TOW #13: "Raising Minimum Wage is a Bad Way to Help People" by Clive Crook

Author Clive Crook is arguing that Obama's push to increase the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $9 an hour is well-intentioned but unnecessary. Although the government has said that there is no "solid evidence" this change would cost jobs, Crook argues that it has no way of telling if it would either. Although the author acknowledges that by certain standards raising the wage to $9 isn't a big jump, and $7.25 is low even by international standards, he still believes that the best way to help those in poverty working minimum-wage jobs would be to lower tax rates for those people. This would keep costs for employers low and encourage them to hire more people.
The main device that Crook uses in his argument against minimum wage is a structure that allows for counterargument. Crook methodically takes each point the opposing side has to say and then rebuts it by pointing out logical flaws in the argument. For example, he says that many liberals and even some conservatives see all minimum wage earners as people under the poverty line, but this image is untrue. A majority of minimum-wage earners are actually students or come from households with additional income. Crook also uses rhetorical questions like, "what if you think employers are shrewdly paying unskilled workers less than their labor is worth? " to try to incorporate the perspective of his opponents before answering their questions as well.
The audience for this article would be people interested in economics, since it came from Bloomberg. The article achieved its purpose because it was convincing and also rebutted arguments from the other side. Clive Crook a senior editor of The Atlantic and graduated from the London School of Economics.

TOW #12: Hiroshima by John Hersey

Hiroshima follows the lives of six people who survive the desolation of the atomic bomb on their city. The story is divided into four parts, starting with the bomb being dropped. The first section sets the scene by describing the lives of each of the six people, alternating perspectives every few pages. The first character introduced is Reverand Mr.Kiyoshi Tanimoto, followed by Mrs. Hatsuyo Nakamaru, Dr. Matasakazu Fujii, Father Wilhelm Kleinsorge, Dr. Terufumi Sasaki, and Toshiko Sasaki. These people are very different, all with different personalities and professions. The one thing that binds them is that all of them were in the city of Hiroshima when the atomic bomb was dropped. This section ends with each of them feeling the impact of the bomb.
Although I have not finished the story, it seems clear that the author's purpose in writing Hiroshima was to inform the American public about the effects of the decision to drop the atomic bomb. This book, published in 1946 a year after the event occurred, sought to put faces on those who suffered at Hiroshima. One rhetorical device used by Hersey is his distinct writing style, combining a journalistic professionalism with a narrative-like story-line. Hersey narrates the lives of each of the six survivors from an outside perspective, impartially but with detailed descriptions as well. Writes Hersey, "Mr. Tanimoto was a small man, quick to talk, laugh, and cry. He wore his black hair parted in the middle and rather long...he moved nervously and fast, but with a restraint which suggested that he was a cautious, thoughtful man" (5). This may be reflective of his desire to turn his writing into a news story, since it was originally published in The New Yorker, without losing a human appeal. Hersey also employs multiple perspectives from each of the characters. By doing so, he widens the scope of his story and makes it more comprehensive and detailed as to all the events that were occurring at the same time. Hersey achieves his purpose by factually detailing the events that occurred and leaving out his own emotions in favor of the much more powerful emotions of his six characters.
John Hersey was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist who wrote for Time Magazine and The New Yorker.

TOW #11:"There Is No Left Brain/Right Brain Divide" by Stephen Kosslyn and Wayne Miller

The commonly accepted idea that our brains are divide neatly into two sections, the left "logical and analytical" side and the right "intuitive and creative side" is actually a myth, according to Kosslyn and Miller. The truth is that the differences between left and right sides of the brain is actually very subtle, and the two sides mostly work together to process information. This article also addresses the root of the myth, an experiment done by the California Institute of Technology. The results of the experiment were skewed out of proportion by subsequent news sources, leading a majority of the public to believe in the idea of two very separate and different sections of the brain. Ultimately, although this theory is not true, the authors admit that exactly how the left and right side of the brain function separately and with each other is still vastly unknown. They do, however, hypothesis that a model of a "top-or-bottom" brain is better than the original.
The article mostly attempts to dispel the original theory through an appeal to logos, but the effort falls short. It describes the original experiment done by Caltech, but does not analyze it further or point out its flaws. It merely quotes one of the experimenters, Roger W. Sperry, cautioning the extrapolation of the data. Thus the reader is unsure why the left-right brain theory is baseless.
The new theory that the authors offer is also vague. Readers are told a "top or bottom" model would be better, but the article does not go into much detail about the differences between the top and bottom of the brain and how these differences influence behavior. It claims that "The characterizations of what each part does are based on years of solid research." But the article fails to show this research.
The audience of this article is probably the American public, given that this is Time magazine. But I feel the author's attempted too hard to put this concept into Layman's terms, which ended up cutting out a lot of crucial information regarding the two theories. Because of this, their argument that the current "Right vs. Left" theory should be changed into a "Top vs. Bottom" theory becomes muddled.
Kosslyn is a neuroscientist and former Harvard Professor of Psychology. Miller is a filmmaker and Providence Journal staff writer.

TOW #10: "The Last Word On Stop-and-Frisk" byJeffrey Toobin

This article discusses the issues surrounding New York's controversial "stop-and-frisk" program, particularly the removal of a judge from the case. In August of 2013, federal judge Shira Sheidindlin ruled this program a violation of the constitutional rights of New Yorkers because, "while African-American and Latino New Yorkers comprise only 54% of the general population, they constituted 84% of all stops in 2012, and 88.8% of the people stopped were not charged." However, because she seemed to be very biased against the program and spoke a lot to the media regarding her view on "stop-and-frisk", she was disqualified from the case, and the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is now declaring her ruling invalid.
The main purpose of this article was to inform readers about the highly controversial "stop-and-frisk" program by focusing mainly on the recent disqualification of a judge. The audience is probably mainly New Yorkers, given that the magazine is called The New Yorker, so this would be an issue important to them. The author begins with a pun, saying "stop me if you've heard this one". This is funny because under the program, police have the right to randomly stop cars if they are suspicious of activity going on. The author also employs a type of chronological organization that makes the story easier to follow, starting with Sheidindlin's ruling and progressing to the current state of affairs regarding the law.
Overall, I believe that the author did achieve his purpose, given the audience he was aiming at. New Yorkers would probably be at least somewhat familiar with the "stop-and-frisk" law so the author never goes into detail about what it is. The article was informative as to the issues surrounding the program and was focused on the contribution of one judge to this law.
Jeffrey Toobin is currently a legal analyst and commentator for CNN and writes for The New Yorker.

IRB #2: Hiroshima by John Hersey

Hiroshima chronicles the effects of one of the most devastating weapons made in human history on the lives of six different people. Among them, two are women, two are doctors, and two are religious men. The book starts with the explosion of the atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, and ends with a postscript written by John Hersey that gives an update of each of the survivor's lives forty years after the atomic bomb was dropped.
I choose this book because a friend of mine recommended it. I know that the dropping of the atomic bomb was extremely controversial decision, and as someone interested in history I want to learn more about this event through people who have witnessed it first-hand. Only then, I think, can I really grasp the magnitude of the tragedy that happened.

Tow #9: Media-"Back to the Start" Chipotle Commerical

In this Chipotle commercial, a farmer starts with a free-range farm with his wife and newborn child. As time goes on, he begins to industrialize his farm into almost a factory, putting the animals into giant buildings where they follow a conveyor belt to be fattened with chemicals and processed. However, the farmer realizes the error in his ways and goes "back to the start", breaking down the walls and allowing his animals to be free-range again. The commercial ends with the farmer, now an older man, hand-putting a crate of goods in a Chipotle truck. His wife and son, now fully grown, watch nearby.
The main appeal of this commercial is to pathos. Chipotle very powerfully spreads the message that their meats come from humane sources. The suffering of the farm animals when they are placed into the dark buildings is clear. There is also a clear contrast of color throughout the commercial. At first, everything is green and sunny, with the animals happily grazing in the fields. Then, the primary color is gray as the farmer begins to industrialize his farm. The colors return to a cheerful green and blue when the farmer sees his error and returns to sustainable farming. Coldplay's The Scientist also adds to the mood with its haunting quality and swell at the end as the farmer goes back to his humane methods.
The target audience is the American public, particularly adults. Not many people think about where the foods they eat come from, especially in restaurants. However, Chipotle's advertisement not only makes people confront this problem, but it also shows how Chipotle is addressing this issue as well, making the restaurant chain seem humane and attracting customers not only because they enjoy the food, but also because they appreciate the philosophy.
The advertising here seems subtle, because views do not know it's about Chipotle until they see the truck at the very end with the Chipotle logo on it. However, it achieves its purpose marvelously by not shoving the product in the viewer's face but instead first showing a moral issue, which the view is likely to react to more. Now when they see Chipotle, they connect the chain to sustainable farming and organic materials, which are good for the viewers.

Tow # 8-"Dreams From My Father" by Barack Obama (IRB)

After learning about President Obama's experience as a community organizer in Chicago, the third and final section of his autobiography is entitled "Kenya". Obama travels back to his father's nation or origin to find out more about the man that he could only admire from afar but never really knew. In Nairobi, Obama meets his grandmother and his extended family. He feels hopelessly entangled in family politics and sees clearly that his father was not a perfect man, as Obama growing up had been lead to believe. In the end, Obama is not disappointed with his search, he merely has even more questions. The autobiography has an epilogue, where Obama returns to Kenya with Mrs.Obama, and he is optimistic that things will change for the better.
One of the most important rhetorical devices used in this autobiography is flashbacks. Throughout both the "Kenya" and "Chicago" section Obama uses extensive flashbacks into the lives of his mother and father. Although they no longer play the same central role in the autobiography in later chapters as they did in the beginning, Obama is continually influenced by his quest to discover his identity through the past of his parents.
The audience for this autobiography, the American public, will probably find it easy to connect to the autobiography. Particularly in the "Kenya" section, Obama seems to focus more on dialogue and action rather than description, emphasizing similarities in thought rather than differences because of the African backdrop. However, he does use Swahili terms at times.
I think that Obama did achieve his purpose of showing that he has seen more than the average political candidate. From "Origins" to "Kenya", there is a sense that by belonging to two worlds and thus uncertain of where he fits, President Barack Obama has gone on an incredible journey.