TOW #13- "Political Party Meltdown" Kevin Baker

At first, I thought this was going to be yet another article ranting about how much Donald Trump has ruined the future of America.  Most articles that are swamping the news nowadays include some sort of completely biased analysis of Trump's elementary wording and how the candidates never answer what they were asked during debates.  And although it is difficult to remain entirely neutral while discussing the current presidential primary race, Kevin Baker takes a different view on America's political situation through analysis of historical events and through intelligent sentence structure that shows his audience that what is happening now has happened before.  His ultimate purpose in his article is not to persuade the American public to vote for a certain candidate but rather take a step back and examine the American political party system as a whole.

Through his article, Baker sways in between historical anecdotes and current day issues.  In the beginning, he draws attention to a time when Roosevelt and his republican opponent joined sides to eliminate any influence of party and to have a vote on ideological ideals alone, and not the demo graphical borders that the parties had already claimed.  All of a sudden, he writes about Roosevelt saying, "He was wrong."  This added emphasis on Baker's views, but I actually had to go back to the beginning and read the entire historical reference again that had taken up a good portion of the page.  The use of historical references helped Baker later in the text when he was explaining what actually made our American system work, but in many cases, it led to confusion on whether Baker was arguing about the past or the current day.

Baker's purpose became most clear in the closing paragraphs, when he wrapped up his thoughts by writing, "We [America] are divorced... and in this state we can hardly expect to work together...It almost destroyed our nation then, and we cannot afford it now."  Luckily for him, I had an assignment to write about this essay, so I kept on reading it to find the purpose.  But, an average American looking for an interesting article may not give Baker the time that he takes to develop his argument after he spends too many words going on about historical happenings.  Perhaps this is why the articles that aren't going into depth and that are just ranting about Trump, are the articles that are getting the most public attention.

TOW #12- IRB Post "Lincoln" by David Herbert Donald

The IRB that I chose to read this marking period was the biography of Abraham Lincoln, written by David Herbert Donald.  I chose it mainly because I am interested in historical fiction, and had seen amazing reviews of the book.  To my surprise, the book has almost no focus on Lincoln's professional life, presidential life, or role in the Civil War, but has rather taken a closer look at his personality, friendships, child hood, and how he got into politics.  I has gone into this text thinking that the author would be preaching like a text book, but have found that Donald is much more interested in how and why Lincoln has made certain decisions in his life and how he got there.  It has painted Lincoln in a way that makes him seem more human, rather than the best American President who has a 19 foot tall statue in honor of him.  

Although Lincoln is pictured in a top hat and outfitted in a professional suit, he did not have an easy road to presidency.  In fact, Donald's purpose in the first half of this book is to prove to the audience that Lincoln was as human as the audience, and had to go through several failures to reach any sort of success.  To achieve this, Donald spent a solid portion of his text explaining that Lincoln did not even want to run for presidency.  Donald used imagery and a primary source that knew Lincoln personally and retold to the audience that when newspapers started showing their want for Lincoln to run for president, he responded by, "Just think,' he exclaimed, wrapping his long arms around his knees and giving a roar of laughter, 'of such a sucker as me as President." That was the same person that is referred to as the best American President of all time.  Even though Donald does not juxtapose between two written ideas, he completely goes against what the typical image of President Lincoln would be.  In today’s world, one has to be extremely confident (almost too confident) to run for President.  By showing how ridiculous Lincoln thought it was that he could be good enough for President, shows just how human he really was, a very contrasting idea from the popular god-like statue that all Americans know and love.  

TOW #11- "Engineering a Better Future for Girls" Amy Fleischer

As a young woman trying to go into the engineering field, this article made me realize that not everyone is so lucky to have had encouragement to explore and pursue careers and education in scientific and technical fields.  Amy Fleischer, a professor of Mechanical Engineering at Villanova University, argues that the United States as a whole needs to make it known to young women that STEM (scientific, technology, engineering, and math) fields are not only for men but for everyone.  In her article published in U.S. News, she uses rhetorical questions along with statistics to persuade her audience of Americans first that there aren't enough women in engineering and then that we need to recruit more women into STEM fields.  

While explaining how few women make up STEM fields, she writes that "...young women currently make up only 18 percent of engineering majors..."  Through this statistic, she shows that she isn't just ranting about something that only she thinks about.  It's not only that she doesn't see many women in her classroom, but also that, on average, women don't make up a big portion in engineering in the entire country among all schools.  Without statistics like these, the audience would not be able to truly take what Fleischer was saying as credible. This helps to show that she truly did her research before writing this article and that this issue should really be taken seriously.  When the audience takes her writing seriously, they can take her purpose more seriously, and truly consider pushing women into STEM fields like engineering. 

Through rhetorical questioning, Fleischer not only keeps her audience interested, but also allows them to engage in more a conversation with her writing.  Without feeling like they are being talked down to, the audience can accept Fleischer’s ideas more effectively and feel like they are taking suggestions from a friend or colleague rather than from a boss. 

Fleischer makes many good points throughout her article, making it clear to her audience that more women should be going into STEM fields.  However, to make her purpose even more effective, she could have used her rhetoric to push her audience to truly act upon this rather than just to think about the issue.