president

After watching the second presidential debate, it seems as though the polls (favoring Obama) are true. While watching the debate it seemed as if John Mccain was frightened, thinking about what would happen if he lost this election, thus, using scare tactics to frighten the American people into voting for him. John Mccain is talking more trash about Obama than any other president in the history of this country. I think that a more effective way of reaching the people and young voters is to talk about what you plan to do in the whitehouse to get this country on the right track, rather than just bashing the other candidate for false accusations.

presidents

With all said and done , I hope we do not miss this golden chance to turn the page in this our dear country.We need the repubs. out at least for a while. It is going to take all of us to clean up this mess we are in as a nation right now. President Obama will be a great catalyst for our recovery......so long "conservatism" governance.

presidents

The Bush-Clinton regimes during the last 30 years are responsible for the conditions that we now find ourselves in. The trade agreements that short change Americans; outsourcing jobs and contracts; selling our assets to foreigners; H-1 Visas to take middle class jobs from Americans for everything that can't be out-sourced; for jobs that can't be moved to foreign countries, they have created conditions that allow illegal labor to take over complete industries within the country like construction and other industries that require little training; over-spending and borrowing money from China or anyone else who will loan us money... little wonder there are no jobs here for Americans, the dollar is of little value, and soon the raping of America will be complete.I think Obama can fix the situation.

2nd Presidential debate

After watching the second presidential debate, I strongly believe that Barrack Obama has better values. Obama defeated Mccain on every subject, from foreign policy to healthcare. Without a doubt, the winner was Obama! Based on the history of US politics however, the actual results may not reflect on who the better man for the job might be. While the Americans desire to change the world, it must be accepted that it is the Americans who need to change. They are feudalistic (like Pakistan); fanatical (like the Taleban); hate people of colour (even after freeing the slaves more than 150 years ago)! Obama should be the next president, but bigots in that country will not allow this!

8/1 Readings

After watching the Pay Attention YouTube video, I felt a somewhat sense of enlightenment. The video definitely brings many good points to the attention of the viewer. One of these many good points is how kids are not being reached enough in the classrooms. In my opinion, the most effective way of reaching out to and teaching a student something is to relate to the material; and by that I mean relate the information and knowledge that you are trying to teach the student into terms that he or she is most familiar with. Is there anything else out there that students can relate to more these days than modern technology? Even little things make a difference, like the library here on campus and their famous text messages they send you to locate a book.
“In the Basement of the Ivory Tower” was another enlightening reading. It was about a college professor, working at two different colleges, and teaching two different courses. After this professor has failed nine out of fifteen students. He expects some form of notification from the administration of these colleges, warning him that he’s failing too many students and that he should start passing more of them. But this never happens. It sucked as a reader and a student to read a story where all of these students fail this course that they are paying for but if they truly would’ve deserved a passing grade, I think that the professor would’ve given them one.
1. What specific ways could an effective teacher use modern technology to gain her students interest?
2. What does the professor in “In the Basement of the Ivory Tower” think about teaching using more modern technology?
3. What is the weapon of choice for the nine failing student’s parents when they beat their kids for failing?

Alex's Poem

Set yourself free from hypocrisy
Enlighten yourself with personal integrity
Learn from the past and don’t accept mediocrity
Learn from your mistakes
And leave your legacy

here's the URL to my 'letter to the editor'

http://mail.google.com/a/mail.usf.edu/?ui=2&ik=34301c6391&attid=0.0&disp=vah&view=att&th=11b5b2052273742a

Letter to the Editor

I strongly agree with this article. It directly relates to the paper I wrote last week about learning from the past. History repeats itself and it seems as though rather than these government officials admitting that they made a mistake and learning from it so it doesn’t happen again in the future, they decide to just point fingers at other officials at different branches of government so they don’t get the blame. I thought it was interesting when the author says, “The army wasn't ready to train Iraqi security forces, or to handle the thousands of Iraqi prisoners detained in places such as Abu Ghraib. “ This is a very true statement, our US forces were unprepared for a lot of the moves that the government threw at them but they definitely did a good job of learning how to cope and then ultimately being pro-active in the situation in the middle east. I also like the part of the article that mentions that, “the army learned from its mistakes. Rather than sulking about the Iraq mess, commanders made necessary changes.” I like it how this statement gives the army credit for being productive in this situation rather than pointing fingers, trying to blame someone else for the mess. I found it very intruiging that the current commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, took a doctorate in history at Princeton. That is most likely one reason why the army is being more productive by learning how to manage the situation rather than trying to blame others for the rash decision our governmental officials made to invade Iraq. This article definitely points out some of the facts that people should know about this war that’s going on. I believe that there is so much to learn from the past that we can’t dwell on who’s fault it was, but we need to focus more on how to deal with the situation and make sure the same problem doesn’t happen again.

Free Writing

I believe that the College Algebra course is too overwhelming to take in the Freshmen Summer Institute.  Mr. Hoare is directly responsible for this problem.  All of the work that Mr. Hoare is putting on us is overwhelming when you consider the amount of work that we are being assigned in our other classes.  All of the studying and homework for this course combined during a week  would probably be around 10 or 12 hours.  We students are stressing out.

7/25 Readings

The article “Media and Risky Behavior,” written by both Soledad Liliana Escobar-Chaves and Craig A. Anderson talks about how kids these days are too involved in what the media feeds them. When kids watch these mind tainting movies and somewhat subliminal messages on TV, they are in a way triggered to hold bad habits, habits such as underage alcohol use, violence, sexual behavior, smoking, and obesity. The article gives some shocking results, some that make you shameful of what we have become as a nation. The tradition that we have created for our youth is in a way disgraceful. I thought it was interesting how the article states that watching an hour of MTV increases the likeliness of pre marital sex.
Heather Chaplin wrote the article entitled “Is That Just Some Game? No, It’s a Cultural Artifact”, which talks more about how video games are more than just a hobby, their more of a historic artifact.
I still have three questions pertaining to these articles:
1. How much have the statistics of youth obesity changed in the past few decades?
2. What were the authors of “Media and Risky Behavior” trying to accomplish by writing their article?
3. What was the author of “Is That Just Some Game? No, It’s a Cultural Artifact”,
trying to accomplish by writing his article? And what was the main message she was trying to send to the reader?

7/18 readings

By reading this graphic novel I learned a lot more about hurricane Katrina and the effect that it had on people. This graphic novel, entitled “New Orleans After the Deluge” tells the story of the real life terror that five people went through during this tragic event. This novel is consisted of five different characters, Hamid, Denise, the Doctor, Kevin and Leo. All five of them had five very different plans of surviving the hurricane. Each person has a different outcome from overcoming the storm but the one similarity of each person’s outcome is that they all got screwed over in some way. Whether it was a water shortage, or just a lack of medical attention, they all suffered greatly.
The reading interview between Robert Root and Satrapi was very intriguing. I learned that Satrapi does all the scripting and illustration by herself, without any help from a writer or artist. My favorite line in this article is when Satrapi talks about how you have to know the movement of the contents in your graphic novel. She says, “Illustration can be very static, but in comics you cannot have that. You have to be able to know the movement, you have to know the anatomy of the human being.
I thought that the interview was good but I found that the graphic novel was overall the most interesting. I loved the message that the graphic novel gave about how the government and FEMA were more concerned about the looters and gang members than saving the lives of the poor victims of this natural tragedy. When, in all actuality, the so-called “looters” were just doing what they had to do to survive. People died because they didn’t have enough water, what would anyone do in that situation.

1. What’s the whole story on the people getting rejected from entering Algiers after the storm?
2. Did the toxic water that people were walking through cause any damage to their health?
3. Does Satrapi plan on doing many more political graphic novels?

7/11 readings

Marjane Satrapi’s reading and illustration was very reader-unfriendly, unlike the other previous articles that were assigned for us to read. After reading the article, “The Texture of Retracting in Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis,” by Hilary Chute helped me understand the illustration a little better and helped me gain a better grasp of what message the Satrapi was trying to send to her readers.
Marjane Satrapi’s illustration presents to the reader a little taste of what it was like to be a young girl in the Middle East in the 1980’s.
One aspect that Chute mentions about Satrapi’s illustration is how it breaks the stereotype that what graphic novels are supposedly “supposed to be.” Chute’s writing gives a very in depth look at Satrapi’s writing. Everything from Satrapi’s background and childhood to the settings of her illustration is talked about in full detail in her article.
I think that especially now, in the 21st century, we should eliminate all bias and sexism between men and women in all aspects of life. To think that there are still people out there who say, “The graphic novel is a man’s world, by and large,” is ridiculous. Even though we deny it, there is still a lot of sexism and prejudice out there, even in America and where we live.
I still have a few questions for both authors. First of all, what are Marjane Satrapi’s present day struggles with everything that’s going on in the Middle East? Also, what does Hilary Chute think of the present sexist problem in America? And last, what are Marjane Satrapi’s and Hilary Chute’s thoughts and personal opinions on the completely unnecessary ‘war on terror’ in the Middle East right now.

7/2 Readings

Frank Mathis, the author of the article “Writing a Memoir”; the Involvement of Art with Craft,” talks a little about his experience through World War II and also gives some advice on writing a memoir. I personally believe that the most important issue that Mathis brings up is the fact that to write a successful memoir you have to both be a creative, artistic writer, you also have to be a historian on what you’re writing about. Mathis also talks about how rewarding writing a memoir is.

“Our Own Words” is a collection of memoirs written by students from Florida State University. I didn’t get a chance to read all of the articles but the few that I read were very interesting. In “Knocked Up,” Nicole Filmore uses a very reader friendly style to reach her readers. Also in “Sing With Me somehow,” Alison Slusarczyk talks about how both composing music and playing the music on her piano made her life more bearable to deal with.

In “Similar to Our Own Words,” which was written by college students at Clemson University, these students talk about their experiences through Hurricane Katrina and also the solution for education in New Orleans in post Hurricane Katrina. This collection of stories also talks about these student’s personal stories of pain and suffering in their experience with this horrible tragedy.

My favorite of these three writings was “Writing a Memoir,” simply because of his idea of combining both historian and creative craft skills to write a proper memoir. Mathis also talks about how rewarding it is to complete a well written memoir, which is something that all of these Clemson and Florida State students experienced after writing their memoirs. The Florida State student’s articles kept me very interested because of both their creative style of writing and their use of slang and profanity in their writings. I think that even something simple as these students use of profanity makes a memoir a lot more reader friendly. The narratives from the Clemson students is interesting as well, however, they don’t use enough of the creative writing techniques and reader friendly approaches that the Florida State students used. It was a lot harder to stay focused while reading the articles from the Clemson students than it was during the Florida State students.

Even after reading these unnecessarily long readings, I still have three questions. First of all, what are Mathis's most vivid memories about his experience in World War II first hand, and what did he have to sacrifice in order to fight in the war? Also, what does Nicole Filmore experience present day with both being an aunt and being the sister of a new mother? And lastly, how was it for Maria Hernandez to spend six days in a Superdome?

6/30 Readings

Waxler, Jerry. "Is Writing a Memoir Therapeutic?" Memory Writers Network. 28 Sept. 2007. 30 June 2008 .

Franklin, Antoinette, and Iriel Franklin. "Hurricane Katrina Victims Memoir." StoryCorps. 2008. 30 June 2008 .

These two stories are both about ways of dealing with and also overcoming past struggles and experiences in life. The writing by Jerry Waxler talks about how we can improve our feelings by describing them, therefore writing them down, or talking about them, like the two Hurricane Katrina victims did in their audio memoir. Waxler quotes Louise DeSalvo in his writing, saying “By finding certain words deep within our minds and writing or describing them, we explain long forgotten events that have never been clearly thought through. And then we share these words with people, telling our story to others, we open ourselves to the healing effects of social connection.” This is in a way what Antoinette and Iriel Franklin did by telling their memoir of their experience with Hurricane Katrina.

I felt a keen sense of reality by while both reading the writing and listening to the audio memoir. I feel as if writing down your problems (or speaking them) allows you to look at your past in a retrospect way, which people don’t get a lot of chances to do now a days because of all the modern distractions and empty things we use to try and fill ourselves with to ignore the truth and the past. Waxler wrote about how DeSalvo views the healing of social connection, which I strongly believe is true. I think that when we write our problems down or allow other people to listen to our struggles in life or our past, we are putting ourselves out there in the open to connect with. I think that to have someone socially connect with you by discussing your life or past is the greatest therapy in the world. In some cases, pain lets us know we’re alive, it reminds us everyday. Therefore when you feel someone else’s pain by listening to them or their memoir, you have somewhat of a sense of life and meaning fill you up, same goes to the person who is describing their life or writing their memoir.

1. How is Jerry Waxler’s life doing present day?
2. Have the Franklins moved out of Houston and moved on?
3. Is writing a memoir necessarily writing an autobiography or can it just be about one thing in your life?

Free Writing:
I came to USF beecause I wanted a new experience, I wanted to meet new great people, get out of my small town and move to a huge city atmosphere, also help my organizational skills, this is an opportunity to make a great future for myself, a whole new chapter in my life and get an education
I almost went to my local community college because I wanted to stay in town with all my friends, Im going to miss my hometown, my dad was a huge inspiration to go to college and be successful, he said don’t mess this opportunity up, Im excited to start a whole new life, almost
all my friends went to college or universities