Politics and Lobbying

August 25, 2011

I had very interesting day at my internship with the ANCA-WR . Me and couple of my colleagues at the internship had various discussions about politics. The conversations started off great and it seemed that we all had some common ground on issues we mentioned. As the issues started getting controversial like human rights, democracy and so forth, our view points split at different forks in the road. The problem with politics is that there no right answer. I learned in my American politics class at Glendale Community College, politics has a very complex structure to it . There is various approaches to solving or trying to solve national or international issues. Since I lived in the United States my whole life,I want discuss one of the most influential parts of American politics and that consist of lobbying. The Lobby sector can give hope for issues dealing with genocidal recognition or amendments for civil rights within a country the Untied States and can also be the most powerful tool to stop positive change from occurring within this country . The lobby groups can also prevent genocide recognition and civil rights from seeing any success. This depends on what is the interest of the lobby group is and how much influential power and money they have to make ensure their interest are sustained.

The defense lobby industry in last 13 years (1998-2011) has prevented issues of genocide recognition and human rights from getting pushed in a progressive direction. According to to the Center of responsive politics, the Defense Industry (consisting of Defense, Defense electronics, and miscellaneous defense) has spent exactly 1,307,409,219 in comparison to ANCA’s funding within the last three years (2009-2011) of 170,000 dollars. According to Center of responsive politics, the number of lobbyist in 2011 working for ANCA totaled a 113 lobbyists in comparison to the US defense Industry who have 713 lobbyists. These numbers between funding and hired lobbyist show the disparity of how US politics can be shaped and influenced . I know that I have a lot to learn as I transfer to California University of Riverside,But I hope that I gain more knowledge in the aspects of Lobbying as I get older so that I could one day find a way to tweak this unbalanced aspect of politics.

For Immediate Release
Media Contact: Elen Asatryan
Email / Tel: (818) 500-1918
Armenian National Committee of America
Western Region
104 N. Belmont, Suite 200, Glendale, CA 91206 * Tel. (818) 500-1918