Seal of the United States Department of Education

The U.S. government is divided into 3 interrelated branches; each with some degree of power over the other 2 branches in a system of checks and balances designed to prevent abuse of power: the Executive branch, the Judicial Branch and the Legislative Branch.

The Executive branch consists of the President, the Vice President; the Secretary of State, the various Federal Executive Departments; also referred to as the Cabinet; NASA, the Postmaster General, the EPA, the CIA and a few others. The cabinet officials are appointed by the president with the guidance and consent of the senate; one of the two bodies of Congress; another branch of the U.S. government. Congressional consent of Presidential appointments is an example of the checks and balances in place purported to prevent abuse of power from any one branch. Aside from the president and vice president, the Executive is the non-elected division of government, appointed by the president and serving at the president’s pleasure. There are 15 State Departments, each headed by an official referred to as a Secretary: State, Treasury, Defense, Justice, Interior, Agriculture, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Energy, Education, Veteran’s Affairs and Homeland Security.

Insignia for the D.O.J.

In the United States, the Attorney General is the head of the United States Department of Justice and the chief lawyer for the country. They are responsible for all law enforcement and legal matters. The A.G. is a member of the president’s cabinet, appointed by the president and serves at the president’s pleasure. They, along with the Postmaster General are the only cabinet members not to have the title of Secretary.

The A.G. is 7th in line for the presidency should something happen to the Vice President, Speaker of the House, President of the Senate, Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, or the Secretary of Defense.

The U.S. Secretary of State is the highest ranking Cabinet official and is appointed by the President of the United States. Although the Executive Branch of the government is appointed and serves at the pleasure of the President, its members must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate; one of the two elected branches of congress. The S.O.S. is fourth in line for the presidency should anything happen to the President, the Vice President of the Speaker of the House of Representatives (the other elected branch of the U.S.Congress).

The Secretary of State oversees and advises the President on U.S. foreign policy; serving the role equivalent of Foreign Ministry. In addition, the S.O.S. oversees all diplomatic relations with other countries; with the exception of some military endeavors. The S.O.S is responsible for protocol functions for the White House. Protocol can best be described as a set of international courtesy rules.

The Secretary of State is also keeper of the Great Seal of the United States, a device used to authenticate documents coming from the White House and as such, the S.O.S. is responsible for drafting proclamations and replies.

In the West Wing, the Secretary of State was  Arnold Vinick played by Alan Alda.

The red, white and blue stripes are strictly defined as Dark Red (Pantone 193 C), White (Pantone safe), and Navy Blue (281 C).

The current version of the US flag was designed by an 18 year old high school student, who only received a “B-“ for his efforts. Robert Heft, took exception to this grade, and issued his teacher a challenge: if Heft’s design proposal was accepted by Congress, he would deserve and receive an “A”. Heft earned his “A”, and by presidential proclamation in 1958, his design was officially adopted as the nation’s flag.

The US flag is never to be “dipped” to any person or thing, except in the case of a naval ship signaling to a foreign country’s ship.

If harm should come to the flag, it must be disposed of in a dignified manner; namely by burning; which is the proper way of destroying a flag that is long in the tooth. The flag must not be allowed to touch the ground, but need not be disposed of if dropped by accident. If the flag is displayed at night, it must be illuminated.

The US flag must not be used on any item designed to be disposable. Darn; there goes my flag coffee cup.

6 US flags are currently stationed on the moon. Must be tough to have them illuminated there. They were put there by Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16 and 17. Other countries who have/had flags on the moon include, the Soviet Union, EU and India. India’s flag is the most recent, and to be fair, their flag was not so much planted, as it was mashed as it hurtled towards the moon in a fiery collision.

When folded properly, the US flag is shaped like a triangle with only the stars showing. If you have exacting standards, it usually takes 13 folds: the same number of original colonies.

The original flag had 13 red and white stripes with a Union Jack in the upper left corner. There was, for a brief time, a US flag with 15 stars and 15 stripes, made to welcome Kentucky and Vermont. The US government reverted to the 13 stripe model as the new version of the flag looked too cluttered. This 15 stars and stripes version, however, inspired Francis Scott Key to write “The Star Spangled Banner” in 1814.

The US flag bears a close likeness to the flag of Liberia; who is connected to the US through involvement in the slave trade; many slaves were taken from Liberia. For this reason, I would think Liberia would want to be as different as it could possibly be. The Liberian flag also has 13 stripes.

Communism is based on the principle of all members of a society being free and that state ownership of the means of production would ensure that all members of a society would be equally taken care of. Theoretically, there are no social or economic differences between members of society. Think of Communism as a sort of political Nirvana in which all members of a society lived equally in harmony without the need for government. It is important to view the rise of the ideal of Communism though the lens of the Industrial Revolution where workers en masse were exploited to the benefit of very few, rich, owners. The ideal of Communism was that workers unite and rebel against ownership so that they all would share ownership (and profits) equally. In practice, the original idea of Communism was twisted into a means of control over a population and the term Communism has become synonymous with oppressive dictatorships that only have one ruling party who strives to crush any opposition.

Communism isn’t the only ideology that in theory looked good, but was used to subjugate people. Look at how Christianity was used, especially in the Middle Ages as a way of controlling people. Often politicians and religious authorities were one in the same and obedient service to the ruling authority was a way of avoiding hell; “do as we say, or you will have an eternity of torture.” I would like to be clear here. I am not saying that Christians are oppressive totalitarians. I am speaking historically of events where it was used to subjugate and repress populations, for example the Inquisition. This abuse of power was what lead to the movement of separation of church and state.

If your employer sponsors you, it will take 3 steps and up to 2 years to finally get that Green Card. The first step is Labour Certification which will take around 3 months, then Immigrant Petition, which takes about 3 months and Adjustment of Status which takes up to one year. You can begin working after the first two steps are complete.

The next way to obtain a Green Card is by Diversity Immigrant Lottery Green Card (DV for short). Every year, the U.S. receives about 8 million of these applications. 50,000 people are chosen randomly by a computer generated program. If your application is chosen, you have one month to actually send in the Green Card Application. If you send in your application too soon or too late, then you are automatically disqualified. In addition, if you don’t follow the instructions to the letter when entering this lottery, you are automatically disqualified.

Lastly, you can marry a U.S. citizen and have them sponsor your application for a Green Card. Any member of your family that is a U.S. citizen can sponsor you, but your spouse will have many fewer hoops to jump through than any other member of the family. The INS will investigate to make sure that you don’t have a sham marriage just to get a Green Card. If they suspect, they will deny your application and leave you stuck in an unwanted marriage.

When Abraham Lincoln took office in 1860, he had campaigned against expanding slavery beyond the states in which it already existed and made it clear that he was looking to do away with it altogether. This ruffled the feathers of 7 southern states, whose economies were built upon the backs of slaves, and caused them to declare their secession from the U.S. After the first battle at Fort Sumter, 4 more Southern states declared secession. The government naturally didn’t back this decision and asked for men to volunteer as soldiers to prevent the secession from happening. Interestingly, the Vatican recognized the independence of the Confederacy; not surprising given their long history of vicious oppression to dissenters but I digress.

In 1862, Abraham Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclaimation, declaring all Confederate slaves that had escaped into the Union as free, even though the Union itself still had several states practicing slavery. When the Union won the war in 1865, nearly all of the slaves in the U.S. had been freed; close to 4 million.

The 11 Confederate States of America, led by Jefferson Davis included South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas (these were the original 7), Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee. Missouri, Maryland, West Virginia and Kentucky has secessionist movements. They wrote their own constitution by taking much of the existing constitution, adding slavery causes and giving individual states more autonomy.

Civil law is based on a system derived in the Roman Empire in the 6th century. Basically, it sets out a list of rules that must be followed that can only be changed by legislation of government. Judges do take into account decisions that have been made in the past, but they cannot change the law. Civil law is the most common system of law in the world. It is also known as European Continental Law. In summary, Common Law is based on rules set forth by judges and Civil Law is based on rules set forth by a governing body.

Here is the nitty gritty. The Democratic Party in the United States seeks to provide a national health care plan and to offer more government supported social programs to help the working man. They tend to be more tolerant of different religions and are less focussed on building the military. In general, they support a higher income tax in favor of universal health care, welfare and retirement protection. The Democratic Party is the oldest and largest party in the United States and was founded by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. Environmentalism has become an important focus for the Democrats.

The Republican Party was founded in 1854 and the first Republican president was Abraham Lincoln. The Republican Party in the United States supports a free market economy with less government intervention. They favor lower taxes and less social programs. The Republican Party in the United States is divided between fiscal republicans and social republicans. Fiscal Republicans favor less government intervention in personal finances and free enterprise. They believe that we have a right to decide what to do with our money and shouldn’t be tightly regulated. Most importantly, they believe in individual liberty with regards to life and personal property. Social Republicans in the United States believe more in old fashioned family values; religion features prominently in their lives. They are pro life and anti gay marriage.

There are a number of rules that govern each program, but one interesting distinction is that eligibility for Medicare is not dependent on income or assets, whereas eligabilty for Medicaid is dependent upon savings and assets, and in some cases, people are penalized if in order to qualify for Medicaid, they gave away money, or undersold assets. What I find concerning about Medicaid, is that payments made by Medicaid to a beneficiary can be recovered from the beneficiary’s estate after they die. So mom dies and she has been receiving Medicaid and she has a small sum of money from the sale of a home or other asset that she leaves to her children, but from it is deducted the cost of her care while she was sick. Talk about kicking a person when they are down!

I feel very fortunate to live in a country that has universal health care. The system has its problems to be sure, but at least, if I lose two fingers in some kind of freak accident, the hospital won’t force me to decide which one I want to keep and which one can be sacraficed because an HMO won’t pay for both.