I recently perused the flickr stream of photos from the republican national convention. I understand the need to point out the uplifting generally upbeat side of any political situation, but these photos just left me with a need to ask what else is going on? These photos seemed to be like painting an old moldy wall, the bad stuff is bound to come up eventually. I found it particularly interesting that there are no images of the current runners for the presidency, they focused on past presidents and the good ole' days of the republican party. Use these images to let us learn about the issues that the convention will address and don't show us your cute little secretaries in their matching outfits, where is the substance?

political image: pertaining to the fact that Americans take the right to vote for granted and then when they are unhappy with the consequences of an elected political officials actions they have no right to be when they did not act on election day when they could have had a hand in choosing someone else.

politics is...

This is my first post in a blog pertaining to a class I am taking at the University of Kentucky; the Visual Culture of Politics. We were given the task to give our own definition of the term politics. Given the current year and the election coming up there could not be a more controversial or important topic, and due to the fact that I will be voting for the president for the first time in my life I believe it is time for me to really delve into my thoughts on the matter. To me politics encompass the governing body of a people, and the decisions which said governing body make which will have influence or impact on the governed body. While politics involves the governing body it also has to do with one's own personal beliefs about the governing body. One can get into an argument over their beliefs on who should be the governing and call this argument political, while they themselves are having no direct impact on the governing body. I also think that politics has to do with the division of power within a group of people. We choose our political leaders because we believe that they can give us as a group the things that we either want most or need most within our community. From the class president in a small elementary school to the leader of the free world we are essentially asking the same thing of our appointed command. Any act that a governing body carries out would also be considered politics to me, as it is what is essentially anything to do with that group of people and the way they are structured. Essentially politics are the governing bodies and who decide who gets what, when, where, and how.