Andrea Joyce
Government
23 October 2017
Political Polarization vs Party De-alignment
Two trends that occur in our government today are party de-alignment and political polarization. These two trends are basically opposites of each other, meaning different things, but can also coexist with each other. In American politics, political polarization is more common today, as it has been proved to be happening more recently due to many factors.
Party dealignment is defined as erosion of party loyalties in an electorate, referring to the decrease in the percentage of American adults that identify either as Democrats or Republicans, and the corresponding increase in the percentage that identify as independents. On the other hand, political polarization …show more content…
By “polarizing president” it basically means they were hated by the other political party. Barack Obama was disliked by the Republican party after he was elected because he did not work with Congress, and he liked to govern by executive order. Republicans also strongly opposed Obamacare, as they did not like the idea of spending their tax money on people who were working, and on people who were poor. But, they also had to admit that Obama was responsible for a successful program available to people. Obama wanted to help and support people who needed it, but the Republicans did not want to do that. In the sixth year of his time in office, 79% of Democrats and 9% of Republicans approved of his job he was doing. During his fourth year, the most polarized year he had, the Democratic approval was 86%, and the Republican approval was at an average of 10%. When Obama ran for president a second time, political polarization was getting higher again. Many citizens decided to split ticket vote if they did not think he was doing well as president, but Obama still won the election with 65,899,660 popular votes and 332 electoral college votes. There were also two less states that he won than in his first election. After Obama served two terms, some people felt that they had to “repair” and get rid of what Obama had accomplished. Hence, a Republican candidate was elected by the people, promising to “Make America Great Again”! This is a prime example of political polarization, as the parties pretty much are just going towards each other, and trying to make America how they want it, with no exceptions. To conclude, political polarization is continuing to become more popular as different candidates of both parties are nominated to be president. It is with a lot of topics and issues that people from opposite parties disagree, but it is certain that they will know which party
Government
23 October 2017
Political Polarization vs Party De-alignment
Two trends that occur in our government today are party de-alignment and political polarization. These two trends are basically opposites of each other, meaning different things, but can also coexist with each other. In American politics, political polarization is more common today, as it has been proved to be happening more recently due to many factors.
Party dealignment is defined as erosion of party loyalties in an electorate, referring to the decrease in the percentage of American adults that identify either as Democrats or Republicans, and the corresponding increase in the percentage that identify as independents. On the other hand, political polarization …show more content…
By “polarizing president” it basically means they were hated by the other political party. Barack Obama was disliked by the Republican party after he was elected because he did not work with Congress, and he liked to govern by executive order. Republicans also strongly opposed Obamacare, as they did not like the idea of spending their tax money on people who were working, and on people who were poor. But, they also had to admit that Obama was responsible for a successful program available to people. Obama wanted to help and support people who needed it, but the Republicans did not want to do that. In the sixth year of his time in office, 79% of Democrats and 9% of Republicans approved of his job he was doing. During his fourth year, the most polarized year he had, the Democratic approval was 86%, and the Republican approval was at an average of 10%. When Obama ran for president a second time, political polarization was getting higher again. Many citizens decided to split ticket vote if they did not think he was doing well as president, but Obama still won the election with 65,899,660 popular votes and 332 electoral college votes. There were also two less states that he won than in his first election. After Obama served two terms, some people felt that they had to “repair” and get rid of what Obama had accomplished. Hence, a Republican candidate was elected by the people, promising to “Make America Great Again”! This is a prime example of political polarization, as the parties pretty much are just going towards each other, and trying to make America how they want it, with no exceptions. To conclude, political polarization is continuing to become more popular as different candidates of both parties are nominated to be president. It is with a lot of topics and issues that people from opposite parties disagree, but it is certain that they will know which party