Civil War II

1. The Soviet Union gave the poor excuse that there were technical difficulties with the barge traffic and road traffic, then they took it a step further by cutting electricity from Berlin, and there excuse was that there was a "shortage of coal" as well. 


2. The USA did not believe that these were genuine reasons because Stalin had a plan to cut off West Berlin from any dependence on foreign allies aid, so that West Berliners would be more dependent on the USSR for government and currency. Stalin just wanted to have some excuses to put his plan into action. Plus. the Soviet Union was one of the superpowers and was very wealthy, so a shortage of coal seemed unlikely. Also, Stalin wanted to cripple Germany and so if they had no resources, that would be crippling Germany and be very convenient for Stalin. 


3. In Source 33 it is from an Historian (American most likely) and he talks about how nothing got accomplished from the Berlin blockade because neither side gained any kind of power or certainty (unbiased opinion). Then in Source 34 there is a commentary from a Soviet saying that the US planned the airlift because they disliked the Soviet Union and used propaganda to turn people against them and that the US only made things worse by almost starting a war over Western Berlin. And finally Source 35 was President Truman talking about how the blockade was testing our ability to give aid and resist fighting a war, and we were successful in helping. The Blockade only made the US closer to the Western European people. 


4. I think that Source 34 and 35 would be the most useful to historians because it gives both sides of the conflict. Source 34 is a Soviet talking about the US failure in helping West Berlin, and Source 35 is President Truman talking about the US accomplishment. A Historian would probably want to find out the opinions of the people on either side of the conflict so that he could get a good idea of how they felt about each other and so that he could seem unbiased about the incident. 


5. I think that Source 33 gives the most reliable view of the blockade because it is an unbiased view from a Historian who has studied this subject and event in history and seems like a pretty reliable source of information because it tells the reader both the situation and what was or was not accomplished, even though it is still an opinion. 

Cold War

pg.325- 3. Cold War means that unlike a Hot War or "explosive war" there is no physical fighting aspect to it, and it is basically a side conflict where two or more nations disagree or dislike one another and stay away from each other or attack in other non-physical ways such as proxy wars, so that instead of the countries fighting each other, they have other substitute countries fighting and the cold war countries pick different sides. 


pg.327- 2. I think that the Soviet Union would of only believed in maybe freedom of religion because of its diversity in its empire, but I do not know its past beliefs in religion, so therefore I am uncertain. The other three (freedom of speech, freedom from want and freedom from fear) are unimportant in the eyes of the Soviets because in a Communistic country you are afraid that the government would kill you for disagreeing with them, which is violating freedom of speech and freedom from fear. Then the entire idea of Communism is shaped around the fact that everyone is equal, and so therefore you must sacrifice some of your wants and get the stuff you only need for the greater good of society. 


pg.329- 2. I think that a couple of the most urgent circumstances that the Marshall Plan should attack would be the coal shortage because of the cold winters in Europe, and then the food shortage would come next, because all those people at least needed food to get through being homeless, and then housing needed to be re-established because millions of people lost their homes. 
3. Greece was the start of  American aid in Europe by financing British troops to stay in Greece while the royal government settled in from the crisis of the civil war, thereby avoiding the spread of Communism and when the "Truman Doctrine" was introduced, it basically stated that Americans stop further spreading of Communistic ideals throughout Europe, so when Czechoslovakia became a Communist country, we stepped up Marshall Plan aid in order to perhaps persuade countries that Americans are nicer than Communists and therefore you should be on our side because we give you aid. 

pg.330- 2. I think that these cartoons are criticizing the Marshall Plan because in Source 27 an American is having to pay a lot of money for Truman to spend on other countries and a billion dollars (not to mention 17 billion) is a lot of money spent on someone else, even if it is a nice thing to do. Then  in Source 29, Marshall is calling a Soviet a "comrad" and kind of giving him a choice and a say in this which is saying that we are going against everything that Stalin is doing, but yet we cannot go directly against him because he still is a superpower and needs to be talked with for foreign business. 
3. (Explained above basically.)


Focus Task   
Stalin I must inform you of the actions that the Americans are taking in order to try to win Europe over. They formed a Doctrine called the "Truman Doctrine" that states that if we as a nation should continue to spread glorious Communism, that they will try to stop it with whatever way most affective. This should be considered a threat and we should ourselves from possible American attack in the future. Next is this "Marshall Plan," which is an agreement that could allow the Americans to send aid into distressed parts of our nation, but I advise against this, for the Americans will only try to make our nations more dependent on American currency and aid than our aid, and perhaps start a rebellion. They are fools for even thinking that we would do such a thing, but they are trying to win over the rest of Europe by handing out aid. 

Focus Task- Optimists vs. Pessimists

1. OPTIMIST EVIDENCE: 
- During WWII significant steps were taken to prevent racial discrimination in the army and employment. 
- In 1950 the Supreme Court ruled that states had to provide equal education for white and black students. 
- In 1952 Brown v. Board declared that segregated education could not be equal, therefore integration was necessary. 
- Montgomery Bus Boycott was an effective, non-violent way to protest desegregation, and it worked because the bus services became segregated. 
- Black and white students worked together and created SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee), which organized freedom rides, and sit in lunch counters, and tried to get blacks in the South to register to vote. 
- Many towns were moved by the Civil Rights movement and completely desegregated their towns. 
-President Kennedy committed himself to a wide range of programs of laws and regulations to end segregation. 
- The amount of blacks registered to vote increased dramatically from 1945 to 1966 (from 5-60%). 
- MLK's "I have a dream" speech had a tremendous impact on the American public opinion. 
-Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, which made it illegal for the government to discriminate in areas such as housing and employment. 
- Voting Rights Bill passed in 1965. 
2. PESSIMIST EVIDENCE:
-

Internment of Japanese-Americans

1. If I were a Journalist in 1942, I could write a very controversial story by comparing the internment camps to what Hitler was doing to the Jewish people and how hypocritical we were being, or I could side with the Japanese-Americans and create a story about how wrong it was to put the Japanese-Americans forcibly into camps, which would be violating their civil rights as Americans in the first place. They were not found guilty of anything and were being stereotyped and discriminated against. If we were placing Japanese-Americans in internment camps, why not the German-Americans? It was only because the panic of the time that made the President do this. There was no killing or torturing or any sort in these camps, but the feeling of getting shipped away from your family and placed into these cramped camps probably felt the same. We were fighting Germany to get these Jewish people out of the camps in Germany, but meanwhile we had people of our own trapped in camps as well!
2.  I probably wouldn't do this because people back in the 1940's had a different view of discriminating and saying offensive things like racial slurs. It was a different time period and the government just wanted the people to feel safe, and wouldn't want people to feel like any kind of Japanese person deserved to be around us. The government used propaganda of the Japanese to make a certain hatred of Japanese people in America, so the story wouldn't make people too happy because they wanted to hear about how bad the Japanese were, even if they were American because they could be aiding the Japanese. 

The most important cause of the Great Depression: Speculator's actions

The actions of the speculators in the 1920's ultimately were the leading cause of the Great Depression because of their over-confidence in the raising of stock prices. In the 1920's, lots of Americans "got rich quick" by investing and selling in the stock market, but when speculators borrowed money from the bank and the stock prices went down in a company, those speculators were in even more debt with the bank. So when a lot of people started to do this, banks ran dry and went bankrupt. In the 1920's over 500 banks had failed and what happens when a bank fails, is that everyone loses their money and the poverty rates plunge. It's probably the most important because of how many Americans were involved with debt from the stock market and how many banks failed. 

Automobile Industry

I agree that without the automobile industry, prosperity would of been hard to reach because so many aspects of the economic boom came from cars such as: building roads, creating jobs not only in the automobile industry, but in the rubber, glass and steel industries as well. When roads were built, transportation was much faster and easier, which was a catalyst into the modern era. From automobiles, there came the idea of quicker transportation, and so the airplane was invented. Motels and fast food drive thru windows were popping up everywhere because of the popularity and efficiency of the automobile. 

Question 3:1920's Economic Boom

The Economic Boom of the 1920's was a time of building and putting the improvements and reforms into action. Road building, Bridge building, and Structure building all contributed to better housing, transportation and easier travel. New technology made older tedious jobs very simple and easy to do, such as refrigerating and talking on the telephone. One of the most important inventions of this time was automobiles and airplanes, which made transportation easier and a lot more quicker. 

Why Labor Unions were not successful

No, it was not successful because Source H the government basically made it illegal to go on strike, which made Labor Unions almost pointless. Next there was Source G, which said that at the strike of Homestead most of the Labor Union workers died while on strike because of the violence, which leads to the general public thinking that Labor Unions are no good as well. And plus, why go on strike if you are likely to get hurt and not be able to support your family anyways? My last supporting source is Source D because it explains the disappointments of industry back then because the Labor Unions weren't really taking an affect on industry yet. The invention of the assembly line made it so that skilled workers got replaced by cheaper, unskilled workers and a lot of workers lost their job from being replaced by machinery. 

US position on Egyptian protests

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12356064


"It thus came as no surprise to many that the president, under transparent US pressure, conceded that he would not stand for re-election in September."


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12361948

"Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak says he would like to resign immediately but fears the country would descend into chaos if he did so.

Speaking after 10 days of protests, he said he was "fed up" after being in power for decades.

He said he was "unhappy" about the violent protests and warned that the Muslim Brotherhood would fill any power vacuum."

In these two quotes we see that the United States has successfully coerced Mubarak into not running for re-election and Mubarak's son will also not be running for presidency next term. President Obama has already been active in Egypt's political decisions and now we should back off and let Egypt's protesters and Prime Minister, Ahmed Shafiq and Vice President, Omar Suleiman to make up what is best now. Also, if you look at the latest quotes by Mubarak he tells the public that he is "fed up" with the protesting which indicates a sign of defeat or compromise. So as of right now, I think we should stand back. 

Option 5: Question #3

Some policies that I feel would be appropriate for my Option would be:

- focus more on winning the hearts and minds of the people instead of forcing them into a government that they are not accustomed to.

- Lots of the Middle Eastern countries have seen our presence in the Middle East as a dangerous threat to their nations customs and our greed for oil, so if we helped out more Arab countries and decreased our amount of aid to Israel a little bit, it will be a win-win for us.

- If we promoted Democracy and Freedom in the region by example it would affect many people more than attacking foreign governments and giving them a reason to not support our ideas. (A lot of young adults are ready for change, so we can influence them). The one exception to that policy would be if a dangerous dictatorship was a threat to the US or our allies and we got permission from the UN Council instead of illegally going into that country.

- If we gain more allies by giving more aid and creating more nations like ourselves, more Arab countries will be generous will their oil and then we wouldn't have to struggle to obtain it from countries like Iran who refer to the US as the "greater satan."

Sharia Law Violation in Dubai

http://www.care2.com/causes/womens-rights/blog/woman-jailed-deported-in-dubai-for-illegal-abortion/

A woman was prosecuted for commiting Zina- the sharia offence of sex outside of marriage and aborting a four-month-old fetus illegally. Her punishment was a six month jail sentence and deportation from the country of Dubai. But the lady considers herself lucky because there are far worse punishments for committing Zina.