Exam 5: Planning and Forecasting

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: I'm not among those who wonder why the senator hasn't made a full disclosure of his financial dealings prior to taking office.

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.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "Would you want to appoint my opponent as president of your company?" -The late Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines, speaking to a group of Philippine businessmen about his 1986 election opponent, Corazon Aquino

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: The statistics Dr. Swain trotted out to prove that bicycle helmets save lives miss the point that a helmet law for bicyclists infringes on individual rights.

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: The best American film of the 2000s so far is No Country For Old Men.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: With her keen instinct for political survival on full alert, Governor Whitman suddenly saw the wisdom of the proposal that she had opposed for so many years.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "Sam Goldwyn once said that an oral agreement isn't worth the paper it's written on. We wonder what he would have said about the Pennzoil-Texaco case." -The Worcester, Mass., Evening Gazette

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: Orlando is a little town with friendly and helpful residents. Still, you might not want to live there. In the summer it's hotter than the Sahara Desert.

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. Well, it looks like the wimps are coming out of the woodwork all over the place. If you're a man, the fashionable thing to be these days is "sensitive." Articles with titles like "Babies and Men," "The Divorced Father," and-can you believe it?-"Men Cry Too" are cropping up all over the place. You'd think today's males were unleashing the bottled-up agonies of a couple of thousand generations from the way they like to step into the spotlight and bare their sensitive souls to anybody who'll listen. They say there are more divorces today, and maybe because of the safety of numbers, a divorce is an excuse for a guy to become a softhead; the summons server may as well deliver a license to cry in public. If a kid wants his modern daddy to come out and toss a ball around, he'll have to drag him out of the kitchen first. After making him take off the apron, of course, so he won't embarrass his kid in front of his buddies. It's a good thing the women are getting out there and learning to run the world. Today's men are busily forgetting how to do it.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: A political endorsement by the Reverend Jerry Falwell, the high priest of holier-than-thou and "let's hear it for apartheid," would help a political candidate as much as an endorsement from the Ayatollah Khomeini.

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: "The answer to the question, 'How are blacks doing in America?' is 'Better than ever before.'" -Ronald Reagan, on the first national observation of the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: "A feminazi is a woman to whom the most important thing in life is seeing to it that as many abortions as possible are performed." -Rush Limbaugh

Headline and article in the New York Post. http://nypost.com/2013/06/24/rogues-gallery-snowden-joins-long-list-of-notorious-gutless-traitorsfleeing-to-russia/

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: Not everyone thinks that [former] Senator Jesse Helms is the least admired American public figure (as some opinion polls show). Even now, one or two southern Republicans lust after a Helms endorsement.

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: People who listen to classical music are more productive.

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: You'd be better off if you got more sleep.

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

Isolate and discuss the rhetorical devices that appear in the following passage: It is, of course, conceivable that the Qaddafi regime has nothing to do with terrorist attacks on Israeli airports, but...

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

Provide a critical assessment of the following comparative general claim: Adolescents face more problems than adults.