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#Post#: 104--------------------------------------------------
Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: MrLyon
Date: December 11, 2012, 3:43 pm
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For this week's outside reading assignment, go to the website of
any major national newspaper (New York Times, Chicago Tribune,
USA Today, Wall Street Journal, etc.). Locate the newspaper's
opinion/editorial page and, on this page, select any editorial
to read. Provide a link to the editorial in your response.
In this forum, provide a 500-word response to the editorial,
evaluating the writer's use of rhetorical and literary
techniques. Use the "Magnificent Seven" rubric as your guide in
judging the quality of the author's writing. What ideas are
brought forth? How are they presented? How are the ideas
organized? What word choices, sentence structure techniques, and
literary devices (repetition, allusions, alliteration, etc.) are
used to make the author's ideas stand out? Type your response as
a reply to this post.
DUE DATE: Thursday, December 13
#Post#: 105--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock13
Date: December 12, 2012, 2:37 pm
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In the New York Times, there was an article named “Too Big To
indict.” This article focused more on the view of the government
and what they can do about prosecuting. The tone of this article
could make a reader believe that the author had a strong stand
point on the bank topic. Even though the author does not include
personal pronouns, a reader can still tell that the author had a
strong feeling. The author, whose name was not printed in the
article, states “There is no doubt that the wrongdoing at HSBC
was serious and pervasive. Several foreign banks have been fined
in recent years for flouting United States sanctions against
transferring money through American subsidiaries on behalf of
clients in countries like Iran, Sudan and Cuba. HSBC’s actions
were even more egregious.” This particular author wanted to make
a point that the London bank was in fact using people and were
handling the money the wrong way. They cheated people out of
their money and thought they were getting away with it. He
proves this with the statement “According to several law
enforcement officials with knowledge of the inquiry, prosecutors
found that, for years, HSBC had also moved tainted money from
Mexican drug cartels and Saudi banks with ties to terrorist
groups.” He stated that many prosecutors and law cases are doing
everything that they can to bring them down. “According to
several law enforcement officials with knowledge of the inquiry,
prosecutors found that, for years, HSBC had also moved tainted
money from Mexican drug cartels and Saudi banks with ties to
terrorist groups.”
HTML http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/12/opinion/hsbc-too-big-to-indict.html?ref=opinion
#Post#: 106--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: Cblock08
Date: December 12, 2012, 2:45 pm
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HTML http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/12/opinion/american-tariffs-bangladeshi-deaths.html?ref=opinion
In American Tarrifs, Bangladeshi Deaths by Sanchita B. Saxena,
Saxena starts out with a very emotional sentence. “The fire that
killed 112 workers...” This use of voice effectively comes
across the reader and catches them so they continue to read on.
The idea of Saxena’s story is very controversial if you take a
step back and there are many different beliefs about how this
should be handled. The internal structure of the piece is
thought out and it transitions nicely throughout. First the
author gives the background of what they are going to be talking
about and as they get deeper we can see how controversial this
is and what it means to them because of the emotion which is
expressed. This leads to word choice and the word choice that
Saxena uses is both regular easy to understand vocabulary and
some of it is sophisticated. With the word choice I can see the
intelligence behind the author. Sanchita is a “political
scientist and associate director of the Center for South Asia
Studies at the University of California, Berkeley.” Throughout
the story, Sanchita discusses the “...huge benefits for
Bangladesh’s economy...” and the impact it will have on people
and surrounding countries. The sentece fluency is perfect in
this story. Sanchita’s sentences flow from one to another and
while reading this story, there is never a question that I want
to ask that wasn’t clarified. “But leveling the playing field of
international trade could advance all of these goals.
International brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Gap, H&M, Target and
Walmart demand low prices and fast turnaround. In that context,
high tariffs work against the goals of fair-labor standards and
factory safety.” This paragraph flows excellently and works well
with the topic. The spelling, punctuation, capitalization,
grammar/usage, and paragraphing looks all correct to me with
exceptions to how it got formatted on my computer. The
presentation was fine. It was easy to read and there was no eye
strain like reading some other small texted stories.
#Post#: 107--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock07
Date: December 12, 2012, 5:50 pm
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The article that I read about was from the New York Times which
was about Privacy and the Apps that you download. It was written
by Edward W. Felten who is a professor of computer science and
public affairs at Princeton University. He said that" Privacy
shouldn’t be all or nothing". He meant that" Adult users, and
parents on behalf of their kids, should be empowered to decide
how to trade off privacy against function and convenience." This
means that also requires that companies disclose their data
practices and keep their privacy promises. There was also a new
study of children's apps found out that 80% of the apps failed
to disclose their privacy practices. That was a problem beacuse
some users wanted to switch companies and not deal with them
anymore. This is the lack of progress which turns into a
problem. This problem was an issue for the users and the
industry itself. Without the information for the users they will
expect the worst. The author of this article brings up a lot of
great ideas. One great thing is that he explains every idea he
has towards this issue. He almost eve gives his ideas in this
article as well. Everything is presented in a good way. This
article the ideas are organized in a good way. Every paragraph
has good facts and are explained so it is easy for readers to
understand. The way the author wrote this article made it seem
like the author was here in person. You could really hear him
saying all of this. He also uses good transition words to make
the article flow better. That makes it great so readers are
interested in this piece. This article is so great and made me
interested in what is going on.
HTML http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/12/11/privacy-and-the-apps-you-download/the-tech-industry-needs-to-step-up-on-privacy-dislosures
#Post#: 108--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock06
Date: December 12, 2012, 6:01 pm
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I read the article “Blast Target Syrian Regime Building in
Damascus” from USA today. This article was about an explosion
that targeted the Syrian Interior Ministry building. There have
been attacks from rebels trying to get closer to Damascus. The
article gave a history to what was happening in Syria and how it
started. The ideas in this article are obvious and straight
forward. The author wrote his ideas out to be very obvious with
giving facts about what is happening in Syria. The author shows
his ideas about what is happening in Syria with the civil war
and the bombing that is happening. “According to activist’s more
than forty thousand people have been killed since March 2011.”
The fact about shows how the author’s message is made by just
showing information to what the big impact to the war really is.
The author has a very strong point when he talks about giving
his details in what is happening in Syria. The organization of
the article is very good and clean. The author has many
different paragraphs that all relate back to the main idea of
the article. Each paragraph has its own idea that is about its
own information and topic that relates to the main message and
idea or the piece. The author has a few paragraphs dedicated to
the history of the war. The voice and tone of the writer is very
serious. The voice shows how the author cares about this war
that is happening and it shows how he wants people to know about
this happening in Syria. The word choice in this article is very
strong. There is a huge variety of words used which make the
writing better and sound very formal and clean. Word choices
like immediate, dramatically, and deadly show how bad this war
is and why people should know about this topic. Those word
choices also show imagery which shows how bad the conditions are
in Syria with the killings and bombings happening. The sentence
fluency of the article makes this a very easy article to read.
The sentences have a good flow and rhythm to them which helps
make it easier to read. The sentences are not awkward sounding
and they have a very easy rhythm to them. The grammar in the
article is very accurately used. The grammar and the correct
punctuation make the piece easier to read and understand. The
correct punctuation makes the sentences easier to read correctly
and makes it easier to understand. The presentation of the
article is neat and clean looking. The title picture is very
accurate to show what is happening in Syria. The balance of each
space and paragraph is very neat as well as the lines balance
between each other. Some things that stand out are the title
because it is in bold and the picture at the top of the article
is big and stands out. The picture shows and gives an idea on
what the article is about and it is very attracting. Overall,
this article was very interesting and informing about this
situation in Syria. The article uses the “magnificent seven”
very well to give information about this topic.
HTML http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2012/12/12/syria-damascus-rebels-assad/1764065/#
#Post#: 109--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock05
Date: December 12, 2012, 6:28 pm
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The article in the Washington Post “What future faces Afghan
women after U.S. forces depart?” the author states many facts
and throws hints of their opinion in their twice. In the article
the author stated “THE SLAYING Monday of a women’s advocate in
Afghanistan underlined one of the greatest dangers of the
approaching withdrawal of U.S. and NATO troops...” which shows
he/she is not in favor of withdrawal from Afghanistan. The
authors argument is legit because they use facts following right
after. For example the author states that three million or so
women are in school but, but Taliban is targeting women of power
now like Najia Seddiqi director of the women’s affairs
department. The article talks about how the Obama administration
and the Afghan Government are attempting to reason with the
Taliban before 2014, when all U.S. troops are out of
Afghanistan. Women in Afghanistan fear the little rights they
have been given will be taken away. Currently political groups
are supporting Senators Robert P. Casey Jr. (D) and Kay Bailey
Hutchison (R) amendment to the National Defense Authorization
Act. Separated into three parts, the first part is to set up
some form of long lasting security for Afghan women before and
after withdrawal. Also would require the collection of data on
women’s security and possibly turning areas of the country over
to Afghan forces. Finally, The Pentagon would be required to
create a plan to train women for the army and police force. The
author concluded his/her editorial with “The murder of Ms.
Seddiqi is a terrible reminder that the United States must not
abandon Afghanistan’s women as it leaves that country.”
Reminding the reader that the U.S. should not leave Afghanistan
without helping out the women there still fighting for their
rights.
HTML http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/what-future-faces-afghan-women-after-us-forces-depart/2012/12/11/8b3ae1fc-43cf-11e2-8061-253bccfc7532_story.html
#Post#: 110--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock12
Date: December 12, 2012, 7:37 pm
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In New York Times, one of the newest articles focused on a
parenting issue. Ross Douthat wrote an article called “One is
the loneliness number.” Douthat starts off his article about how
parents are starting their families later and later, and how the
effects are becoming more dangerous and sometimes even fatal.
Ross explains how the effects of having children at a later age
can be a let down for the parents as well as the kids, because
the kids want young parents that they can be active with and
adults want to have more can kids than they can possibly have at
that old of an age. The author obviously has a slight opinion
on the issue, because he appears to be siding with the fact that
children should have young parents, and deserve the
stereotypical childhood. The author presents the information in
a non formal, kind of friendly way, and makes many points not
only in his favor, but also mentions how parents may just be
nervous for a family, or procrastinates because of their career
or other complications. The ideas are organized in a way where
both points are mixed into one, and they aren’t ever completely
separated.
In the article, Douthat adds that Matthew Schmitz says, “It
is not that with bigger families life is necessarily happier,
but instead that it is richer, denser. What happiness we have
will be more widely and immediately shared, as with our sorrow.”
This kind of summarizes the definition of a family. Families
should always be there for each other, through the good and the
bad. This article highlights on how a family should be closer
in age than some of the families that are being created now.
Ross is obviously against parents waiting to have children,
because life just gets harder and busier, which makes it harder
to have children. So if parents are having children at a later
time, the children are penalized because their parents don’t
have as much time for them as other parents that are younger and
more available for their children when they need them. Also, on
top of it just being hard on both the children and adults to
start late, the longer you wait the greater your chance is for
the child to have some type of disorder or mental problem. This
can become extremely dangerous because the child’s effects can
even be fatal. The author does a fantastic job highlighting his
points more than the opposing position, but also spends some
time on the other opinion. This article was well written between
the vocabulary, the statements and ideas, and the voice of the
author, explaining both sides of the story.
#Post#: 111--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock04
Date: December 12, 2012, 7:47 pm
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This editorial explores the crime behind how a man named David
Koschman died and how the alleged murderer, Richard J. Vanecko,
got away with it. The purpose of an editorial is for the writer
to express his opinion on an issue, but I was unable to find
much indication of this author’s opinion. This editorial was
more like an average newspaper article where the author simply
explains the scenario to the reader. Nevertheless, this article
was very well written and the author should be proud of that.
Without the author’s opinion, the ideas of this article are very
simple; a man commits unintentional manslaughter and is never
charged, possibly because he is the nephew of the former Mayor,
Richard M. Daley. All of the information used was important to
the story and there did not seem to be any insignificant
information. The editorial was organized properly; similar
pieces of information were linked together in paragraphs as all
writing should do. Although transition sentences are not
generally used in newspaper articles, I think they tend to
heighten writing and would have enhanced the organization of
this article, if they were used. Since the author did not add
his opinion in the article, it is hard to judge how his voice is
coming through the writing. I think the author used a very
mature word choice, which is appropriate for this type of
writing. I especially liked this quote, “In his effort to make
sense of the case, Judge Toomin in April said police and
prosecutors suffered from ‘missing file syndrome,’ with symptoms
including prosecutors' records that had vanished and police
records that inexplicably went missing until 2011.” The
“missing file syndrome” part may be the only part of the article
where the author shows his opinion, which is that he does not
agree with how the police handled the investigation. Also the
quote serves as a subtle jab at the police force, which I found
amusing. There is also poor word choice in this article, as
well, like in this quote, “This is not a whodunnit.” First off,
the correct spelling is “whodunit,” second of all, I think this
word choice is too informal for an editorial of a newspaper.
The sentences are very well written and flow together suitably.
I like the use of the dash in this quote, “But the peculiarities
of this case demand that second-guessing — or rather.” I very
rarely see dashes used in writing, so I like how this author was
able to use one effectively. As the author would probably be
happy to hear, I was unable to find any misused conventions or
improper grammar; as I stated before, this article was written
very well. Unlike many of the other articles that I used for
outside reading assignments, this article did not have blue,
underlined words in the text. Although I am happy with this
improvement, the presentation still needs work because of the
constant barrage of advertisements. On another note, I did like
how the margines of the text were smaller; I find that this is
easier to read than when the text is spread across the whole
page.
HTML http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/editorials/ct-edit-manslaughter-20121204,0,5711012.story
#Post#: 112--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock11
Date: December 12, 2012, 7:55 pm
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In this editorial that I read the person is a scientist stating
his opinion about pesticides. This particular scientist doesn’t
like or want the use of pesticides. The scientist understands
that pesticides are used, but he believes that their usage is
becoming a bigger problem and that people use pesticides too
much, and don’t need to use that much. The author first starts
out with, “American agriculture uses more of them more than ever
before. And there threat is more acute than ever.” The author
starts off directly stating his opinion. To back up his argument
or explain why he believes this the writer goes on to talk about
the exposure to pesticides can lead to “adverse
neurodevelopment” such as a lower IQ, autism, attention
disorders, and hyperactivity. The writer states his opinion then
goes on to talk about the evidence he has seen and states the
reasons why he thinks this way. The author puts the words
“robust” and “adverse” in quotations because he is referring to
a statement that the American Association of Pediatrics made.
The author in this editorial uses the words “me” and “I”, which
are pronouns. The structure of this person’s writing is to state
his opinion then go into detail about why he believes this along
with having evidence for each detail. The evidence usually
refers to an organization, study, facts that he has read. The
author creates credibility by stating his opinion then backing
it up with details, and backing up those details by using
quotations or examples from studies etc. The emotional aspect of
the piece isn’t seen or “felt” until the last part of the
article. The author goes on to talk about the strategy helps
protect against “ourselves” and “our families”. Everyone
generally loves their families no matter what and would do
anything to protect them and that’s what the author does. The
author plays on those emotions and uses them to his advantage
saying that if we stop using pesticides we are protecting our
families. The author always talks about the health benefits from
not using or being exposed to pesticides. When anyone talks
about health benefits the author is usually playing with the
emotions of the people reading about this. The author knows that
stating the health benefits will get his or her point across as
for why he believes a certain way, but when talking about health
benefits the author knows it will capture the reader’s
attention. The author will want the reader to read on, and read
all of the reasons why the reader should stay away from
pesticides and ultimately take the author’s side. The reader has
the emotion of concern especially when reading an article about
pesticides, so when the reader hears the health benefits from
not using pesticides the reader will therefore be against using
pesticides and be cautious. Lastly, I believe that the author
and or writer has credibility because the author states his
opinion and backs his opinion up with details, instead of
stating his opinion and telling people to feel the same way.
HTML http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/11/pesticides-now-more-than-ever/?ref=opinion
#Post#: 113--------------------------------------------------
Re: Outside Reading Assignment #8 - Newspaper Editorial
DIR By: cblock09
Date: December 12, 2012, 9:39 pm
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The article I am reading is in the New York Times called "North
Korea's Latest Provocation." It talks about how North Korea
wants to "build and launch a long range rocket and put a
satellite into space." The message is that North Koreans are
crazy and it is going to be a while until they can build a
weapon of mass destruction that fits atop a missle. For an
opinionated based article, it was pretty well organized. The
article started with what North Koreas plan was. Then goes on to
explain what goes on in the country. North Korea is a harsh
regime that will kill its civilians if it doesnt agree. Then
goes on to explain how North Korea cant make weapons of mass
destruction. The USA and China stopped the country from making
plutonium which ended in 2002. The author, seemed to take North
Korea as the laughing stock of the world. The first thing he
mentions is that he "cannot feed his people." Later mentions
that they failed to launch a missle into space in april. These
people are nuts. The word choice was very basic. He told the
issue and went on with how the USA and China would respond. Very
basic vocab and not too many words based on emotions. The
sentences flowed well. It led from North Koreas idea, from the
country itself then how the rest of the world looks at them.
Transition sentence led the reader into the next idea. No
grammar errors. We exhibit the main idea by the author keeps on
mentioning how North Korea wants to launch a missle and they
keep failing. The fact they keep failing keep them trying making
the outside world laugh at them.
HTML http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/13/opinion/north-koreas-latest-provocation.html?ref=opinion&_r=0
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