergeant Major would assess and develop the climate and ensure that the organizational conduct, policy, and norms are aligned with stated values.
-What is the Sergeant Majors role in fostering an environment where moral courage is displayed? -Your response should discuss the relationship between physical and moral courage and how power affects the demonstration of moral courage.

Assignment Instructions: Write a 400-word substantive entry responding to the prompts above. Use at least two references from the attached documents.