The Functions of Advertising Departments

The Functions of Advertising Departments is usually divided into various segments. Each advertising department has a specific function or assignment. Once one department has completed its work, it hands off the completed assignment to the next department in the advertising process until the ad campaign is completed. The first department that becomes involved in an advertising campaign is the research department. The Functions of Advertising Departments as much as media publishing is concerned is important for shaping what the ads would look like.

The Climate of Afghanistan

The Climate of Afghanistan may vary according to specific areas. Most of Afghanistan has a subarctic mountain climate with dry and cold winters, except for the lowlands, which have arid and semiarid climates. In the mountains and a few of the valleys bordering Pakistan, a fringe effect of the Indian monsoon, coming usually from the southeast, brings moist maritime tropical air in summer. Afghanistan has clearly defined seasons: Summers are hot and winters can be bitterly cold. Summer temperatures as high as 49°C (120°F) have been recorded in the northern valleys. Midwinter temperatures as low as -9°C (15°F) are common around the 2,000-m (6,600-ft) level in the Hindu Kush. The climate in the highlands varies with elevation. The coolest temperatures usually occur on the heights of the mountains.

Temperatures often range greatly within a single day. Variations in temperature during the day may range from freezing conditions at dawn to the upper 30°s C (upper 90°s F) at noon. Most of the precipitation falls between the months of October and April. The deserts receive less than 100 mm (4 in) of rain a year, whereas the mountains receive more than 1,000 mm (40 in) of precipitation, mostly as snow. Frontal winds sweeping in from the west may bring large sandstorms or dust storms, while the strong solar heating of the ground raises large local whirlwinds. The Climate of Afghanistan is similar to what is obtainable in the western world today.

The Balance Sheet

Of the two traditional types of financial statements, the balance sheet relates to an entity’s financial position at a point in time, and the income statement relates to its activity over an interval of time. The balance sheet provides information about an organization’s assets, liabilities, and owners’ equity as of a particular date—namely, the last day of the accounting or fiscal period. The format of the balance sheet reflects the basic accounting equation: Assets equal equities. Assets are economic resources that are expected to provide future service to the organization. Equities consist of the organization’s liabilities, which are its obligations together with the equity interest of its owners. For example, assume that a business owns a building worth $7 million and that the amount left to pay on the mortgage loan is $5 million. On the business’s balance sheet, the building would be considered an asset worth $7 million, the unpaid mortgage loan balance would be considered a liability of $5 million, and the $2-million difference between the value of the building and the outstanding loan would be the business’s equity.

Assets are categorized as current or long-lived. Current assets are usually those that management could reasonably be expected to convert into cash within one year; they include cash, receivables (money due from customers, clients, or borrowers), merchandise inventory, and short-term investments in stocks and bonds. Long-lived assets include the land, buildings, machinery, motor vehicles, computers, furniture, and fixtures belonging to the company. Long-lived assets also include real estate being held for speculation, patents, and trademarks.

Liabilities are obligations that the organization must remit to other parties, such as vendors, creditors, and employees. Current liabilities generally are amounts that are expected to be paid within one year, including salaries and wages, taxes, short-term loans, and money owed to suppliers of goods and services. Noncurrent liabilities include debts that will come due beyond one year, such as bonds, mortgages, and other long-term loans. Whereas liabilities are the claims of outside parties on the assets of the organization, the owners’ equity is the investment interest of the owners in the organization’s assets. When an enterprise is operated as a sole proprietorship or as a partnership, the balance sheet may disclose the amount of each owner’s equity. When the organization is a corporation, the balance sheet shows the equity of the owners (the stockholders) as consisting of two elements. These two elements which constitute the balance sheet are the amount originally invested by the stockholders and the corporation’s cumulative reinvested income, or retained earnings—that is, income not distributed to stockholders as dividends.

The Acadian Expulsion

The Acadian Expulsion began as a prelude to their neutrality. In 1749 the British founded Halifax, Nova Scotia, and began to import settlers into Nova Scotia for the first time. During the 1750s, as tensions between Britain and France built toward the French and Indian War (1754-1763), most Acadians remained committed to neutrality as the French and British skirmished over their holdings in the region. The British increasingly distrusted Acadian neutrality and Acadian trade with the French in Louisbourg.

In the summer of 1755, the Nova Scotia military council ordered the deportation of all Acadians from the colony. During the initial months of the expulsion, the British shipped about 7,000 Acadians south to British colonies from Massachusetts to Georgia. After the fall of Louisbourg to the British in 1758, Britain cleared Île Royale and sent thousands more Acadians to Britain and France, as well as to North and South America. Some of those deported died en route, and others were separated from their families. Others fled to Québec. By 1762 only some 1,500 Acadians remained in the Maritime region.

Following the deportation, immigrants from New England resettled most Acadian lands. Scattered across three continents, Acadians began to establish new communities. By 1800 close to 3,000 of these exiles had made their way to Louisiana, where the former Acadians became known over time as Cajuns. Also by that time, substantial numbers returned to the Maritime region, bringing the French-speaking population there to more than 8,000. Acadians founded rural communities in scattered locations where they subsisted through small-scale farming, fishing, and working in the woods. The Acadian Expulsion was one incidence that showed the suffering of ordinary people as a result of the tension between two opposing colonial powers.

The End of Monarchy in Afghanistan

The End of Monarchy in Afghanistan came after the 1973 overthrow. In 1973 Muhammad Daud overthrew the king in a coup. He declared Afghanistan a republic with himself as president. Daud announced ambitious plans for economic development and tried to play the USSR against Western donors, but his dictatorial government was opposed both by radical left-wing intellectuals and soldiers and by traditionalist ethnic leaders. The leading leftist organization was the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), which had been founded in 1965 and in 1967 split into a pro-Soviet Parcham faction and a much more radical Khalq faction. The two groups joined forces in 1976 to oppose Daud. The End of Monarchy in Afghanistan was one incidence that finally cumulated in the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan on December 25, 1979 with the Soviets capitalizing on the instability in the government at the time of the invasion.

The Cultural Impact of Advertising

The Cultural Impact of Advertising has generated some arguments for and against in certain quarters. Some are of the opinion that foreign culture alien to a particular area is imported while others merely see it as a means of learning other people’s way of life. Advertising can affect cultural values. Some advertising messages, for example, encourage aggressive individualism, which may clash with the traditional cultural values of a country where the collective or group is emphasized over the individual or humility or modesty is preferred to aggressiveness. With the globalization of the world economy, multinational corporations often use the same advertising to sell to consumers around the world. Some critics argue that advertising messages are thus helping to break down distinct cultural differences and traditional values, causing the world to become increasingly homogeneous.

Many advertising campaigns, however, have universal appeal, overriding cultural differences, or they contribute to culture in a positive way. Humor in advertising has made many ad campaigns widely popular, in some cases achieving the status of folklore or taking on new life in another arena. For example, a popular ad campaign for a fast-food chain with the slogan “Where’s the beef?” became part of the 1980 Democratic presidential primary campaign between Gary Hart and Walter Mondale. The ad ridiculed a competitor by depicting a small hamburger patty dwarfed by a huge bun. During a primary debate one of the candidates used the ad slogan to suggest that his opponent’s campaign lacked substance. The Cultural Impact of Advertising is however such that when a particular product is advertised the culture of the originators many a time are clearly visible.

The Early Political Career of Abraham Lincoln: United States Congressman

The Early Political Career of Abraham Lincoln: He was United States Congressman after his service in Illinois. Congressman-elect Lincoln was a popular, masterful politician in Illinois. Having succeeded in the rough-hewn Illinois legislature, he was confident that he would make his mark in Congress. Once in Washington, D.C., however, Lincoln became one of many unknown freshman congressmen. The inner councils of government were closed to him, as was the Washington social life that Mary Lincoln was looking forward to. However, Lincoln never lost confidence in himself. He wrote Herndon, “As you are all so anxious for me to distinguish myself, I have concluded to do so before long.” The Lincolns, with their two sons, lived quietly in a modest boardinghouse. Lincoln had a small body of friends with whom he could relax and discuss politics. Among them was Alexander H. Stephens, the Whig congressman from Georgia, who later became vice president of the Confederate States of America. The Early Political Career of Abraham Lincoln: His role as United States Congressman would further prepare for an eventual presidency of the country.

The Economy of Afghanistan

A decade of Soviet occupation, war, and economic manipulation followed by years of civil war left the economy of Afghanistan in shambles. Even in the 1970s, prior to the wars, Afghanistan had one of the lowest standards of living in the world. As the Soviet-Afghan War and its effects spread throughout the country in the early 1980s, two separate economies emerged: the urban financial and industrial facilities, tied especially to the Soviet Union, and the largely independent rural subsistence economy. The production, trafficking, and movement of drugs and weapons became a major hidden part of the economy.

Over the centuries, Afghans have developed a number of different strategies to earn a living from their difficult environment. Most Afghans are settled farmers, herders, or both, depending upon ecological, economic, and political factors. They are usually self-sufficient in foodstuffs and other necessities. Industry and mining developed considerably in the 20th century, but local handicrafts remained important.

In 1956 the government launched the first of several five-year plans. Irrigation efforts and development of a better road and telecommunications network had top priority, with later efforts toward production of textiles, cement, electricity, fertilizer, and grain storage facilities. Progress was made to develop better trade with the outside world, especially with Europe, the United States, and Japan. Major nations aided Afghanistan in building roads, dams, hydroelectric facilities, airports, factories, and irrigation networks. After the Soviet invasion in 1979, development aid from the West ceased, and until 1991 Afghanistan was economically dependent on the USSR. Following the collapse of the Taliban regime in late 2001, Afghanistan began the reconstruction of its war-ravaged economy with assistance from international financial institutions and individual countries. The Economy of Afghanistan from the foregoing cannot be said to be fully developed due often times to the impact of war and unstable governments.

The Executive in Afghanistan

The Executive in Afghanistan has the same function as other presidential democracies. The president is head of state and head of government, as well as commander in chief of the armed forces. The president is directly elected to a term of five years and may serve no more than two terms. The 2004 constitution established a strong presidency, but it imposes some restrictions on presidential power. For example, some of the president’s appointments and policy decisions are subject to parliamentary approval, including those of government ministers and Supreme Court justices. The Executive in Afghanistan is responsible for running the government and foreign affairs.

The End of the War for Hitler

The End of the War for Hitler began after the D-Day invasion. By the time of the Allied D-Day invasion of Normandy (Normandie), in northern France, in June 1944, the war was going very badly for Hitler. A series of losses to the Allies and failure to defeat the Soviets had left Hitler’s armies severely weakened. Hitler’s Germany had also changed a great deal. British and American bombers were devastating its industries and cities. The Germans who had reservations about Hitler’s regime had begun to find some recruits. However, most of the population still supported the regime and especially Hitler; consequently, those opposed to him saw his assassination followed by a military takeover as the only way to topple the dictatorship. Several assassination attempts, beginning in March 1943, miscarried. A bomb was placed in Hitler’s headquarters at Rastenberg in East Prussia (modern Poland) on July 20, 1944, but did not kill him. The conspirators tried to launch their coup anyway, but with little support the effort failed. Hundreds involved in the coup attempt were executed, and Hitler maintained control of the country.

Underestimating the Americans, Hitler launched his last reserves west into the Ardennes country of Belgium and Luxembourg in the Battle of the Bulge (December 1944-January 1945). He felt that despite massive Allied gains, a hard blow would cause popular support for the war in America to collapse, and would lead to the disintegration of the coalition arrayed against him. All he accomplished, however, was to draw away troops needed in the east, allowing the Soviet army’s winter offensive to roll all the way to the gates of Berlin. Hitler decided to remain in the city, hoping to inspire its defenders and anticipating a breakup of the Allies’ alliance. When neither of these hopes was realized, he appointed Karl Dönitz, the head of the navy and a devoted Nazi, as his successor. He then married his mistress Eva Braun and committed suicide in Berlin on April 30, 1945 and hence the End of the War for Hitler