Hi all, Senior in HS and trying to understand

[presonorek]

Graduating this up-coming year (yay!) and want to try and understand this thing we call our government...
Here to learn!

Not the best place to learn about government. School is the best place to learn how it works, the branches, the separation of powers, gerrymandering, etc.

You come here to read opinion, not fact.

School is the worst place to learn anything because all the teach is left wing nonsense.

Yep. Just skip school and you will be much better off in life.

 

[MisterBeale]

As you can see 18 and life, this isn't the place to look for fact. Unless you can weed through the derps who think opening a book is tantamount egging Jesus' house.

What books would you recommend to someone for understanding how government works?

You're asking the wrong poster. Ike is a devout Communist who has no clue how our government works and is sorely in need of such books himself.

There is no single book that adequately explains everything in all it's nuance. For a basic primer, Syl Sobel's books are a pretty good place to start if you are a young person wanting to learn the basics. If you are more advanced or need something with a little more depth, my recommendation is Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville. It was written in the 1830's by a Frenchman but is still surprisingly relevant today.

Probably the very best resource for discovering how our founders intended our government to work is not a book at all.... it's the Federalist Papers. I mentioned this in my first post. Anyone who wants to fully understand what the framers meant by the words written in the Constitution, should read the Federalist Papers.

Those might be a good start about how things got started, however, they don't really explain the reality, not one bit, of what is going on today.

They are idealistic tracts which should inform citizens about the ideal, but in no way have any bearing on reality.

Well, if you want reality.... Read any of Mark Levin's books. I recommend Ameritopia, Plunder and Deceit and Liberty and Tyranny. You will find them to be full of factual information and historical events you probably never knew about.

Now, I will take exception to your comment that the Federalist Papers are "idealistic tracts" ...because they certainly are nothing of the sort. The FP are a series of essays from the framers on the specifics surrounding everything in our Constitution. Why it is there and why it is important. It's really like the User's Guide to the Constitution.

A lot of young people today think that the SCOTUS exists to "interpret" the Constitution. That is false. The SCOTUS exists simply to rule on the Constitution which is interpreted through the writings in the Federalist Papers. Everything in the Constitution is addressed in full detail with complete explanations in no ambiguous terms as to what it meant. So this silly notion that SCOTUS is supposed to "read the tea leaves" and determine what was meant is foolish and ignorant of actual historic fact.

This is the single biggest problem we have with regard to education on government in America today and as ChrisL said, schools should spend MUCH more time on this. I will admit, it's difficult to read the Federalist Papers because it's written in Old English and it takes a bit of patience and becomes cumbersome and monotonous sometimes, trying to decipher what is being said. Still, it is our best resource for the meaning and intent of every single detail found in the Constitution.

It's idealist insofar as none of it is applicable today, or rather, that it isn't being applied today.

I won't disagree with you that IT SHOULD BE.

Yes, I agree with you, young people think the SCOTUS exists to interpret the Constitution. But why?

The reason they do, is because there are two schools of thought, strict constructionists, and judicial activists. Judicial activism seems to be the philosophical rule of the day.

As far as Mark Levin goes? He might be fun for partisans to read, or if you want a political hack to confirm your political bias, but he's not going to tell you how the elites really run the system, nor how they think.

 

[Boss]

As far as Mark Levin goes? He might be fun for partisans to read, or if you want a political hack to confirm your political bias, but he's not going to tell you how the elites really run the system, nor how they think.

I disagree. I think the man has a remarkably brilliant understanding of history and he lays out the case very well in the books I mentioned. If you haven't read them, don't cast judgement. It's not just ideological pablum to confirm political bias, it's documented facts of history. He goes into quite a bit of extensive detail on the elites in Plunder and Deceit in particular.

People on the Left call him a "hack" because he speaks out against their Socialist agenda... that doesn't make him a hack just because they claim it. I mean... wtf? Is everything a Liberal spews the fucking gospel truth now? If you're honestly THAT brainwashed, there's no help for you anymore.

 

[there4eyeM]

Graduating this up-coming year (yay!) and want to try and understand this thing we call our government...
Here to learn!

Not the best place to learn about government. School is the best place to learn how it works, the branches, the separation of powers, gerrymandering, etc.

You come here to read opinion, not fact.

School is the worst place to learn anything because all the teach is left wing nonsense.

Yep. Just skip school and you will be much better off in life.

"Brown shoes don't make it..."

 

[Muhammed]

Graduating this up-coming year (yay!) and want to try and understand this thing we call our government...
Here to learn!

I'm a senior also, and still trying to figure out our govt.

It might be easier to figure out things if you were not perma-buzzed.

Nothing personal, just an observation.