McCain's speech

I think McCain delivered his speech with a lot of integrity. He opened up by being very humble, by announcing his call to president elect Obama, and how he was proud of him. I think he was doing this to connect with the majority of the American populace who voted for Obama, because his crowd in Arizona were ignorant rude people who started booing at the very mention of Obama's name. He showed that he excepted his fate and was acknowledged that the outcome was from the American's desire to change,and that he would continue to help the president to implement this change. His introduction used pathos to connect to the American people, so he would not look like, a bigoted prideful conservative that never backs down.

In his body his organization went from the past to the present to highlight the steps America has taken to change. He noted how Teddy Roosevelt invited Booker T. to the white house, and how we have come as far as having a president who is African American. He also inferred that his was a valiant achievement that American's have made. He did this to show the incredible will of the American people to change their lives for the better.

McCain repetitively used the pronoun we to create a sense of unity to America. He also used a lot of introductory phrases to emphasize the importance of the next clause.

In his conclusion he then thanked everybody, which is a sharp contrast to the victory speech we watch in class of President Bush. He did this at the end because he wanted to show that the new change is the most important issue for America right now. He also thanked his supporters and campaigners at the end to stress that they were the backbone of the campaign, which can not go without notice. And at the very end he stressed the valiant stubbornness of the American people to never give up, and not for his marathon in competing in political positions, but to never give up thee will to make America the best society to live in.

Visual Argument

In German class, I am learning about how after the war the Germans initiated a guest worker agreement with surrounding nations to help rebuild Germany. A large percentage of the helpers came from Turkey, to help rebuild because the population of German men was significantly low. A lot of the Turkish people stayed after the rebuilding and there a a whole slew of different opinions about the Turkish still living in Germany. Recently, my class was learning about the radical right view, who thinks the turkish should leave. For homework we watched a video on youtube with a song and just one image remaining on the screen throughout the whole song. It was a poster of Turkish people with bags packed and their backs turned and on the top saying thanks for the help and next to the picture saying now leave, the national party. I think this visual effect is very effective for the national p[arty and many other Germans because they feel that the Turkish are taking over their culture and jobs, leaving a lot of the east Germans without work when the wall fell. The image's message is short which is perfect for a political poster that is on a sidewalk so people can fully understand it when they are passing by. It is also an effective location because a lot of people in Germany walk or ride bikes, meaning a significant amount of the population will see this poster.

I don't think this image is very effective to get the Turkish to leave because they have established a new home in Germany. I mere poster is not going to change their minds about that. Also the red and black colors that outline the picture and words, makes the poster look cynical which might lose some understanding with Germans who have mixed issues with this subject simply cause the poster is exuding bad vibes.

All in all I think the poster did a concise job in putting everything that they wanted to say on a single poster. The viewers will get the point immediately.

Research

My first primary source only have a few things that make it primary. It has a couple of statistical data graphs that chart growth of transnational corporations. I had trouble finding concrete statistical studies with lexis nexis statistical. It was difficult because, this one was not already explained to us in class, and once I found a study that appealed to me, I couldn't even find the full text because the links on the abstract would never lead me to it, and when I looked up the titles on the general search, I never found the particular study that I wanted. So my first source has a lot of secondary input on foreign direct investment of transnational corporations. My second document is a primary source of a transcript of a capitol hill hearing testimony dealing with the inability of the Federal Regulation and Oversight of Energy's inability to discern the regulatory failures of the company Enron. This was found relatively quickly on the Lexis Nexis congressional studies

Corporations

Even though this is a prominent theme within debates, it can still be narrowed down to specific issues. It can be narrowed down to issues on how much power they have, how to tax them, and changing their role in the world. I want to base my paper more specifically on decreasing their power, and this can be further narrowed down to issues such as changing their status in the nation as being an "individual". Also it can be debated on whether or not corporation should be allowed intellectual property rights on living organisms. I think I want to stick to the topic of decreasing their power and uses the other narrowed down issues as points of why their power should be decreased.

A lot of people have experience with this issue, because many people are tied to corporation whether it be scientists manual laborer's politicians, and etc. Their role in society affects all social classes. Although most of these strata of society deal more with being impacted by corporations, I would Say that people who have the most experience in it are employees of the main office of the corporation.

everyone in the world is talking about this issue because of the rapid pace of globalization that has hit our society. Foreign relations have a lot to do with corporations considering that a lot of the factories are based in countries with a lower cost of labor.

Primary sources that I would like to tap into are statistical studies of corporations actions. Another primary source would be finding an employee from a corporations and interviewing him or her. What I really want to find is the positive and negative affects corporations have, and for example how growing advances in science have allowed corporations have some amazingly close to owning life as we know it.

Humurous Piece

My piece is a new-talk show skit of a business meeting with John McCain and the current Chinese president Hu Jintao. I wanted to exaggerate John McCain's stand with corporations. I highlighted the Republican stereotype of sometimes forgeting the needs and wants of the lower class or foreign entity's to implement free market and capitalist policies. I also used a few tendencies that John McCain seemed to emphasize in his debate against Obama as well as some influence from the Saturday Night Live Debate.

I feel like my piece lags at some point, and the joke or exaggeration does not get across. What could I do to spice it up a bit? Does it catch your attention from the beginning?

Humurous Argument

It may be a relative easy skit to choose, but I choose the SNL skit of the presidential debate in Mississippi to be my example of a humorous argument. The way that each actor accentuated the candidates diction and common ideas was hilarious. They pointed at each candidates overwhelming disadvantages using hyperbole. For example, how McCain kept justifying how he was different from Bush by explaining his predictable voting patterns against some of republican's, especially Bush's, policy, they characterized what he was saying by the actor of John McCain proclaiming that he is an unreliable candidate. The joke of Obama pulling the race card in dealing with North Korea, represented the lack in confidence of Obama being experienced enough to be effective in international diplomacy. This skit is also a very good example of the kind of things I want to implement in my humor piece. I want to create a dialogue between John McCain and Asian leaders as well as Obama's dialogue with them, emphasizing on redundant points the candidates brought up in their debate, and other things I found amusing.
http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/video/clips/presidential-debate/704121/

Op-Ed

I want to be creative on this project and write the piece from an Asian point of view. Many different nationalities live in America and their voice has a right to be heard too. What I specifically want to do with the topic from the Article "The Next President should focus more on Asia is to focus on the benefits of focusing more on Asia, and not just the countering reasons like we are doing nothing in Iraq. I think it will be hard trying to voice it through the perspective of a different nationality, but I want to try. Plus, the study the author of my artist used for research had a variety of nationalities within the study itself that will help me achieve my goal.

Letter to the Editor

Re: Next President should focus more on Asia.
I think that an account of how the United States should focus more on Asia, from a foundation mixed with Asian and American logistics and views, is an interesting way to analyze the situation. Normally, this type of account would allow the reader to see both perspectives of the nations in question. Although Paul suggests that it is a foundation of both ethnicities by quoting the retired US diplomat and the South Korean Minister, who developed parts of the study, I think that Paul fails to address the views of the Asians in the article. The article highlights how the U.S has been neglecting Asian diplomacy, not how (according to Han Sung-Joo, Tommy Koh, C. Raja Mohan of the study) Asia “wants the U.S to be an effective, global leader” when dealing with, as stated in Peter’s article, “pressing international problems.”
However, Peter does include quotes from the South Korean Foreign Minister on the topic of how the next president “will inherit the North Korean nuclear problem and should not lose time in diplomacy aimed at talking Pyongyang into giving up its atomic weapons.” Peter includes this claim to show how the American government might lose sight of important economical relations with Asia, and how Asia does not want this to occur. Though this point is an interesting outlook of why the U.S would be more active in Asia, it does not explain why it should.
The U.S focus “on the urgent at the expense of the important,” explains how the U.S. has lost some of its standings in Asian politics, but not why the U.S should focus more on Asia. In the Introduction to the study titled “Americas Role in Asia,” it explains how the U.S. is losing its dominant role in Asian trade due to the rising regional identity of Asia that constitutes the majority of Intra-Asian trade. I may have assumed that the U.S. might want to be more focused on Asia due to economic reasons, but I would have not known that the U.S’s importance to maintain this relationship was so dire because of the declining majority it has within Asian trade interactions.
Peter’s extensive knowledge of the study puts him at a credible position with his audience to consider his point; however I think he missed out on a few details that would allow reader to fully understand why the next president should focus more on Asia.
http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSN1034895420080911

Factual Argument

The title of my factual argument article is McCain Seen as Less Likely to Bring Change. Although the poll's title referring to the people's positon on change, it also bring's a number of other issues, like people's position on the Republican candidates after the convention, and different groups of people decisions on who the advocated. What I though was important in this article is that the authors Robin Toner and Adam Nagourney included a detailed description of what poll they found their factual data from. For example, how much the sampling error was, how many people were included in the nationwide telephone poll, and how many were registered voters. Another point that they brought up was a correlation between the economy being the top issue affecting their voting position, which presidential candidate will be able to manage the economy better, and who they think was less likely to bring change. Since the majority thought Obama had the greater ability to manga the economy McCain was ultimatly the candidate who was seen less likely to bring change.

My Editorial Piece

Since I am in Model United Nations, and because I am required to take a class on the origins of the UN, I decided that I wanted to pick a topic dealing with the candidates and their position on the UN. After many searches I found an article in Reuters that is based off a study that the next president should focus more on Asia. The main point of the article is to illustrate that the U.S. needs to maintain alliances with powerful nations such as Japan and China to help solve international problems. I am very intrigues in the metamorphosis that the United States role in international affairs will turn into. The next president has a lot to do with the changing role the U.S plays in foreign diplomacy. I also found an interesting structure of words that I think suggests bias which will be a great point to bring up in my rhetorical response.

How will I choose?

As of now I am maturing in my political position. In other words, I am at the intermediate stage between changing from the politics/values that I was encultured into, to determining my own position about policy. Because of this state, I can not reach some decisions on ethical issues such as abortion or gay marriage.

I do want to choose the candidate who I feel has the best policy to restore The U.S's economic state. I understand that the United States is a very social entity that wants to engage into the activities of other nations, but there comes a point and time where the nation's leader must solve the problems of his or her country.

Once I find the candidate that appeases my feelings towards the economic intent, discovering exactly what the candidates foreign diplomacy policy is will be another important component in my decision. One of of the big issues dealing with foreign diplomacy is how will the candidate handle the War in Iraq. If I do vote, I might be likely to chooses to create a plan to pull out of the Iraqi war.

Global Warming is another important stand I will consider in my choosing. I want to pick the candidate that identifies that this is in fact a growing problem that must somehow be retarded.
In relation to this issue, I want to choose the candidate who I think has the best goals in developing alternative energy due to the depletion of oil and because of the negative effects it has on the environment.

Though I am not one hundred percent about my own stand on some issues, I do have some strong ideas of what would be the better policy to benefit American citizens.

Logos

As I was thinking for something to use for my logos, I decided to pick an object that would hold true to "Everything's an Argument" , that everything can be an argument. As I glanced to the ground, I saw pack of lights bulbs that I had recently bought. Highlighted in red, "50% longer life*" was the first thing my eye was drawn to. Then I immediately looked to see the brand, which was GE, to see whether this brand has credibility due to its performance in electrical supplies. Thus when I read the explanation inferred by the *, the numbers that were shown to prove that GE's Long Life white bulbs were 50% more efficient than regular soft white light bulbs, I thought the explanation was true. GE's had 1125 hours of efficiency whereas the regular ones had 750 hours, and the number of lumens( the measure of how bight it is) were fairly close. They use mathematics to prove their claim that their bulbs lasted longer to try to persuade you to buy their product(act). But as a skeptical consumer I did the mathematics and 50 percent of 750 hours was 355 . And 1125 hours is not 355 more hours than 750, 1105 is. Yes, the numbers are close so did they just round the number up to make it a solid even number or did they use a multiple of tests and that number was the median? Should I trust this product, or buy it again?

Logos

Ethos

As I was reading Obama's campaign site and the different policy's he will establish as President, I could not help but notice that he had a number of other website groups he was apart of on the side of the page. The weblink on the top left was Facebook. I clicked on the link, and on the very top of the page I saw a picture of Barack Obama and his candidate for Vice President, Joe Biden, and the phrase, "Our moment is now," above them. Facebook is a very popular site, predominatly used by American college students and teens. Having a facebook profile is displaying that Obama is trying to connect with Americas youth. He is displaying himself as a candidate who knows interests of Americas youth, and participating in it as well. He also uses Ethos to show America's youth his credentials, one of them being a graduate stundent of Harvard Law along with the year he graduated. The slogan also represents his position in that he is a candidate of the "now".

I realized that having a facebook was an important way of campaiging for both presidential candidates, but the facebook application on Mccain's campaign site was not so easily found.
http://www.facebook.com/barackobama?ref=s&refurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fs.php%3Fq%3Dbarack%2Bobama%26init%3Dq

This course has appealed to me in a number of ways, other than that it is required as a part of TCU mandatory core credit hours. One is that I want to make stronger arguments in my essays. I have unique ideas, but the way I explain those ideas do not work out so well sometimes. I think that having the presidential election as the theme to my essays of argument will help me discover my values about the election, thus causing me to have a strong main point in my papers. The theme of the presidential election will also help me become more engaged of currents events, and political happenings, which I am very interested in, but not something that I regularly keep up with because I choose watching Project Runway instead of CNN as I turn on the T.V. I am also a member to the Model United Nations here at TCU, and the presidential election of the U.S. is an interesting study of how foreign policy might be different from the United States.

Most of the writing I do is probably on facebook. I am a late bloomer to this very popular site, and I find myself constantly signing on to it and writing little posts under people's picturs, or looking for the next person to chat with on the chat feature. Even in this informal situation I find myself being horrified by the way I write, sometimes not knowing if the person can fully understand what I am saying because of my fragments are rambled without punctuation. In college I also wirte quite a few letters to family members. I love writing these because I love to imagine how my grandmother or aunt feels when they recieve my letter, and them knowing that I think of them.

I am mostly interested in international politics because I like to empathise with all different cultures. Being in the Model U.N. gives me a chance to discover how the U.N, the most important forum for international debate, works. This does not mean that I don't care about what goes on in America, but I believe that all societies are connected in one way or another and learnig how to communicate effectively between of the nations, as hard as that is, is very important. In fact, learning about American policies first helps me conceptualize my own country's policy in case I ever wanted to do something internationally in the future.

This blog has displayed the argument that I am colorful and happy with my use of pastels, mainly blues and pinks. Also by my image it shoes that I am dedicated to my boyfriend and want to display him in pictures representing me because he is a big part of my life. I think my blog shows my points of view on a variety of themes from school, to social habits/activities. I could go on and on about what each proponent in my blog argues, but in summary I think my blog argues that I have passion about the things I do, and that I can be miscombobulated at times.

I have read the syllabus and fully agree to it's terms and conditions.

Thank you for reading my post,
Mandi