choose 1 of the interest groups noted in the chapter, and 1 interest group related to your college major/career

ASSIGNMENT 2

Special Interest Groups, Political Parties, The  Media

Word process, MS Word, double spaced.

Approximately 1 page.

1. Interest Groups – choose 1 of the interest groups noted in the chapter, and 1 interest group related to your college major/career.  Research the groups on the internet reading the groups’ official web sites.  What is the group’s purpose?  Where and how do they get money? What kind of activities do they engage in?   NEXT access the web site opensecrets.org. This is a nonpartisan organization that consolidates information  on political spending by individuals , PACS and other sources.  The information is gathered from public and required reporting by these groups as well as elected officials and candidates.  Find your group and determine how much money it spent on political activity  including to which candidates or elected officials and political parties.

Approximately 1 page for EACH party’s platform

You can list or bullet each issue with a couple of summary sentences.

2. Political Parties – research the Democrats and Republicans through each party’s official web site. What is the current party platform?  A party platform is the official position of the party on the current major issues. For example the Democrats are “Pro Choice” and the Republicans “Pro Life”.  You will find each party’s brief summary of their platform at a link “Issues” on the bottom of the home screen. The full official platforms in PDF are also on the sites but you are not required to read these very lengthy documents.

• Do read ALL information under the party’s ISSUES link.  Then briefly list the party’s position on each of those issues, but not in general words like “better education” note how the party intends to achieve that from the information.

• What other kind of activities is the party involved in?

• What other information is on the web site?

Democrat National Committee Democrats.org

Republican National Committee GOP.com

(The Republican Party is also called the Grand Old Party – GOP)