Exploring Congress; How it Works

      According to vocativ.com, Marco Rubio is currently one of the worst congressmen. This is probably due to the fact that he currently has the most missed votes if any member of congress, which gave him an absentee rate of 8.30%. From October to December of 2015, Rubio missed around 75% of votes. However, when he does vote, his ideas tend to lean towards those of other Republicans and he also scores about 50% on the leadership scale. The Report Card of govtrack.us ranks Rubio as second highest among Senate Republicans in terms of working with with the house and third highest for bills sponsored. His report card also puts him in the highest 20% among Senate Republicans in leadership and bills introduced. He primarily supports bills in the areas of foreign affairs, taxation, health, crime and law enforcement, welfare and the finance sector.
      The bill that Rubio sponsored that interests me the most is the Second Amendment Enforcement Act of 2015, which has only a 5% chance of being enacted. The bill is 42 pages long and was read twice in front of the Department of Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The bill states that district government can not prohibit someone who is allowed to own guns from owning them barring the hunting of some wild animals and birds. It also makes it illegal for any authority to eliminate the private ownership or use of firearms for legitimate person. The bill also intends to amend the Firearm Regulation Control Act of 1975. to change the definition of a machine gun so that the repeal of semiautomatic weapons in D.C. ends and eliminate criminal penalties of unregistered firearms. The really strange thing about the bill that I found was that the first section was titled "Short title" and simply stated that the bill could be referred to as the Second Amendment Enforcement Act of 2015.



Links:
http://www.vocativ.com/usa/us-politics/congress-absenteeism/
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/s874/summary
http://pixel.nymag.com/imgs/fashion/daily/2016/01/05/05-rubio-boots.w245.h368.jpg

Socialism 2016?

After a speech on Thursday explaining his socialism ideas, Senator Bernie Sanders gained a positive impression for socialism. 56% of Democratic primary voters polled said that they had a positive feeling of socialism. At Georgetown, Sanders explained that the redistribution of wealth was at the heart of American social contract and even linked himself to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and Theodore Roosevelt. One interesting fact is that over half of Hillary Clinton's supporters also claimed that they approved socialism. 52% percent of Americans also agree with Sanders that America should place a higher tax on the rich and distribute that wealth back to the poor. It is also good to note that socialism is very highly rated with Americans under the age of 30.

Donald Trump's SNL appearance calls for equal time

After Trump's hosting of the late night show, many Republicans filed reports for equal time, and they will get just that. However, it won't be on SNL and won't even appear in a cameo on the show. John Kasich, Mike Huckabee, James Gilmore, and Lindsey Graham received their wishes and will appear in commercial and promotional air time on NBC, maybe during SNL.

Trump attack's Clinton's stamina

The Times reports that over the last few days Trump has been bashing the democratic presidential candidate by simply saying that she is too low energy to be president. If this sounds familiar, that's probably because it is. Trump used the same tactic with great results on Republican Jeb Bush. Trump later went on to say that Hillary is just not a strong enough person to be president.

Ben Carson says he saw Muslims celebrating on 9/11

After coming under fire for claiming that he saw Muslims in New Jersey celebrating 9/11, Donald Trump's presidential rival, Ben Carson too says that he saw Muslims celebrating on the horrific day. "I saw the film of it," Carson explained. Reports of this behavior are widely considered folk lore, as officials in the state of New Jersey deny it, but Ben Carson still claims to have seen the scenes on TV, but says not all Muslims are like that. The Times reports that Carson said he understands that people will respond inappropriately to anything and that that behavior was inappropriate.

Japanese Government

     Japan has a Constitutional Monarchy (parliamentary) system of government, much like Britain and Canada. Like America, however, the Japanese is divided into three branches, the judicial, legislative and executive. The Legislative branch of their government is known as the Diet. The Diet is composed of two houses, the House of Representatives and the House of Councilors. The executive branch is known as the cabinet. The cabinet consists of the Prime Minister, who is elected by the Diet and appointed by the Emperor, and no more than 17 Ministers of State, the the Prime Minister appoints. The Judicial branch is comprised of the courts. The Japanese government is unitary, which means this national government has a large amount of control over local governments.

     There are currently about 11 parties represented in Japan's Diet. The parties are: Liberal Democratic Party, Democratic Party, Innovation Party, Komeito, Communist Party, Party for Future Generations, People's Life Party, Social Democratic Party, The Assembly to Energize Japan, New Renaissance Party, and the Okinawa Socialist Masses Party. The major parties were the first five listed above. The Liberal Democratic Party is considered as the largest party and is, ironically, a conservative party. Most of the major parties are focused on Japanese Nationalism, conservatism, social liberalism, economic liberalism, and neoconservatism.





https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_political_parties_in_Japan
http://web-jpn.org/kidsweb/explore/government/index.html
http://japan.kantei.go.jp/constitution_and_government_of_japan/fundamental_e.html

Trump gains even more attention after SNL

After receiving 12 minutes and 53 seconds of airtime on SNL, it seems that Trump received a lot of conversation on social media platforms. The Times reports that there was 28 percent more engagement around Trump this past Sunday then there was following the Republican debate in Colorado. Trump also saw a huge uproar in twitter action on the night of his appearance, during a time of day that is generally quite about politics. In his own way, Trump claims that the performance doesn't matter because the Nielson rating is expected to be high.