Five Point Lede.info

There was a time long ago in American history when the two well known political parties within the United States were actually one; the Democratic-Republican Party. As anyone can see, time has diverged the two parties upon very different paths.  Today, a large and clear rift – at least culturally speaking – has grown between the two modern-day factions of the US political machine.  In order to explore and understand the differences between the parties and the roles that they play with regard to government, (America’s “two-party-system,” is a representative system, intended to serve the idea of Democracy )  first, a clear understanding of the purpose of a political party must be had.

The parties are organizations with the purpose of representing ideas within the American government.  The ideas they represent, are the ideas (or in this case, beliefs) that members of the party feel are best for our government to operate upon.  For example, the Republican party (one of the two major US parties) consists mostly of people who have a “conservative” political ideology (or “philosophy,” rather). It is a basic philosophy of how government should operate – its overall size, basic responsibilties, and the services that it ought to provide to the country’s inhabitant citizens. Hence “political ideology” – or “ideas of policy”).

You may have heard the word “conservative” used in a different context, perhaps? “We must conserve our electricity, in order to save money on the bills!” – In this context, a conservative is someone who basically uses as little as possible, so as to prevent needless wasting, and save money.  This helps to understand the conservative philosophy; it is based on the belief that the government should be limited in its size and duties, so as not to waste money and resources. I am generally speaking, of course, as this is a broad generalization of the diverse and varied beliefs held within the Republican party alone. Diversity of beliefs is present within both parties, whom may have members that possess a wide range of different ideas, yet tend to agree on certain fundamental principles with regard on how government should be used. People with a conservative ideology most often are represented by the Republican Party within government, however it certainly is possible to be a conservative Democrat, or a liberal Republican!

The liberal philosophy is one based upon the central belief that the government provides essential and necessary services to its people, therefore it should be of formidable size and influence, so that it can continue to make a positive impact within the lives of its citizens. Because they see a need for government, they feel justified pushing for a larger one. This often means calling for more taxes to provide services such as medicare for the sick, or food stamps for the poor.  See?  Increase the size, in order to increase the role (more sevices and help)!  On the other hand, a Republican may push for less taxes, which means that the citizens will, have to pay less of their money to the government. Great, eh? Who wants to give their money to the government? This is why the Republicans push the message of cutting taxes – because it is a popular one!

But wait – is it really that simple? After all – if people pay less taxes, the government has less funding to provide popular and necessary services to the public. Programs such as Social Security (that provide retirement funding for people who are retired and therefore no longer working and bringing in an income) are funded with taxpayer money! This is where the Democrat’s own popular message comes in. You see, cutting taxes is very appealing to people – that is until some of the people realize that also may mean cutting or losing programs or parts of programs!  Whether or not this affects your situation personally, or whether or not you believe the government should be bigger or smaller, may affect whether you are a Democrat or Republican and vote accordingly.

Hopefully this gives you a general sense of the platform the two parties campaign (in election season) upon, and the differences between them! Keep learning, because knowledge is power, and you certainly can learn a lot simply from watching the two parties debate! Hopefully, as you are involved, you feel moved to be active and participate to make our nation and world a better and stronger place.

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