Mafia As Government Essays - American Mafia, Mafia,

Mafia As Government History and Introduction The history of the Mafia began in the ninth century, when a secret society was formed to protect the people of Sicily. Sicily was occupied by Arab forces. A group of Sicilians fled into the countryside to escape, and later to fight, the encroaching forces. This group became the Mafia. The groups original intentions were to create a sense of loyalty and respect for tradition, culture and family. The Mafia protected its' members interests and promoted protected individuals and businesses in exchange for loyalty and monetary tribute. As time passed, and the Mafia expanded to the Americas, the Mafia became more criminal, engaging in provision of illegal services and collection of taxes in defiance of the legitimate government. It is the purpose of this work to argue that the Mafia, a criminal organization, meets the criteria to be considered a government. The terms Mafia or mob used in this work should be considered to be synonymous and to refer to the American Mafia. The Mafias structure is similar in nature to a feudal government system, with agents reporting to regional governors, who in turn report to the organizations leader. While the mob may or may not possess an overall head, individual regions of the mob may be thought of as a form of local government. The Mafia, as it is currently being discussed, exists within the confines of the United States, and thus may be in competition with, or at least overlapping the geographic areas of other government systems. Definitions of Government Ayn Rand has much to say on the proper function of government, but it is unclear as to what she considers a formal definitionon of what exactly categorizes an organization as a government. Her most specific response to the question appears in the opening sentence of The Nature of Government. The opinion is that the use of force and the enforcement of rules should be limited to government. (Rand) Randall Holcombe references Robert Dahl and Max Weber, summarizing their points of view that a monopoly on the use of force in a given area is the defining characteristic of government, thus adding a spatial characteristic to the definition. Holcombe further points out that obviously a monopoly on the use of coercive force is not required as can be seen from examples of overlapping area and jurisdictional authority within the federal, state, and local governments in the United States. Finally Holcombe puts forth the idea that, for a positive economic view, the hallmark of government is the ability to tax all parties within a given geographical region, for the purpose of financing its operations. (Holcombe) Mafia as Government Would the Mafia meet the criteria of Rand, Dahl, or Weber? Except in certain isolated instances, probably not. The United States federal government exerts coercive influence over practically all individuals or firms living or operating within its boundaries, not to mention state and local agencies. Of course, by any definition requiring a monopoly of use of force, whether spatially limited or not, the real governments dont qualify as governments either. Following Holcombes definition, which does define the aforementioned federal, state, and local agencies as governments, where does the Mafia fall in respect to being considered as a government? In other words, can it be argued that the Mafia has the power to tax all businesses or individuals within a geographic area? Armed with only information from hearsay and popular culture, the answer would have to be yes. Systemized extortion or protection fees could very well be collected for all within a given area. It may be that the popular image is inaccurate, which may affect the classification, but for the sake of argument it is considered an accurate assessment here. The issue may be raised as to the legality of the mob. It may be argued that they cannot be considered a government as they are criminal. What is it that distinguishes the mob as criminal? Is it the services provided by the mob, which the real government has deemed illegal? Obviously the argument over legalization of certain enterprises is too great to be discussed fully here, but consider that underprovision of a good by traditional, and of course legal, markets is often one of the

Awe and Awesome

Awe and Awesome Awe and Awesome Awe and Awesome By Maeve Maddox Words, like human bodies, become enfeebled over time. Awe and awesome are two such words. In the early Middle Ages, awe meant â€Å"immediate and active fear; terror, dread.† Because awe was frequently used to describe the fear inspired by the divine, it came to mean, â€Å"dread mingled with veneration.† The adjective awesome was used to describe something that inspired a feeling of solemn and reverential wonder tinged with latent fear, the feeling that Ahab’s crew would have experienced as Moby Dick rose up out of the sea next to the Pequod, or that Moses thrilled to when the voice spoke from the burning bush. In the 21st century, the adjective awesome is applied to just about anything: 10 Unexpectedly Awesome Cover Songs How to Become More of an Awesome Person What Are Some Really Awesome Ways to Use Chocolate Mint? I Had Some Really Awesome Noodles Today Clearly awesome has dwindled so far from its original meaning as to mean nothing at all. Perhaps writers of such statements could pause and try to think of a word that still retains a distinctive meaning: 10 Unexpectedly Catchy Cover Songs How to Become A More Likeable Person What Are Some Really Inventive Ways to Use Chocolate Mint? I Had Some Really Delicious Noodles Today Unlike the adjective awesome, the noun awe continues to mean something. In the expression â€Å"to be in awe of,† awe means â€Å"respectful admiration†: Cricketer in awe of cataract surgeons We are all in awe of the dedication and commitment of our polio eradication colleagues around the world. The expression â€Å"in awe† conveys the experience of an emotion felt at seeing something fearful or sublime in nature: We  watched in awe  as the  Aurora  Borealis danced around us, all alone in the Icelandic Countryside. Photographer Kenneth Watkins watched in awe from just 30 yards away [as two male lions fought for mating rights]. But the expression â€Å"in awe† is also dwindling into meaninglessness: Travellers in awe of new airport [The store clerk] watched in awe as she stacked up an enormous armload of music.   I watched in awe as my friend ate her first push popsicle ever. Finally, there is the military coinage â€Å"shock and awe† in which awe retains the meaning of fear or dread: shock and awe: a military doctrine based on the use of overwhelming power and spectacular displays of force. Even this fearsome expression is being used in various non-military contexts with descending coherence: If organized labor were to throw its money and numbers behind a shock-and-awe effort to organize fast food workers across the country, they would no doubt emerge immensely strengthened. Greek workers resist shock and awe austerity measures   The Shock and Awe of Ikea’s Employee Spying Program [Employees] meet personal needs by using inappropriate openness to shock and awe co-workers.   What he has done to date has left everybody in shock and awe. This video  left me  in  shock and awe. Kids use the Walkman for the first time and react with  shock and awe.   Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Expressions category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Addressing A Letter to Two PeopleOne Fell Swoop30 Words for Small Amounts

A Strategic Brand Management

A Strategic Brand Management According to the book Strategic Brand Management by Kevin Lane Keller (2008) , Identifying and creating brand positioning is the first and important stage of the strategic brand management process. Positioning effects on a founding benchmark and works toward building a strong brand by helping marketers to design, to implement, to solidify or to sustain brand associations. Aaker (1991 ) also supports the idea that the brand position can offer clear direction to a communication program implementation. To establish the position of a brand, the concept of it should be clearly defined. Criticism of the literature reveals numerous meanings and clarification of positioning. Sekhar, (1989) states that the concept of positioning developed from research on market segmentation and targeting. Kotler (2003, p. 308) defines brand positioning as â€Å"the act of designing the company’s offering and image to occupy a distinctive place in the mind of the target market. The end result of pos itioning is the successful creation of a customer-focused value proposition, a cogent reason why the target market should buy the product†. Arnott (1992, 1993) parallels the idea by stating that positioning is, correlated to the rivalry, management attempt to adjust the tangible features and the intangible views of a marketable contribution. Furthermore, Kapferer (2004, p. 99) emphasises on the distinctive characteristics that make a band different from its competitors and alluring to the public. In addition, Sengupta (2005) enhances the term of perception that indicate the core of the brand in terms of its functional and emotional benefit in the decision of customer. Also, it is shown as points in perceptual space and thought up a product class. In essence, Keller outlines the idea behind the concept of brand positioning that involves four aspects; target market identification, the nature of competitors, the ideal of points of parity, and the points of difference. Identifying target market is crucial part in establish a robust positioning because dissimilar segment may have diverse brand knowledge structure or perceive the same brand in different way vary by own attitudes, beliefs, and experience. The target customer can be classified as descriptive (customer-oriented), which associated to the kind of customer or behavioral (product-oriented), which related to how customers consider of or utilizes the brand or product. The behavioral side is more significant to comprehend brand position due to stronger strategic implication. Decided type of target can, then, implicitly sketches the nature of rivalry because businesses usually target that same segment in terms of category membership. Once the appropriate competitive frame of reference for positioning has been formed, the correct points of parity (POPs) and points of difference (PODs) are able to make. Point of parity (POPs) are characteristics or benefits that may mutual with other brands separated into two forms: category and competitive. Category point of parity is a standard association expected by customers to show the credibility of companies. Competitive Point of parity are associations designed to abolish rivalry Point of difference. It is used when firms want to break even the area that competitors are attempting to seek an advantage and achieve advantages in some other areas. To illustrate, to enter in the fast food industry, there are key elements that help customers to label a brand as a fast food restaurant such as quick service, good taste, and low prices. These are fundamental features and benefits of product category that it belongs to. Point of difference, on the other hand, comprises of strong, favorable and unique associations for a brand based on attribute or benefit association in the mind of customer. It is associations that customers believe that they couldn’t find in the competitive brand. It is considered by functional basis, performance-related consi deration and imagery related criterion, which are competitive strengths and insight about consumers’ motivations. Reeves and Ted Bates advertising agency (1950) also support the common concept of PODs in terms of unique selling proposition (USP) that promoting use to compel customers to buy product that competitors could not race. For instance, fast-food chain Subway uses the healthier benefit as PODs compared with other quick-serve restaurants that supported by less fat attribute. Nike, for another example, claim of superior performance in athletic shoes.

Financial Accounting Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Financial Accounting - Essay Example Further an analysis is made to understand which of the two objectives is apt for the GPFR. Also an analysis is made to understand if the proposal of the IASB has helped improve the GPFR. A conclusion is then drawn out based on the discussion. However to discuss this further it is essential that we first understand what general purpose financial reports deal with. The next section focuses on understanding general purpose financial reports in detail. The Statement of Accounting Concept (SAC 1) explains general purpose financial reports as reports that are intended to meet the needs of common users who are unable to command the preparation of reports tailored to their specific needs. Also GPFRs can be produced by entities that have users who cannot command the preparation of specific information. The entities are required to be reporting entities and if they are not deemed to be report entity then it would not require producing a GPFR and would not require complying with all the accounting standards (IASB, 2008). GPFRs are not produced for a single group of users. It has grown from the basic need of all groups of users who need financial information. However there are conflicts between the groups since almost every group require different information for example suppliers and lenders vs. the shareholders, or the senior management vs. the employees. Shareholders require a more detailed report which helps them analyses the profitab ility, whereas lenders and suppliers require the report to be made for them to be more conservative. Similarly senior management would have concerns about the profits that are reported as if the profits are reported to be high the chances of increase in wage demanded will also be high. The main objectives of general purpose financial reports of the Australian accounting standards board is to provide reliable and

Samsung Electronics Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 3

Samsung Electronics - Case Study Example What the Chinese lacked in design and production, they compensated in their business acumen. They forged alliances with those market leaders only and got the license to from them to produce chips based on blueprints and sold at low cost, in order to penetrate the market. Thus, looking at the market strategy of the Chinese firms and their potential to imitate and innovate existing products, there is genuine threat from the Chinese firms. Samsung needs to look at the various options of competitive advantage to respond appropriately so that it could maintain its leadership position within the semiconductor market. There are two main areas where Samsung can keep ahead of the Chinese firms. The first one is its state of the art R&D which greatly facilitates development of new products through specialized product development teams. The new products ensure that the constantly changing preferences of the customers are met timely thus making certain that they maintain their leadership position. Chinese not only lack R&D facilities but lack of experience is also a big drawback in the area of R&D. The second important area is its design and production line. Backed by effective R&D team, the company has the requisite infrastructure and capabilities to design and produce innovative products. The Chinese firms have yet to acquire expert knowledge of the design and production technology of core units of semiconductors. This gives a huge advantage to Samsung to go in for new products and create niche market for them in the emerging new economies like India, China, Brazil etc. It is assumed that despite huge government concessions to Chinese firms in China, lack of effective intellectual property laws would be a big deterrent for other big companies to transfer technology. Samsung, therefore, would be right to continue innovative products and add-ons for existing as well as for new market. In the changing paradigms of business environment, there is

Persuading the Teacher to let me do my Research Paper on Prison Essay Example for Free

Persuading the Teacher to let me do my Research Paper on Prison Essay Abstract   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The United States is currently facing an overcrowding crisis in its prisons today. Increased rate of crime and the refusal by the relevant state authorities to expand the number of correctional facilities has put a strain to the existing prisons. This has been recently been revisited in the national forums with calls from the concerned stakeholders to address the situation before it gets out of hand. Overcrowding according to prison authorities has reached peak levels to an extent that inmates are forced to share cells. The negative impacts of overcrowding are known and they include aggression and a higher likelihood of disease spreading (Paulus, P et al 112).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   This situation needs to be arrested. There exist many strategies on the table that can be used to curb overcrowding. These would range from building new facilities, alternative correctional methods and proper designs of the correctional facilities. (www.johnhoward.ab.ca). The purpose of this short essay is to apply all the persuasive and writing schools acquired, use them to convince my instructor on why I should be allowed to tackle the above topic.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In this paper, I shall look at the resources that are they’re touching on this topic, and use them to present a solid case and position regarding the topic. This all is meant to prove to my instructor that this is a topic worthy tackling and that I am the right person. The possible thesis statement for the essay will be: The federal government should allocate adequate resources to alleviate the problem of overcrowding in our prisons. This thesis statement emanates form a personal belief and strong conviction that the situation as it stands in our prisons breeds more problem that it seeks to solve. The government has a key duty to provide essential services to all the citizens of this nation in spite of the status in life. The inmates are no lesser human beings than us ad deserve all the resources possible to make their stay in prison meaningful.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   There are two very specific reasons that have aroused my intense interest of covering this specific topic. The first is my background and secondly is my interest in championing for human rights. Having been born and bred in a crime prone environment I have a first hand experience with criminals and a better understanding of why people indulge in crime. The political, social and economical factors that can lead to crime. The prisons are supposed to be correctional facilities and not to excessively punish and waste the potentials possessed by the inmates.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In writing this research paper I intend to utilize a large number of resources. The Internet and the library will provide a good source of information on overcrowding. Goggle scholar for example has lots of articles covering this topic. For example an article by Anne Bolduc â€Å"our crowded prisons† provides useful insights (Pg 45-57). From the library, a book by Stephen D, et al (America’s correctional crisis, Pg 12-56) focuses on the topic. There will be supplemented by other journal articles and materials from the web. This is an interesting topic and I plan to invest a lot of my time to expound more on the existing information. Works Cited Paulus, P, Cox V McCain, G: Death rates, Psychiatric commitments, blood pressure and perceived crowding as a function of institutional crowding. Environmental psychology and non-verbal behavior, 3, 1978. 107-116 Prison overcrowding. John Howard Society of Alberta, 1996. Retrieved on 21/09/07 from http://www.johnward.ab.ca/pub/c42.htm Anne Bulduc. Our crowded prisons, animals of the American academy of political and social science. 1985, 45-57 Stephen D. Gottfredson, Sean McConville. America’s Correctional Crisis. Prison populations and public policy. Greenwood Press, 1987, 12-56

Religion in American Politics Essay -- Role of Religious Lobbies

The United States of America has the most diverse religious population in the world. In places like Iraq, Syria, Israel, Afghanistan, Yemen, and other countries too numerous to mention, countless lives are lost over religious differences. In America, a Protestant can live happily next door to a Jew, who might live across the street from a Muslim, or a Catholic, or a Sikh, or even a Humanist! This is in no small way attributed to the fact that the US Constitution’s First Amendment includes what is known as the establishment clause, which states that â€Å"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,† effectively separating affairs of religious institutions from secular, governmental institutions. That is, however, no guarantee that American politics will turn a blind eye to religious beliefs. In fact, in the past few decades, political agendas have been turning more and more religious in nature(Paraschivesc u 2012:22). In 1960 John F. Kennedy was elected the first Roman Catholic President of the United States, putting an end to the 171-year tradition of presidents, beginning with George Washington, that were from Protestant backgrounds. While many conservative Protestants scoffed at Kennedy as trying to break down the wall of separation between church and state and bring Catholic teachings into American government, Kennedy eloquently replied by saying, â€Å"I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute—where no Catholic prelate would tell [a Catholic] president how to act and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote.† Kennedy went on to elaborate that no faith-based educational institution should be granted money by t... ...olitical system for as long as Americans are religious. References Chapp, C. B. (2012). Religious rhetoric and American politics: The endurance of civil religion in electoral campaigns. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Fowler, Robert Booth, and Allen D. Hertzke. 1995. Religion and Politics in America: Faith, Culture and Strategic Choices. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press. Hertzke, Allen D. 1989. â€Å"The Role of Religious Lobbies.† Religion in American Politics. Ed. Charles W. Dunn. Washingtonc D.C.: Congressional Quarterly. Kosmin, Barry A., and Seymour P. Lachman. 1993. One Nation Under God: Religion in Contemporary American Society. New York: Harmony Books. Paraschivescu, M. (2012). ‘We the People’ and God, religion and the political discourse in the United States of America. Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies, 11(33), 21-38.