The SetupGroucho Marx once said, “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it, misdiagnosing it and then misapplying the wrong remedies.” If only he knew how right he was… January 2025. There is a new president in the White House. 2024 was an exciting election for sure. Trump? Harris? Haley? All interesting. But not as interesting as the real surprise candidate. Who was this mysterious stranger? RFK Jr.? No. Elon Musk? Hardly. Arnold Schwarzenegger? Getting closer. Your new President of the United States is: Justin Bieber??? That is right. In a stunning move (and after a constitutional amendment for those who noted that Mr. Bieber is both Canadian and under 35 years of age), the country decided that if they were going to spend the next four years following someone’s every move, it might as well be an entertaining train wreck. Heaven help us all. Only one problem. Mr. Bieber, for all his wonderful qualities, knows nothing of American government and politics. Fortunately for him, he has picked the right person as his new domestic policy advisor: YOU! So get to work, and don’t mind the screaming fans.The Assignment Now that we have gotten that out of the way, it is time to get down to the assignment. As the newest advisor to the most politically inexperienced president in American history, you will need to call on all that you have learned in POS1041 to help Mr. Bieber. Specifically, President Bieber has asked for your help in passing a new law. The details of the law, as well as the details of President Bieber’s party affiliation (if any) are totally up to you. President Bieber wants to know about the kinds of difficulties that his proposal will face, and the things he needs to do to get it passed (GO BACK AND REREAD THE PREVIOUS BOLDED SENTENCE as that is the main part of the assignment). Specifically you should inform President Bieber of the following:1) The structure of our constitutional form of government (separation of powers, checks and balances, federalism – you should talk about all three of these and each should be its own paragraph).2) The role of specific actors within the formal branches of government (Congress, the bureaucracy, and the courts – you should discuss all three of these and each should be its own paragraph).3) The role of other institutions and actors (the media, political parties, and interest groups – you should talk about each of these and each should be its own paragraph). You’ll want to tie this all in with how a bill becomes a law. Your final exam should be in the 1200-2400 word range. That’s a pretty wide range. Is it possible to do well if you write less than 1200 words? Yes, but only if you’ve been gifted with the brevity of Hemmingway. This assignment is asking you to summarize everything you’ve learned this semester so if you’re completing it in 500 words then that means you didn’t learn a whole lot and it’ll make me sad. You probably don’t want me to be sad while grading. Can it be more than 2400 words? Sure, if you feel like it. You probably won’t feel like it, though. I also go into this more below, but you must work alone on this assignment. The point is to figure out what you’ve learned, not what someone else has learned, right? Citations/Plagiarism – Read this very, very, very carefully
The only resources you need for this assignment are the book and the stuff in the modules (videos/readings). THIS PART IS SUPER IMPORTANT. MAKE SURE TO USE IN-TEXT CITATIONS in your paper. What do I mean by in-text citation? It means that any time you reword someone’s ideas or information in your own words, or if you directly quote them, you let the reader know right there in the body of the paper where you got that information from. You can do this using footnotes or endnotes but the main way people do it these days is through paranthetical citations at the end of sentences like so. (Fuerstman, 2023). You will want to include specific page numbers from the book if you are referencing book material. I know for many of you this may be your first semester in college and so this process is a bit new to you. You should be aiming to have at least a couple of these in-text citations every paragraph. Even if the only source you use the whole time is the book, you should still be telling the reader regularly what pages you are getting information from, even if it feels repetitive to do. If you do not use in-text citations and only have a works cited page you will lose 10% on the assignment.
In-text citations are different from a Works Cited page – which you’ll also want to include at the end of the paper. I don’t particularly care what format your in-text citations and your Works Cited page are (MLA vs APA vs Chicago) just so long as (a) you stay consistent in the paper and (b) I can figure out how to find each source myself if I so choose. If all of this sounds very unfamiliar to you, I’d recommend checking out this page from Scribbr.Scribbr is also a great source for helping you format citations.
Remember that whenever you use someone’s idea, either in a direct quote or reworded yourself, you should use a citation. Using someone’s words or ideas without citation is plagiarism and doing so will lead to a minimum of a zero on the paper and quite possibly failure of the class.
Finally, and this bit is also very important, you are more than welcome to use any AI/LLM (such as ChatGPT, Bing, Claude, Bard, etc.) to help you write your paper. If you do, please know two things. First, in your Works Cited page you should include a short paragraph just telling me how you used AI. No need to lie or anything – it’s 100% okay to use it. Second, you need to independently verify and cite sources for any information provided to you by the AI. Remember, these models do not know things in the way that we use the term. They will absolutely make stuff up and state it confidently. If you use it to generate text that says “the U.S. Senate has 853 members and they only meet on Saturdays”, you’d better have a citation to a non-AI source for that right there in your paper (and not a citation to the AI itself since, again, it could be hallucinating).
Important Tips 1) President Bieber, for all of his reputation as a bit of a flake, will not be in the least impressed with general or vague suggestions. Or for that matter with suggestions that are not based on textbook, modules or class discussion material. What separates and A-paper from a B-paper from a C-paper? The level of details, specificity and thoroughness employed in your answer. Again, I can’t stress this enough, you do not need to do any outside research other than what we’ve already done in the class. You must work alone on this assignment. Evidence of working with another person may result in a lower grade, including the possibility of a 0 on the assignment. 2) I really can’t stress this enough but you should re-read the assignment again before writing. You’d be amazed how many people don’t do what the assignment asks them to do. Please don’t be that person! 3) Proper spelling and grammar is appreciated. If I have to puzzle through what you mean by each sentence then that’s not going to go well for either of us. 4) You can write this either as a formal essay or as a letter to the president – whichever feels more natural to you. Either is good. 5) This is your best opportunity to integrate all that you have learned this semester, which will help you remember it for the rest of your life. Too often we teach American government and politics as if each branch and actor operates independently of the rest. The truth is much more complex – and messier – than that. So dig in. Have fun. Good luck.
Rubric
Your grade will be based on the following:
Accuracy/Level of detail on the workings of the nine categories in the assignment (courts, interest groups, federalism, etc.): 50%Tying the above into how the president can get a bill passed:15%Details on how a bill becomes a law:15%Grammar/spelling10%Accuracy of in-text citations/works cited:10%Total100%
