The following is a video of a debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in 2016, where they talk about one of the bigger topics of today’s political culture in America.
Throughout this video, you can see that Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both want to stop illegal immigrants from coming into the country, but they both have different ways of doing it. Donald Trump has seen individuals who have been killed by illegal immigrants, as well as people who have had their lives destroyed by the heroin that has been exposed to them through drug lords that have entered the United States illegally. Because of this, he wants to deport all illegal immigrants out of the country, and for immigrants to only enter the country, if they have been legally admitted through the proper channels. Hillary Clinton, however, believes that the illegal immigrants should only be deported from the United States, if they are violent. She believes that the United States is a nation of immigrants and a nation of laws. She believes that all of the good, illegal immigrants should state that they are illegal immigrants, and that they should not be deported, because she does not want the illegal immigrants to be separated from their children that are citizens. The reason she believes that the illegal immigrants should state that they are illegal immigrants, is because she does not want them to be underpaid by their employers, and therefore taking away from the jobs that the American citizens should have.
This video is a good representation of American political culture, because it is something that most everyone in the United States wants. The issue of immigrants is part of our political culture, because everyone for the most part, does not want criminals, and people with bad intentions to be let into America. There are ideological beliefs, though, which is why people want different things to happen to the immigrants. Donald Trump, as well as a big portion of the United States, wants for all illegal immigrants to be deported out of the country. Hillary Clinton, though, as well as a large portion of the United States, wants all of the illegal immigrants, except for the violent ones, to be able to stay in the country.
- If open borders are fine, then why is it okay for every other country to have their borders closed?
- If closed borders are fine, then why is it okay to separate families?
- Why should people be punished/not punished for traveling into the country illegally?
- Why should criminals be given/not be given a second chance at a new life?
- Why should people not be deported from the country, just because they have a child who was born as an American citizen?
I personally thought that the assignment seemed a little weird at first, but I think that it ended up being a pretty good assignment, because you had to find a video of an argument that had a topic that had to do with a political culture of today, where the majority of the citizens want similar things. I thought that it was a nice exercise, having to come up with good questions about the video. I personally think that this assignment should be used for future classes.
I enjoyed your blog; you did a good job showing both sides of this sensitive topic in a neutral tone. I wish becoming a legal American citizen was not so timely and challenging. I believe this is a significant reason why so many immigrants enter the country illegally.
This is an excellent post, as it revolves around a non-self explanatory video and the accompanying write-up is also great. The video and writing present an important topic in American political culture, and presents both sides of it without attempting to lean too much towards one side. This would be great for presenting to students because it would open up both sides of the discussion to them, rather than coaxing them towards one side. After the students would’ve read chapters 1-2 of the textbook, they’d hopefully be able to understand the various aspects of American political culture that are presented in the video, such as the freedom of open debate and the presidential selection process.
Overall, this is a great post. I’d say that the questions could be improved by making them more reflective and open-ended to cement the students’ understandings of the chapters they read, rather than asking questions that are related to the video topic.