Week 10 Required Readings

Advocates of Limited Government:

Ron Pestritto: “The Birth of the Administrative State: Where It Came From and What It Means for Limited Government”

Ryan Messmore: “A Moral Case against Big Government”

Progressivism and Expansive Government:

Peter Dreier and Dick Flacks: “Patriotism and Progressivism”

John Halpin and Conor P. Williams: “What is Progressivism?”

Ruy Teixeira and John Halpin: “The Progressive Tradition in American Politics” [pay particular attention to the bullet list, Progressive reforms: A century of accomplishments”]

Capitalism and Socialism: Pro and Con:

Capitalists:

Walter Williams: The Entrepreneur as American Hero”

Samuel Gregg: “Markets, Morality, and Civil Society”

Communists and Socialists:

Bertrand Russell: In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays (1935): Chapter VII: “The Case for Socialism”

Marx and Engels: Selection from The Communist Manifesto (1848)

Chapter II: Proletarians and Communists

Compose a brief essay of at least 400 words but no more than 600 words (not including your references list) on the following topic, referring to and critiquing relevant ideas from at least three of the Week 10 readings as you develop your thoughts:

It’s vital to remember that concerns about the size of government cannot be separated from economic beliefs since all actions by the government must be paid for—primarily—through taxation. According to the website of the Social Security Administration, “[presently,] the Social Security program is the largest single item in the annual federal government budget. As a percentage of total federal expenditures, in 2002 Social Security benefits were approximately 22.6% of federal expenditures. As a percentage of federal outlays, Social Security benefits have ranged from a low of 0.22% (during World War II) to a high of 23.2% in 2001” (http://www.ssa.gov/history/percent.html).

Assume for the purpose of this assignment that we do not currently have a Social Security Act, but that the creation of such legislation is being seriously considered by the federal government for the first time and that the government has accurately predicted that cost of such a program. Create an argument for or against the passage of such a law based on your conception of the ideas on the optimum size of government and on government interventions in the economy (Social Security is an intervention in the economy).

In addition to employing ideas from the assigned readings, you may bring in ideas gathered from research (as long as you cite and reference them), but these should not dominate in your essay.

Write in essay form (that is, in paragraphs, not in bullet points). Be as specific and precise as you can be. Use the Discussion Board Grading Rubric in the Assignments area to guide your thoughts on what constitutes a high-quality essay.

Important Assignment Guidelines: Not following these guidelines will have a negative impact on your grade for the week.

1. Write in Arial font, size 14 (chosen from the drop-down menus on the create thread box in the Discussion Board forum), unless otherwise directed by your instructor.
2. Reference specific ideas from at least three of the assigned readings that illustrate these values. Always name the author whose ideas you are discussing (use the author’s full name the first time you refer to him/her; after that, identify authors by their last names).
3. Provide in-text citations for all ideas, opinions, and facts derived from the course readings, whether you simply refer to them, paraphrase them (put them entirely into your own words), or quote them. Place the in-text citation at the end of your sentence but before the period that ends your sentence. The in-text citation should give the author’s last name (unless you’ve used it already in your sentence), the year of publication (if known), and the appropriate page number(s) from the reading (if page numbers are used in the online text of the essay). Do not use the title of the reading unless it does not have an author).

Here’s an example of a citation for the Thomas Paine reading for Week 1: (Paine, 1776).

Here’s an example of a citation for the John Locke reading for Week 2: (Locke, 1689, pp. 46-47).

1. Provide a References list at the end of your essay that includes bibliographic references for every reading cited in your essay.

Note: Your references list does not count toward your minimum word count.

Center the word References (do not underline it, place it in quotation marks, or place it in bold or larger size font).

Present your references, listed alphabetically by author’s last name.

Follow APA formatting guidelines for your list. The Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) offers excellent detailed explanations of APA Format requirements. This is the URL for the Purdue OWL:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/1

Note: This URL can also be found in the External Links area our course’s Cyber-active site.

Here is an example of a references list entry:

Locke, J. (1689). Of the beginning of political societies. In Two treatises

of government (Chapter VIII). Retrieved from

http://idcontent.bellevue.edu/content/CAS/eBooks/K...

Note1: The first line of the reference begins at the left margin. All

subsequent lines should be indented one tab.

Note 2: Do not include bibliographic references for any reading not

cited in your essay.

5. The goal of the assignment is not to determine the "right answer." Students are strongly discouraged from using non-assigned readings in their essay.

The assigned readings were chosen to present students with opposing perspectives. The goal is to help students recognize and engage the intellectual tension, competing truths, that these issues present.

Our world is complicated and students are best served when they seek the truth and challenge their own dogmatic truths.

As noted author H.L. Menken wrote, "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple and wrong."