TOW #10 - Visual

Gary Varvel, artist of the political cartoon shown below, is a political cartoonist for the Indianapolis Star. He has been the editorial cartoonist since 1994, and was the chief artist for The Indianapolis News for 16 years before he began work with the Indianapolis Star. Varvel is known for his political cartoons, as many of them address very controversial topics in the political world. In this particular cartoon, he addresses the issue of spending of the United States' budget by President Barack Obama. It depicts the president sitting back in his office chair while saying, "We don't have a spending problem," as the walls of the White House behind him are burning down.
Symbolism is a very prevalent rhetorical device used in this cartoon. Varvel helps the viewer to know that spending is represented by the fire by clearly writing "Spending" on the fire. The walls are also a symbol, and they represent many things: the infrastructure of our government, the country's and our well-being, our own freedoms, and so on. This depiction of fire implies that the spending in our country is destructive and counterproductive to the infrastructure of our government, our well-being, and our freedoms. Meanwhile, President Barack Obama, who is responsible for spending our money and causing this uncontrollable fire, is relaxing in his seat as if nothing is going wrong. He's either completely oblivious to the damage he's dealing, or he is choosing to ignore it, but either way, Varvel is not portraying a good image for the president.
Meant for the citizens of the United States, Varvel drew this political cartoon to raise awareness of the destruction that is being caused by Obama's actions of spending the country's thin budget. I believe that Varvel was accomplished in revealing that destruction because of how successful his use of symbolism was. Fire is a very straightforward symbol: devastation, havoc, ruin. There was no question as to what it was doing, and who was responsible.

TOW #9 - Text

On November 13, 2015, several terrorist attacks took place in the city of Paris, France. Currently, over a hundred lives have been claimed dead, and the number is still rising. The Washington Post reviewed the aftermath in their article with witnesses and experts. The authors, Emily Badger and Mark Berman, wrote this article to report to the world the devastating events that took place this past Friday and to get support for the families of those who were attacked by including logical statistics. The main purpose of the article was to analyze the reasons behind the places that the terrorists chose to attack. The Washington Post found that the sites were chosen because, "as the ISIS statement suggested, [they] were more abhorrent to the attackers for their culture than their politics. These are places where beer is served, where men and women dance together, where religions and culture mix" (Badger & Berman). They took into account the places in which the attacks occurred: the concert hall, the cafes, the stadium. Those places are all areas in which western culture clashes with Arabic culture. The terrorists intentionally chose those places because of this fact, and also for their intention to terrorize basic, everyday life. I support the families of the victims of the attacks on Paris, and have no doubt that these terrorists will be brought to justice.

IRB Intro Post #2

For the next nonfiction book I'm going to read, I chose Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand. Not only was it recommended to me by a friend, but I saw the movie that was based on it not too long ago. However, I expect many things to be different from the movie and from the book, as most book-based movies are. Although World War II isn't the most intriguing thing to me, it is still interesting and I hope to challenge myself by reading something that is a bit out of my comfort zone.

TOW #8 - IRB

With one marking period down and three left, I have finished reading Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer. In comparison to many reviews, I rather enjoyed Into Thin Air. Krakauer did a spectacular job at narrating a personal thriller. Though the real event may not have been as crazy and action-packed as it was depicted in Into Thin Air, I still appreciated his rendition. In the second half of the story, Krakauer finds himself facing an enormous storm, both literally and figuratively. A massive blizzard renders his expedition crew inoperative, and at the same time the other crew members are not being cooperative with Krakauer and each other. One thing after another, luck is not in Krakauer's favor as him and his team descend from the summit. Eventually, with the loss of several members, they make it down. Even though it is a non-fiction account, Krakauer writes Into Thin Air for the purpose of entertainment. He accomplishes this through the use of his diction. His word choice and tone emphasizes the intensity or melancholy in certain situations. For instance, when Hutchinson, one of the expedition's team members, recalls when Weathers, another team member, was blown off of the mountain by a strong gust of wind, his tone makes the story short and gloomy. This causes the memory to be depressing and the reader can only feel sad for the unfortunate death. Overall, I thought Into Thin Air was well written and recommend it to anyone. Krakauer was very successful in entertaining me with his personal account of his expedition on Mt. Everest.