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Indents are hard to see, so the 2nd paragraph begins with the line; Some advice that Congressman...

Outside Reading post 5&6 of 12

Not many jobs require spending half of your time concentrating on them. George Stephanopoulos had to work 14-16 hours a DAY during his time as a White House advisor. The section of the book that I read demonstrates that in order to work in the White House, you need to devote a ton of your energy and time into your job, you have to let it take over your life. When talking about his commitment to his job, Stephanopoulos said, "But my job did come first, for better or for worse. Besides, I didn't have time to be lonely, with work consuming twelve, fourteen, sixteen hours a day, six days a week, and several hours on Sunday. Every day was a dozen meetings, a hundred phone calls, a new crisis, another first" (135). This quote shows that Mr. Stephanopoulos didn't even have time to think, his schedule was so jammed full. If you are going to be part of the body that runs the entire country, you must be determined to work ceaselessly around the clock to keep the cogs turning. When you work in this manner, your personal life gets eaten up too. The author exclaims, "Soon I was too-as a single man...But it was also Joan's final straw, a sure sign of where my heart was. First the campaign, then the transition, now this. My job would always come first. She dumped me a week later-exactly what I deserved" (135). Someone cannot have any distractions when working for the President, including a girlfriend. They do not posses the time to give the adequete amount of attention that a lover deserves, they would barely even be able to see each other! If your job is a serious one with many responsibilities, then you need to be willing to give your full attention to it in order to do it properly.

Some advice that Congressman Tony Coelho gives the author is, "Nobody will remember what happened to you. They'll remember how you handle it" (152). This idea is central in the next passage of my book, where Mr. Stephanopoulos is replaced from the press secretary position. He is talking about how to appear in the best light just before the replacement and recollects, "Listening to the past-tense praise was a little like hearing my eulogies, which was fitting, because that afternoon I would have to perform the political equivalent of speaking at my own funeral. Gergen wasn't set to start for another week, and they hadn't decided who would do the press briefings once he came on board. So I had four more days of facing the reporters who'd become my tormentors. Tuesday noon was the start of my final run" (152). It is necessary to look back at your past accomplishments in order to prepare to transition into a new role. To make your appearence look the best, you need to make it seem like you are not being hurt by the change. Mr. Stephanopoulos needed to make his situation look like a promotion instead of a demotion. When Clinton was announcing that his team was bringing in David Gergen for the job of Press Secretary, Stephanopoulos noted, "Before heading to the Rose Garden, he approached me and congratulated me on my new job. What new job? Nobody's really said what I'm going to do. Clinton's touch was perfect. Now if only I could convince the rest of the world to congratulate me. I hadn't prepared a statement of my own, but my actual words wouldn't matter much. My mission was to look like a man who was bieng promoted" (150). Society as a whole never cares about the intricate history of a situation, they just care about how the person looks while they are confronting it. If they are downcast and dull, then society will view it as a failiure. If the person does the opposite however, society believes that they were successful in their venture, no matter what the truth really is.

The beliefs of the characters in this film vary depending on their social backround and loyalty. Most everyone on the docks inwardly dislikes "their union supervisors" (aka the mob), but would never dream of speaking out against them in fear of them or people close to them bieng hurt. This is a valid fear because the mob has proven that they will persecute those who stand against them, for all to see. Although it may be a valid fear, it is not neccisarily the right thing to do. The men on the docks have a great commaraderie with one another, and lots of them are great freinds. They think of the docks as one big family, feeling others pain, but not always speaking against it. I think that they would define a traitor as someone who tells a party something in order to benefit themselves at the cost of others at the docks. A whistle blower, on the other hand, would be someone who stands up to the mob and valiently tries to tell the truth to set things right. Unfortunatly, anyone who has the guts to do that most likely will be "hooked" by the mob. There are not many examples of traitors or whistle blowers in the film, just the select few who are brave enough to stare death in the face for what they believe is right.

In many cases, there is a not so fine line between a traitor and an informant on riminal activity. Depending on your viewpoint, someone could be either one of them. I think that a traitor is someone who assists the enemy of the group they are a part of and therefore hurts the group. A whistle blower is someone who stands up for their personal beliefs, even in the face of danger, to try to make this world a better place. A traitor lacks the ethics to realize that they are harming their own comrades, or is too blinded by greed to care about their real friends anymore. On the other hand, only a select few people in each society posess the knowlege and moral compass to guide them on the right path, and even fewer also posess the courage that is required to carry out your actions. Society will exclude and shame a traitor, while they revere an ethical crusader and immortalize them forever.

Outside Reading post 4 of 12

The saying "The first time is always the hardest" rings true with the Clinton Presidency. Coming off a win in the 1992 Presidential election and a great inaugural speech, the first issue Clinton faced was meeting with the Military chiefs of staff about the situation of Gays in the military. The new President had to make an ethical decision about weather to go and attack strongly in support of his beliefs or play it cool to not make a bad impression as a new president. Mr. Stephanopoulos says of their situation; "I was proud of his argument, but I also knew that we had no cards to play. If we didn't work out a compromise with the chiefs,, they would sabotage us on the Hill" (124). The Clinton staff was confident in their viewpoint, but they did not want to create political uproar, so they were at a fork in the road. They could go for the aggressive but possibly devastating move, or lay low and come to a safe compromise. What ended up happening was bad overall for the Clinton administration, the compromise evidently not paying off, with the author saying; "The compromise satisfied no one, except Republican political strategist, who now had a killer issue for the 1994 midterm elections. The military resented the intrusion, Democrats were furious, the public was confused, and the gay community felt betrayed" (128). In this particular situation, taking the safe route against your beliefs did not keep them safe. The Clinton administration learned this the hard way, as many administrations have done. This problem shows that you have to stand up for what you believe is right, even though it may be risky, or you may end up falling flat on your face anyway.

Answer to Blog Question Q2 AMS

The choice of weather to benefit your family or society is an interesting one, to say the least. This choice is shown through many different people in the play. Characters in Arthur Miller's play, "All My Sons", decide what is more important based on their own selfish impulses. The story is based around Joe Keller, who operated a factory that made airplane parts for the army in WWII. After 21 cracked cylinder heads made by his factory caused the death of 21 American pilots, him and his coworker were put on trial. Joe was supposedly innocent of all charges, but his coworker was put in jail. This case builds suspense throughout the story, until the son of the coworker comes to get Joe to confess, and Kate misspeaks, giving a clue as to why Joe is guilty. Chris gets angry at his father and is interrogating him until Joe cracks and erupts, "Because you know I don't belong there. Because you know! Who worked for nothin' in that war? When they work for nothin', I'll work for nothin'. Did they ship a gun or a truck outa Detroit before they got their price? Is that clean? It's dollars and cents, nickels and dimes; war and peace, it's nickels and dimes, what's clean? Half the Goddamn country is gotta go if I go! That's why you can't tell me" (82). Joe made the decision to send the bad parts out because he was obsessed with giving Chris a good life and keeping his business alive. He might have known it was morally wrong when he did it, but over the years, he slowly convinced himself otherwise because if he lost the respect of Chris then he would have no reason to live. Kate makes it hard on her fellow family members when she refuses to believe that Larry has passed away after being reported missing in action over three years ago. She constantly retorts at them whenever they suggest that he may have passed on, and is immensely stubborn in her views like when she says, "Because certain things have to be, and certain things can never be. Like the sun has to rise, it has to be. That's why there's God. Otherwise anything could happen. But there's God, so certain things can never happen. I would know, Annie- just like I knew the day he went in to that terrible battle. Did he write me? Was it in the papers? No, but that morning I couldn't raise my head off the pillow. Ask Joe. Suddenly, I knew! I knew! And he was nearly killed that day. Ann, you know I'm right!" (28). Kate's reasoning that Larry is alive because she feels it and God wouldn't have it any other way is just a stubborn excuse not to face the truth. She is selfishly keeping to her own world instead of giving in to reality and allowing Chris and Joe some peace of mind. The actions of Joe and Kate show that they are acting on their own selfish desires to make choices in life.

I think that it is appropriate to put the needs of your family before the needs of society only when you are not directly harming society by doing so. Joe Keller does not share my thinking because he effectively causes the deaths of 21 pilots just to keep the respect of his son and stay away from jail. As a human being that is part of society, you have to take responsibility for your actions even if that means that you take some punishment in the process. Just because you might of had a stroke of bad luck like Joe Keller does not give you the right to pass that on to society, which in Keller's case, caused many deaths. The classic conundrum of stealing bread to feed your hungry family is an interesting match to my view. I would steal the bread only because it does not do a great amount of harm to society and it saves active participants in that society, my family. Stealing bread from another hungry family is a different story, because you would be doing harm to them if you stole it. 

Outside reading post 3 of 12

The section of my book that I read this week started with a scandal that accused Clinton  of dodging the Vietnam draft. Reporters had found a letter from him to Colonel Holmes that started with the line "'I want to thank you, not just for saving me from the draft...'" (74). This letter started a downward spiral that ended up with Clinton being projected third or worse at the New Hampshire primary. In politics, even when you seem to be out of the race, if you work hard enough and strategize well, you can still win. After an accusation that claimed Clinton wanted to give a job in government to someone he allegedly had an affair with, Mr. Stephanopoulos wanted to give up the race. He gives his interpretation of Clinton's attitude by saying, "I was sure all was lost, but Clinton demonstrated that power of pure will. He was determined to touch and talk to every voter in New Hampshire. We staffers left the suite in shifts to accompany him, but we were superfluous. This was all about Clinton-his pride, ambition, and anger, his need to be loved and his drive to do good. Watching him made me wonder if you had to be a little crazy to become president. What did it do to you to want something so badly?" (79). To win, Clinton would almost have to talk to everyone in New Hampshire, but this quote shows that he had the determination and drive to do it. In order to come back from the pits of despair in a political campaign, you need to want to win with every ounce of your being. Clinton's staff, including Mr. Stephanopoulos, worked tirelessly around the clock at their base in Little Rock to fend off every Republican attack that came their way. They used a simple, but deadly, three phrase election manifesto to head their strategies, the ideas were Change vs. More of the Same, The economy, stupid, and Don't forget health care. The author's thoughts on it were, "I thought of it as a campaign haiku-an entire election manifesto condensed to nineteen syllables.  James drilled it into our heads, and every speech, every event, every attack, and every response had to reflect one of these three commandments" (88). These three ideas fended off every attack the Bush campaign threw at them, lessening the distractions and allowing the campaign to gain some ground. With this premise, Mr. Stephanopoulos and his fellow staffers were able to strategize well enough to get right back into the race.