1. What did the Supreme Court decide in the Wal-Mart case? And more importantly, how did it justify its decision? According to the open lab lecture information in Wal-Mart stores inc Betty Dukes v 2011, the Supreme court made a decision that women can not move forward with their case of class action lawsuit, as they do not provide any “Commonality” which means they should have the same legal issues regarding to the class action lawsuit. Women said they were discriminated by company as they paid less on salary than men workers and promotion also was less. However Supreme Court decided it can not be the common reason or problem to the case, as they were paid by different managers in a different individual stores. By checking the policy of Wal-Mart company wide, the Supreme Court find out that there is no any policy that could discriminate the women. And after decision of Supreme Court, they said that women’s case can not be the class action of lawsuit.

1. In what ways is the court system better suited to protect the individual, than are the elected branches of government (such as Congress and the President; or the Mayor of NYC and the NYC City Assembly)? Give an example to illustrate your argument. From my point of view the court system is better suited to protect individuals rather than other branches of government, because of the court system follows the rules of Constitution and rights of the people which are written on Constitution. For this we could take as an example, Miranda v situation. Court give him his rights to use Fifth Amendment which is right to remain silent, and also Six Amendment which allows him to have a lawyer, even these decisions was not popular at that time. When we come to Congress and other branches, they try to make decisions which are popular and thinks about public opinions, in order to be re-elected.
2. Think about how federal judges get to become judges – unlike Presidents, Mayors and members of Congress (and other legislatures), they are not elected, but rather appointed. Many Americans have thus called the federal courts system, and especially the Supreme Court, anti-democratic places in our government. Do you agree that the Supreme Court, for example, is an anti-democratic part of our government? What could be the reason for this way of choosing judges in federal courts? (HINT: think about our discussion of “Federalist #10”, and which social class plays a leading role in our government system.)
   Response: Yes, I agree with that, Supreme court is anti-democratic because they will not be voted by people or citizens of the country, they will be voted by President and Senate will approve it, which gives them rights to follow the rules of Constitution without thinking people’s wealth or status in the country. As we read on Federalist #10 , they were voted only by wealthy people, who can use the court system for their interest and criminal justice, which i think is not right. That’s why court system being anti-democratic helps them to make right important decisions when it comes to court cases and system.

1. P. Williams writes in her essay, that the war on terror is a new type of a war. What’s new about it, how is it different from traditional wars? Williams describes how scary is terrorism, which makes people be afraid. So the difference between war on terror and traditional war is, terror does not have a purpose to start a war, they just want to scare and make people be afraid, it is not the same war as traditional which makes war for land or something else. It is war for civilian organizations.
2. In what ways does the “Roving Wiretaps” of the Patriot Act seem to violate the Bill of Rights? Which amendment(s) does it seem to violate and why? Roving Wiretaps let the government to check person’s technological devices such as email and other things without any warrant. Which is going against to Fourth Amendment where is written Government is not allowed to check the devices without any important reason.
3. What about “Sneek and Peek” Warrants? Sneek and Peek Warrants, which let the law enforcement to search the home or business without immediately notifying the target of the investigation. They protect their this action as they can do this search without notifying on the houses of drug dealers or criminals. But I think it is still against to Fourth amendment.

1. Describe how you understand the “Establishment Clause” and the related “Lemon Test”. The Establishment Clause is a part of First Amendment. Which means that government prohibited from creating or supporting a state-sponsored religion. The Lemon Test comes from 1971 year which known as Lemon v. Kurtzman. This test established for deciding whether a law or other government action that might support a particular religious practice should be allowed to stand. And it has 3 criteria which are ” 1. The action or law must not lead to excessive government entanglement with religion. 2. The action or law can not support or hurt religion. 3. Law must have some secular purpose; there must be some non-religious basis for the law.
2. Is burning the US flag protected by the First Amendment? Explain by referring to the relevant court case discussed in the reading.Yes, it is protected by First Amendment, as freedom speech symbol. One such person was Gregory Lee Johnson, a member of various pro-communist, in 1984, as part of a protest near Texas, Johnson set fire to a U.S. flag. He was arrested, charged with “desecration of a venerated object” and eventually convicted of that offense. However, in 1989, the Supreme Court decided in Texas v. Johnson that burning the flag was a form of symbolic speech protected by the First Amendment and found the law, as applied to flag desecration, to be unconstitutional.
3. What does it mean when someone says “I’m taking the Fifth”? When someone says that ” They are taking the Fifth”, it means they want to remain the silence, and not providing any information which could be against to them during the court process or case.

1. Describe the primary differences in the role of citizens in government, among the federal, confederation, and unitary systems. In a federal system they pay attention to people votes and opinions, and they have two parts of levels, which are state and national government, all of them was able to take taxes and make decisions, while people also was able to vote to president also to the Governor. In a confederation system most of the power was on states and region governments not national government, due to that people interact with their state governments. On other hand, in unitary system most of the power held by their national government, and they will make decisions in order to give power to region governments.
2. Briefly explain how you understand the system of division of power. The division of power is governmental system and structure in order to prevent from dominating. And it is divided by two parts such as state government and federal government. While state government takes care of school and public safety. The federal government handles national defense. And also division of power system has three branches, which are ( legislative, executive and judicial branches ), all of them helps preventing from dominating.
3. How does the federal government shape the actions of state and local governments? COVID-19 pandemic. Federal influence on New York during COVID-19 was significant, primarily through financial aid and policy guidance. And they also helped and supported with emergency response and vaccination and health measures. The financial aid which federal government provided also helped to support people when they lost their jobs and also business closures.

1. What concept that we have already discussed does “faction” remind you of? The concept of faction reminds me the different social classes which has different interest, such as poor and rich people, while poor people want fairness, rich people wanted to control the power and keep resources under their control.
2. According to the Madison article he says that, some people get richer and richer because they have ability and talent for it. Some people stay poor because they do not have that talent which other rich people have. And he mentioned that that’s why government should protect and support rich people to be richer as they bring the more opportunities to the country.
3. Do you agree with this explanation of wealth and poverty? I am partly disagree, as not all rich people have talents, some of them owns their family businesses or lands which was left by their family members to them. From other point of view that governments support because they bring a lot of profits to the government, which I am agree. But if we look om the other side poor people also could have talent to be wealthy, but they do not have resources to start, such as money and lands.
4. What is the core mission (“first object”) of the US government? After reading all articles it give an idea and changed my opinion on US government system. As Madison says that the main task of government is to protect the wealth and land of rich people and support them. As an international student I did not have as much information about system, as much I get know during reading the articles. I think everybody heard this phrase, that America is the place of opportunities and equality among different class of people. But after reading the informations, my opinion changed, I think is there are more opportunities to wealthy people than regular class people, which is unfair in my point of view.
5. Are you surprised that Federalist #10 is not in favor of democracy, and supports a Republican? I am not really surprised, as government always supported rich people, that’s why they do not want poor people to vote for equality and fairness, which would take power and wealth of rich people.

1. Based on the reading constitution was written by rich white men who owns businesses, lands and slaves. All system was controlled by them. Women, slaves and men who do not own anything was not able to give a vote, this group called disenfranchised. Rich people in order to maintain their wealth tried to keep control by themselves.
2. The class structure is little similar as nowadays also only few percent of the people control most of the wealth an power. However the difference is nowadays every person can vote once you turn to 18 years old, which does not exist in back days.
3. The people who wrote the Constitution were afraid of democracy, because they thought that if they give this opportunity too poor people they will start taking power and their wealth from them, and there would be equality, and the same better lifestyle. For not loosing their power and wealth, they created the Constitution which looked like democracy. But they were still able to control the system, and keep their wealth.

1. Which statistic on wealth inequality in the US (discussed on p. 29) made the biggest impression on you? Explain why? According to the reading, the statistic of percentage wealthy people which is 1% and owns a lot of places and other 90% percent of people are middle or low middle classes which spend their labor just to pay rents or to survive impressed me so much. It shows that how system is not fairly. Rich people gets richer, poor people stays poor not because of they do not work hard, because of they labor is not paid as it is valued. This inequality in the system shows that there is so less chance that poor person can get rich in the future.
2. What could be some of the implications of living in a society that has such huge wealth inequalities? Do you see this dynamic getting played out in everyday life in our society? How so? Example? From my point of view living in a society where huge wealth inequality shows that the people do not have a same equal chance to live their better lifestyle. And it could affect to crime and seeing a lot of homeless people. Due to the wealth inequality there would be different living conditions in a society. For example in New York reach people can afford good expensive cars, clothes from good brands, study at good schools , better healthcare and the main one is good calm houses and neighborhood which not everyone can afford. But if we look liter further we could see the regular low class people who works hard just with hope that they will also achieve these all luxury affords one which is barely going to happen. As richer people gets richer not because they work hard, because of they invest their money which they already had.

According to the video and reading 5.1, I understand that capitalist and wealthy people maintain and grows their businesses and money by using system M-C-M. Which is:

M- Which means Money. The capitalist and wealthy people already have and they will invest to make more money.

C- Means commodity, which i mentioned already for what capitalist going to spend their money in order to grow and maintain their money.

M- also means money, which comes from investment and labor which their worker brings to them.

In general, capitalist and wealthy people maintain their wealth by investing their money to commodity and machines and workers which brings their labor power to do labor and getting paid less than how much labor they spend. And most of the profits which comes from them gets capitalist and owners of the business which they use cycle of M-C-M.