Talk:Federal government of the United States

I think this should be at Politics of the United States, like with the other countries. In spite of this page (http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Whatlinkshere&target=Government_of_the_United_States). --KQ 21:27 Aug 31, 2002 (PDT)

Perhaps this should be at U.S. Federal Government ? Susan Mason

Oh no, not again... ;) -- Oliver P. 05:11 Mar 12, 2003 (UTC)

Shrug...People generally don't say "Federal Government of the United States", its too stilted. Susan Mason

Plenty of Americans refer to it as the "federal government." For the benefit of non-Americans, the full title Federal Government of the United States makes perfect sense. Funnyhat 01:08, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I have no preference for either, rather I have been attempting to fill out the Politics of the United States page and this page. I simply wanted to indicate that this page was dealing only with the federal government and not any state or local government. - Sfmontyo

I suppose what Im getting at is we should generally write United States as U.S.. Susan Mason

Oh my God. Although I disagree with his last comment, I'm afraid I have to agree with Lir on something. Beware, the end of the world is at hand. This article should be at Government of the United States, not "Federal Government" ... -- Zoe

Zoe, I'm not sure if Susan was reacting to the fact that "Federal Government" and "Gov of U.S." might be considered redundant. I believe that that is what you are referring to. Is that correct? I think that Government of the United States is a bit too vague as it might mean:

1. ) all the governments in the country which are of course the federal, state, and local governments or
2. ) it might just mean the federal.

If you are used to thinking that the U.S. is a federal republic, then you'd probably think of the 2. I changed it in attempt to make it more clear that this article deals solely in regards to the federal gov in context of the Politics of the United States. -- Sfmontyo

"Government of the United States" refers to the national government. The national government of the United States is a federal government. Therefore, "Federal Government of the United States" is redundant. -- Zoe

The term "government" is more general than that, as Sfmontyo just pointed out. Perhaps Government of the United States should discuss the general structure of the system of government, outlining how the federal, state, and local governments interact. By the way, Zoe, you are making a different point from Susan Mason (whose proposed title left in the word "Federal"), so apart from your agreement that the current title is wrong, you're not in agreement on the details. So no need to worry too much. ;) -- Oliver P. 10:51 Mar 13, 2003 (UTC)

I looked at some of the government web sites that I have been using for info and this is what I found:

from usembassy.state.gov

The federal government of the United States consists of three parts: the executive, legislative and judicial branches. The ...

from www.info.gov

Describes the basis of the government of the U.S. ... Federal, State, and local governments are explained and compared.

Those sites make a distinction between the government of the United States being all three versus the federal government being just well, the federal government. BTW: In the Politics of the United States page, you'll find a general description of the state and local govs, again taken from the usinfo.state.gov site. - Sfmontyo

One more thing, just to be clear, I believe that the above shows that there are at least two different ways of interpreting the phrase government of the United States and that there is sufficient ambiguity to warrant adding the term Federal in order to disambiguate the two meanings. I know that in other contexts, government of the United States refers solely to the federal government. - Sfmontyo

Isn't that what should be discussed here? All of the states have their own pages or sections on the state governments. -- Zoe

I thought about it and if someone does the work of renaming it :), what I'll do is what Oliver suggested, that is, I'll place a sentence at the top stating that the article is about the federal government and point them to the Politics of the United States page and the individual state pages for info about the state and local govs. Cheers - Sfmontyo

"Federal Government of the United States" will save us that disambiguation at the top. I'll move this back if no one objects (the fool who moved it in the first place didnt bother to move the talk page). --Jiang 10:17, 19 Jan 2004 (UTC)

There is an interesting proportion of description devoted to executive versus judicial and legilative branches. Also in the "related links section." Of course it's all NPOV so it's not biased at ALL in its presentation. Should NPOV include the organization of articles?

Seems like the best way to correct the disproportion would be to expand the legislative and judicial sections. The executive is the largest and most complex sector of the federal government, though, so perhaps it makes some sense for it to be a little bigger than the others. - Walkiped 03:31, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Maybe it would be prudent to cut down on the sections on the executive branch and rather refer to the actual articles where each department is described. That would make the whole article less bulky at once. It's a big change though so I'd rather hear some comments before going on. - sebmol 20:11, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea to me. - Walkiped 07:13, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Done. Please let me know if this turned out allright. If not, please feel free to edit. It may also be good to include maybe some form of chart or diagram in this article that presents the composition and relationships within the US government.--sebmol 12:20, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)