Age of Imperialism Continued

A Current Uprising

Today, there are many uprisings in the Middle East, like the overthrow of the Libyan government. February 16^th, 2011, marked the beginning of the overthrow of the Libyan government. It started out with many riots in Libya, and then ended up with the assassination of the ruler of Libya at the time, Muammar Gaddafi. During the revolutions, crowd protesters protested outside local government offices and demanded the release of the political activists. They chanted slogans accusing the Quatar-based news channel of broadcasting lies. The uprising resulted in the overthrow of the Gaddafi government, and Sharia became the new basis for law in the country.

"Spotlight On" the Suez Canal

Today, the Suez Canal is operated by the Suez Canal Authority. The canal itself is 101 miles long, and 984 feet wide. It begins at the Mediterranean Sea at Point Said flows through Ismailia in Egypt, and ends at Suez on the Gulf of Suez. It also has a railroad running its entire length parallel to its west bank. The Suez Canal can accommodate ships with a vertical height of 62 feet or 210,000 deadweight tons. Most of the Suez Canal is not wide enough for two ships to pass side by side. To accommodate this, there is one shipping lane and several passing bays where ships can wait for others to pass. The Suez Canal has no locks because Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea's Gulf of Suez have approximately the same water level. It takes around 11 to 16 hours to pass through the canal and ships must travel at a low speed to prevent erosion of the canal's banks by the ships' waves.

3-2-1 Summary

Three Things I Learned

• I learned a lot about the Suez Canal. I've heard of it before, but I didn't know where it was, or it's significance.
• I learned about imperialism in the United States. I never put two and two together, and understood how it was that the United States was imperialistic.
  
• I liked learning about the great migration during this chapter. It was neat seeing that people were migrating to other countries besides the United States.
  

Two Things that Interested Me

• Imperialism in the United States. I was really interested when I had to come up with proof on each side. That the US could and could not be imperialistic. It really made me think, and was difficult for me to come up with reasons on both sides.
  
• The political cartoons. I love political cartoons because frankly make me laugh. They are a really neat way of looking at history in a completely different sense.
  

One Question I Still Have

• Why has the United States tried to defend itself and say that it isn't imperialistic, when there are clearly imperialistic tendencies there? I just don't understand why it would be such a problem for us to say that.