Editorials

I do not know if I did this correctly but here goes:

Justices Amended Constitution on Their own Editorial

The main debate in this editorial is property rights. In this editorial the case of Kelo is basically saying that taking his property in order to build another piece of property for public use is acceptable. The common belief is that liberals are anti property rights and conservatives try to maintain property rights. The word “public uses” was used consistently and this phrase makes an identification that public use is a good thing. It is obvious that the conservatives are outraged by this decision. Such words that point to this are: “just compensation”; “it will pass unjustly to private developers.” O’conner says that economical development takings are unconstitutional.” Thomas even thinks that this decision has erased the Public Use Clause in the Constitution. Conservatives believe that what a person owns should not be easily taken away from them.


By Letting Redevelopers Take Little Guy’s Property Editorial

“The underlying liberal vision was that private property was the instrument of individuals privilege and power, which had to be cut down to size by an alert legislature that had the interests of the little man at heart.” Another sentence that argues for liberals is, “It is necessary to allow developers to assemble large parcels of land for major developments.” This article is still about conservatives trying to argue that what the liberals are doing with property rights is wrong.


More Than Abortion is at Stake in Supreme Court Picks

This editorial argues how property and state rights seem to have more value than individual rights. The main individual right they argue about in this piece is abortion. People are outraged that court justices that are all on one side or oppose a certain side should not be elected. There should be a variety of court justices who are fair to all sides. “President Bush has picked lawyers and judges who favor a pre-New Deal approach to the constitution” clearly gives a hint that Bushes ideas are conservative, and that it is liberals who believe protecting individual rights is more important that what conservatives call important or not. The article then gives examples of court decisions if their was only one side (the conservative side). The article is definitely against conservative views.


Losing Our Country

The writer is against the problem of inequality between classes. He is taking on the view of a liberal. He says that since 1980 the government has favored the wealthy at the expense of working families… and favoritism has become extreme and relentless. This shows that Krugman is against favoritism. Another phrase, “From tax cuts that favor the rich to bankruptcy “reform” that punishes the unlucky.” He says that it is not a pretty picture in this piece. The conservatives try to cover up this favoritism by changing data to mislead. This must mean that he thinks the other party is misleading. He refers to these people as partisans.

Blogging

I have no idea….

Nunberg first tries to define what exactly blogging is. It was shown that blogs include news summaries, opinion columns, or collection of press releases, however most were written more in the form of a journal by college students, office workers, and stay-at-home moms. He then goes to say that understanding blogging can be difficult, that the language is confusing at times. He says the language can be informal, impertinent, and digressive. He compares it to people in a high school cafeteria chatting about different things including “snarky” remarks about people at other tables. I think he is trying to say that blogs are more about opinion and expression rather than giving out information as in magazines and newspaper. He says that blogspeak is “an adaptation of the table talk of the urban middle class, it is not a language everybody in the cafeteria is equally adept at speaking.” He says that at least the newspaper is more of a neutral voice, so I suppose he is comparing this to blogging. I honestly have no idea what he is talking about. I think he is trying to argue that blogs should not become or be taken as serious as real newspaper articles and magazine and that it shouldn’t be considered genuine literary form. Meaning, that its mainly just people chatting and bitching about things with no real purpose or reason like journalistic writing in magazines and newspapers. ????

On Political Labels

Liberalism strives for the equality of man and that the government is a force for positive change in society. They believe that government should limit the freedom of businesses when original freedoms are at stake.

Libertarians believe in a limited government but find it difficult to accept the exceptions the government makes when they limit freedoms to uphold traditional values. Libertarians would probably agree with conservatives on low taxes and less government programs but disagree with policies that could limit individual rights. However libertarians and liberals believe in free expression.

Conservatives believe in limited role of government except when individual practices might threaten traditional values. They want to end homosexuality and abortion. For conservatives the government is seen as a problem.

Chosen summary assignment due Friday

I plan to use strategy 6, which involves quoting and paraphrasing.

In this short summarized article about The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland Maatta is trying to give a summarized version of her analysis of the book. In the beginning paragraphs she writes about Charles Dodgson and how his story is based on a girl Alice, who was very close to him. Dodgson wrote this story for three young girls which included Alice. Dodgson was believed to write the story in honor of Alice Liddell. Many people consider the story to be “variations on the debate of gender.” Maatta mentions a few events that she finds are important. One is when Alice continuously grows and shrinks in the book, believing that this changing of size indicates the ups and downs of adolescence hood and the battle between being a woman or a girl. Girls at adolescence are unconfident. A line in the book reflects upon this, “She generally gave herself good advice, though she rarely seldom followed it.” Throughout her adventure she is incapable of understanding the rules of the Wonderland which could in fact reflect on adulthood. This would make since at the adolescent stage in her life. Time is an important theme in the story. The rabbit is constantly looking at his watch and tea time is the same time each day; growing up takes time. Maatta declares, a theme stated earlier, that the first story of the book is somewhat close to a description of a young girl (Alice) leaving childhood, going through youth, and then entering the world of adulthood. If one looks deep into the story they will find evidence that suggests the feelings Dodgson had for Alice. There is long sentence at the end of the first story where Alice’s sister proclaims her feelings for her. This was believed to be evidence of Dodgson’s feelings. (I will write the long sentence right now). Grief is a common tone throughout the sequel and Maatta thinks that this is the grief Dodgson felt when Alice grew up and moved away. His thought are portrayed through Alice’s sister throughout the book.

Taken from http://www.alice-in-wonderland.net/explain/alice841.html

Strategies and Techniques

I have used the Method, which includes opposite binaries, strands, anomalies, pattern of repetition, exact repetitions, and contrast. I have also used paraphrasing, summarizing, prompts, notice and focus (ranking), and defining significant parts and how they are related. I have tried (don’t know if I succeeded) to make the implicit explicit and finding implications. I have tried for the first time to use the “seems to be about X but could also be (is really) about Y” concept in the last piece we read. I have used the technique of searching for a pitch, a complaint, and a moment.
I have not used free writing because I felt free writing would make it more random, and I assumed we were trying to use the other methods and techniques. I want to continue to try 10 on 1 concept. I have almost gotten there but it ended up being more like 5 on 1. That I need to work on. I also need to improve my “asking so what” technique. I do not think I have used pushing observations to conclusions as much as I need to. There is still a lot of work I need to do with some of these techniques.

Privilege

White Privilege and Male Privilege

To paraphrase briefly, McIntosh begins writing about male privilege, and how they are sometimes unaware of the privileges that they have compared to women. She does this to make a point, that even she is in the same boat when it comes to having privileges others do not have. She goes on to explain how at one time she was somewhat ignorant of the large comparisons between white and black privilege. She speaks about male privilege and as the text goes on her focus is on white privilege (in comparison to blacks) and eventually leads to the issue of power.
She discuss how power, unearned privilege, and privilege kind of form into one.
I noticed that her tone of writing) is a more concerned tone or a tone of revelation mainly to herself but also to the readers. I found it interesting that she took the time to 46 conditions she is “privileged” to have, while many blacks do not. Her list was concise. Later she lists 8 observations from her own experience in relation to heterosexual privilege.
Significant parts in the piece are, male privilege/advantage, white privilege/advantage, privilege systems, unearned privilege, and power. This also includes the opposite of these parts.
The main emphasis in this piece is privilege. It is then broken down into further emphasis such as, male privilege, white privilege. The next emphasis due to the amount of repetition is the word “advantage”; which is closely based on privilege. Later in the piece power is mentioned, which also relates to privilege and advantage. And dominance is pointed out briefly at the end of the article. It is like each one is part of another or greater part.
There are several strands I noticed, and some have already been stated. One major strand is when McIntosh makes the analogy of white privilege as a weightless knapsack she uses the strand, “provisions, assurances, tools, maps, guides, codebooks, passports, visas, clothes, compass, emergency gear, and blank checks”. The other strands are, male privilege/advantage, white privilege/advantage, privilege systems, unearned privilege, and power.
This piece was filled with opposite binaries. These are just a few: privileged/underprivileged, male privilege/female privilege, white privileged/black underprivileged, disadvantages/advantaged, power/powerless. All of these binaries and opposite binaries prove to be important issues.
The explicit is that white privilege and male privilege are higher in rank than black privilege, whites are taught to recognize white privilege as males are not taught to recognize male privilege. Denial and ignorance also exist. Male and white privilege are unearned, they are given by birth, citizenship, and “by virtue of being a conscientious law-abiding normal person of goodwill.” In many cases this is due more to skin color than class, ethnicity, religion, and location. Skin color is an asset that white people have throughout life. A common example would be in the work field; although it has improved it still happens. Power is also an asset for males and whites. A man’s sex is the main example of this power because they have been given the title as the “dominant.” I noticed a key phrase in this article that stood out. The portion had to do with dominance and power. “ In some groups, those dominated have actually become strong through not having all of these unearned advantages, and this gives them a great deal to teach others.” This phrase suggests that unearned advantages weaken us or serves as a crutch. The last sentence of the article sums it up very well. “Whether we will choose to use unearned advantage to weaken invisible privilege systems and whether we will use any of our arbitrary awarded power to try to reconstruct power-systems on a broader base.”
An implication could be that we have a choice as a white person or a man on how to deal with or use the advantages, power, and privileges we have. Another may be the urge for us to defeat this warped system. Make it known that blacks are equal to whites and women are equal to males. We have improved as a country to present everyone as equals, however, we have a long way to go. It is obvious that we need to realize the differences yet not let it affect us that we are blind to the privilege systems and not take our privileges, etc. for granted.
I will now go into the question of: “What does it seem to be about, but what could it also be?” This article seems to be about the differences between females verses male, and white vs. black. But is “really” about the progression and lack of progression our country has accomplished or not accomplished. As of right now I really cannot think of anything else although I am sure they are more. This is one that crossed my mind.
The pitch wishes us to believe that we as whites or females are ignorant about the privileges and advantages we have. The piece also wants us to believe that such differences exist yet it is our choice what to do with it. The piece is reacting to the privilege systems in this country. The moment is now and for the future. It says that now we are ignorant and prone to adopt the system. And in the future hopes that we will change this system, adopt new ideas that there should be equality.

Happy Face

The pitch of the piece is that this so called “orthodoxy of friendship” is a lie, or more so a stretch from the truth and far from the reality between the black race and the white race. The piece is reacting to the relationship between black and white people. It is reacting to how movies portray a friendship theme among black and white people, when in his mind is just not so. The moment of the piece takes place in the present. It does make references to past history. It was written because of the tension between African Americans and Caucasians that has gone on throughout history and is still present today.

He uses a pattern of repetition when he gives numerous examples of movies that portray friendship or a connection between whites and blacks. He also uses the word friendship frequently; because of the repetition of this word it is significant. It is obvious to anyone that this article is about friendship among blacks and whites. A probable strand would be, “commercials, news features, TV specials, and films.” These relate because they include the media in which they believe racial harmony exists. One quote that can sum up the part about how movies portray the “orthodoxy of friendship” is, “The good news at the movies obscures the bad news in the streets… The movies reflect the larger dynamic of wish and dream.” He refers to the past, and how that today Americans are forgetting the past of blacks, such as slavery and the civil rights movement and that it has no affect on the present.

Thinking implications, I believe that one thing DeMott is trying to say is that white Americans and African Americans are beginning to forget how different they are from each other. He lists some statistics on the 2nd page that evidently separate whites from blacks. These statistics are very important details in the article. They are significant because they address some of the differences between blacks and whites that many people are now disregarding. He also believes that people believe this “orthodoxy of friendship” myth so they feel less guilty for being racist or being bias. He thinks people assume they can make up for the past (even with un-involvement) by becoming friends with black people. To prove hatred has diminished they will carry out this friendship theory to clear their guilty conscience.