Exam 5: Planning and Forecasting

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: Soon after the mass suicide in Rancho Santa Fe, California, Ted Turner-owner of the Atlanta Braves and vice chairman of Time Warner-said that he thought the suicides were "a nice way to get rid of a few nuts."

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: Food tastes better with butter than with margarine.

Construct eight sentences, each illustrating a use of this slanter: downplayers.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: I simply won't go into those cowboy bars; they're full of guys who disguise their insecurities with cowboy boots and hats.

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: NCAA rules for recruiting athletes are broken more frequently by Division 1 schools than by Division 2 schools.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "Early in the third phase of the Vietnam War, the U.S. command recognized that the term 'search and destroy' had unfortunately become associated with 'aimless searches in the jungle and the destruction of property.' In April 1968, General Westmoreland therefore directed that the use of the term be discontinued. Thereafter, operations were defined and discussed in basic military terms which described the type of operation, for example, reconnaissance in force." -Lieutenant General John H. Hay, Jr., Vietnam Studies

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "... the basic right to life of an animal-which is the source of energy for many animal rights wackos-must be inferred from the anticruelty laws humans have written." -Rush Limbaugh

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "Nazi propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels... justified the attack on thousands of Jews as a step toward removing an 'infection' contaminating Germany. 'It is impossible that, in a National Socialist state, which is anti-Jewish in its outlook, those streets should continue to be occupied by Jewish shops.'" -Reuters report in the Sacramento Bee

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: Libya's strongman Colonel Muammar Qaddafi is the kingpin of Mideast terrorism, as Israeli and Western intelligence sources assert. Qaddafi's "who, me?" denials are as believable as would be his announcing conversion to Judaism.

Construct eight sentences, each illustrating a use of this slanter: loaded question.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage:

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: Once you've made our Day Planner a part of your business life, there's a good chance you'll never miss or be late for another appointment.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "The people who [fought] the Soviet-backed government in Nicaragua [were] freedom fighters, just as George Washington was in our country." -Ronald Reagan

Provide a critical assessment of the following quotation. Discuss rhetorical flourishes and slanting techniques, if any, including otherizing, demonizing, fear or hate mongering, and fostering xenophobia. Some passages may fit more than one category. "…In this 8-year period, gigantic genocide was carried out over the Bulgarian nation. At the insistence of foreign, hostile-to-Bulgaria factors, the population of our people is projected to remain 3.5 to 4 million residents. This is Bulgarophobe's plan, and this plan is realized in front of us. If someone asks how, I will show him: when the right of the Bulgarians to be masters in their own country became stolen, when they will be left to die in misery and lack of medicines and medical services, by being subjected to terror by Gypsy bands, who everyday disrupt, rob, rape, and maltreat the Bulgarian nation, after which nobody deliberately seeks out the crimes committed by them, because this is the directive outside, not to investigate the crimes of these minority groups. The goal is for the Bulgarians to live in fear, to be discouraged, crushed, and submissive. Hundreds of thousands of chronically ill are dying right now because mob companies of the previous cabinet make dirty deals with the life and health of the Bulgarians. Because relatives of the previous Minister of Environment are trading with medicaments for cancer, and therefore there are not any medicaments, and hundreds of thousands of Bulgarians with cancer face a slow, excruciating agony." -Volen Nikolov Siderov, July 11th, 2005, Bulgaria. quoted in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volen_Siderov

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: Doctor Mohanty is younger than me.

A) Discuss any instances of nonargumentative persuasion or pseudoreasoning and explain any slanting techniques you find in the following passage. B) Rewrite the passage in language that is as emotively neutral as possible but still retains the same informational content. "[S]o frantic is the education industry for raw material (students), institutions are not only lowering standards (requiring only 'a pulse in one hand, a check in the other'), they are discounting tuitions and advertising sushi and waffle bars in the students unions and prime cable service in the dorms where, [author Anne] Matthews says, some students hibernate for days 'eating red licorice and channel surfing.' Some institutions send bounty hunters abroad in search of wealthy foreigners." -George Will

A) Discuss any instances of nonargumentative persuasion or pseudoreasoning and explain any slanting techniques you find in the following passage. (We'll comment on features we find obscure, unusual, or tricky.) B) Rewrite the passage in language that is as emotively neutral as possible but still retains the same informational content. "It [the feminist movement] was crazy. The lunacy, unfortunately, wasn't confined to sex. Male reviewers abased themselves before Miss [Susan] Brownmiller's book Against Our Will, and the male editors of Time magazine, in a spasm of liberal gallantry, named her as one of its 12 Women of the Year, thereby atoning for five decades of Men of the Year." -Joseph Sobran, "The End of Feminism"

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "[The CIA] instructed security forces in Uruguay, demonstrating torture techniques on beggars taken off the street. These activities, and many hundreds more like them, have been thoroughly documented by government investigations, by the press, and by the testimony of former CIA employees." -Progressive Student Union

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: Compact discs produce a clearer sound than do vinyl records.

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: Chrysanthemums that have been pinched back produce bigger blooms than those that have not.