Daniel Cintron                            assignment 1                                                                      9/17/15
A majority (57%) of Americans believe the federal government today has too much power. Most of the rest say the government has about the right amount of power. Few say the government has too little power. Americans were least likely to be concerned about the government's power in the years immediately after 9/11, but half or more since 2005 have said it has too much power. Partisan views about government power are highly dependent on which party controls government, and on the political and social environment at the time of the survey. At this point, 77% of Republicans say the government has too much power, compared with 63% of independents and 32% of Democrats -- which reflects the current Republican position that there is too much government spending and power in domestic and economic affairs.
However, when George W. Bush was president, Democrats were more concerned than Republicans about government power. In Gallup's September 2005 Governance survey, for example, 55% of Democrats said the government had too much power, compared with 50% of independents and 41% of Republicans. At that point, Democrats were almost certainly interpreting this question in terms of government anti-terrorism actions taken after 9/11, including the Patriot Act.

In my opinion, this passage is seems to mainly focus on separation of power within the government political parties. More specifically, the passage emphasizes the opinions of Americans based on the amount of power the government has. Also political parties, such as the Democrats, and Republicans, along with the independents, voiced their opinions about the amount of federal government power between the years 2001 and 2005. According to percentage rates, there was a majority of Americans who believed the government had too much power, along with the political parties, and some thought the government did not have enough power. I think the meaning of this passage is to portray the beliefs of the amount of government power between the time of 9/11 and the years after, to give Americans an idea of how the country had changed in terms of power distribution, based on how the 9/11 tragedy was handled and viewed between political parties.

The reason why I chose this passage is because, the opinions of Americans and political parties in the distribution of the government power, seems to still be discussed in the present, from what I hear on the news. Either one political party thinks the government has too much power, or the other political power thinks the government has very little power, or both parties agree on the amount of power the government has. I thought this passage was important for the simple fact of my knowledge, I was under the impression that the government is not supposed to have too much power. The government should have equal power, along with political parties and the states. I believe it is important and very necessary to take into account the amount of power the government has, and possibly avoid some sort of dictatorship.