Proposal

For this writing project, I'm going to be writing about the importance of manned space flight. This is a timely issue for the whole nation, as Obama just recently unveiled a plan changing NASA's budgetary focus away from manned space flight. In this piece I'll show how the topic is relevant to everyone, including undergraduate students here at UW-Madison.

To get this point across, I'm going to focus on several main aspects of the argument. First, the overarching reason for manned space flight, the one that trumps everything- survival. We've come very close to being wiped out as a race many times in the past, from disease, nuclear war, and the like, not to mention the possibility of everyone's favorite disaster movies coming true and the earth being smacked by a giant meteor. Human spaceflight will eventually lead to human colonies in space, creating redundancy for us as a race- if we have people living elsewhere besides Earth, we no longer have to worry about our whole legacy being wiped out in one untimely accident.

Second, I'll focus on timeliness. Getting a head start as soon as possible is key. Manned spaceflight is really still in its infancy, and the resources and technology required to allow us to start setting up colonies elsewhere simply take a long time to develop. If we wait until it's needed, it will simply be too late. We have to get things moving now, so that when the time comes we aren't saying “You know, I wish we'd gone along with that whole colony on the moon idea” right before all the nukes hit and send us back to the stone ages. It's like a 401k plan; if you don't start investing in it early, by the time you actually need it it's too late.

With those to big ideas out of the way, I'll focus on issues a little closer to home, and show why it matters to UW-Madison students in particular, apart from the whole survival of the human race bit. Specifically, I'll focus on the economic side of things. For one, we're currently in a recession. The US is the biggest world power right now, and the quality of life here shows it. What happens when other nations start to pull ahead of us in the space race? Suddenly someone like China will be seen as the nation at the forefront. Companies will start moving investments there, and we'll lose our spot at the top. Second, madison is a very progressive city, and people are always worrying about “going green” and starving overpopulated masses. What better way is there to save the environment from the strain of overpopulation than to start spreading out and leaving Earth? Yes, it's a long way off, but eventually we'll have habitable colonies on the moon, mars, and who knows where else. Colonies that can help relieve the pressure from all the overpopulated areas.

For sources, I'll probably use mainly news articles about the space program (as well as overpopulation and pollution issues for the last part), with possibly some history books for background on the space program so far.

I think that this piece will help people think about the issue in a different light. I want to point out some benefits of manned spaceflight in areas that most people have never really thought about before.

Option 2 - Proposal

Media is one of the largest influences on people today. What to wear, what to eat, what kind of car to drive, and yes, who we should elect into office. Every second of the day, there is someone in our media telling you how to live your lives, and reporting on how others are living theirs. The biggest effect of this is our opinionated news media: Sean Hannity, Keith Olbermann, Rush Limbaugh, Rachel Maddow, etc., etc. All of these people have radio shows, television shows, articles, and books. So the real question is: Do they have an effect on how our country is run? The answer is yes. But the other question is: How much do they affect it?

Now, I do not want to focus on such a large scale like national politics. Let's focus on something smaller like state government. I want to find out how people like this affect how our state runs and who is elected. I also want to focus on if more money = more power. So, for my project I will look at how TV ads (from everyone) and media control or don't control congress.

I think this will be extremely relevant to current times because there is almost always an election going on, and Congress is in session a majority of the year. Also, after the last supreme court ruling, anyone can run TV ads, so if you have money, go for it!

I will do 3 different kinds of research. 1) I will search in academic journals about politics and media, 2) I will talk with people about how they view the media and political commercials, and 3) I will do research at my internship with a State Senator to see how our constituents react to certain things.

So far, I have found that there is a large effect on people from media. We get more phone calls in the office when there is a big event going on, and we get even more petitions and calls when someone goes on TV and tells our constituents to do something. So, I feel like I will be able to find out how much of effect our media has on everyday politics.

The Proposal

The Situation:
I am interested in exploring the history and current condition of government censorship, especially in relation to the first amendment and particularly regarding free speech (depending on where the evidence takes me). I want to compile evidence and make an argument about what condition our first amendment rights are in and what should be allowed or not allowed—or at least ask some questions about the philosophy of censorship. The idea of government censorship is relevant today especially because of pop culture and political happenings happening now—from the war in Iraq to the library mall preacher, to allowing porn on the UW Campus, to protests happening in front of the catholic church and Memorial Library. My focus will be on a bigger, more national level but the points will be broken down into palpable, applicable theories/proofs.

“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” –Voltaire

The Focus:
The meat of my paper will be looking through places where censorship worked, failed, should have been used, should not have been used, etc. and trying to quantify the evidence into some kind of conclusion about its effectiveness, or even whether it is necessary. Is censorship more helpful than hurtful? Who does it discriminate against? Who does it help? Are some people denied rights because of it? I can see running into the problems of defining a “right” of man, but I would like to avoid that kind of debate because it will be unproductive. What I want to focus on is the government’s responsibility/power to censor the public eye, and whether that power is appropriate, used well, or needed (ex: dirty pictures/porn, burning books/flags, politically correct speech, FDA having guns, indecent speech, anti-political/anti-American commentary, government news management).


Methods:
I think a combination of both a survey (conducted by me) and articles online would be effective. I like the idea of using online sources because they are the easiest to verify and the most up-to-date. But I want to avoid gathering a lot of information and spitting it out again in a new form. Some of that is bound to happen in a research paper, but hopefully if I conduct a survey and put it in my paper I can keep my focus straight and stay on track with what interests me about censorship. It also helps me feel responsible for the claim I’m making (instead of copying other people’s claims). It is obviously important to use credible sources and reliable experts, but the issue of government censorship is broad enough that even though a lot of people want to get their two cents in, the history of government action and political stances (professional findings, essentially) is very accessible and easy to weed out. My favorite resource so far is the International Society for Independent Freedom because they are fighting for the first amendment rights globally, which means they have a lot of evidences to prove the need (the site is mostly about America, the philosophy is more international). I am also very interested in the United States official positions on it, so for that I will rely on court cases to speak for the nation (Roth vs. United States, Alberts vs. California). The Supreme Court is going to be a great resource on finding out what the official position on censorship is. It is not as official, but the Berkeley law blog has some really interesting ideas with the trend of American’s freedoms and believe that they have been declining since 1964. I may include some things like that as well.


Possible implications:
My preliminary findings are that there are going to be multiple solid evidences for both sides, and that it could be more of a moral issue than a political or social one (should kids be allowed to see pornographic magazines in grocery stores? how much information should the government tell the American people and release to the press?), but I am going to try to steer it away from opinion if I can, or at least make claims that are concrete ideas to form opinions from. I hope it will, by the end, help my fellow undergrads think about what they really want to/should know because it’s “out there.” I hope that they learn some temperament, and concede that it takes a lot of discernment to figure out what they should and should not be exposed to, even in a democracy. Some things are just not healthy; some things are downright dangerous not to know. I hope they feel empowered to decide for themselves which they want, and to base that conclusion on information instead of opinion or definition (i.e. “liberalism”).

Over the past 7 years in Wisconsin government, there has been a skewed opinion. Not only has our current administration caused one of the highest debts in our state history, they have also managed to make our state the 3rd worst state to do business in. Now this is not to stay that it is all Jim Doyle's fault, but I have to say that a Governor of the state must take a lot of credit for it.

Jim Doyle announced last summer that he would not run for a third term in office. This probably has something to do with the fact that his approval ratings have dropped below 30%. The real situation I want to touch on, though, is the upcoming race for Governor. Tom Barret, the Mayor of Milwaukee, and Scott Walker, the Milwaukee County Executive, are the two front runners from the Democratic and Republican Parties, respectively. Now, the race is going to be very important for our state because the winner will be able to shape the direction of our state. Another important piece of the election is going to be how the election will be run. The US Supreme Court found that having the McCain/Feingold campaign finance law was unconstitutional. Not only will this affect our nations elections and campaigns, it is going to also affect our state run campaigns.

Before McCain/Feingold, most campaign money came in as large donations from corporations and the extremely rich. Since it went into effect, however, many campaign contributions were from grassroots efforts. The current campaign within the Scott Walker group has raised a majority of its money with small donations. They have had over 18,000 people donate to the campaign. Everything is going to change now that corporations and any other rich company or non-profit can give as much money and say anything they want.

Many people will argue that this is going to ruin our election system and make it so whoever has the most money wins. I don't believe this is true, especially since both sides have multi-million dollar backers. I am glad that the supreme court has found McCain/Feingold unconstitutional, as you should, too. This will allow everyone to have a voice, just as our fore fathers had intended. Yes, there will be more ads on television now from private organizations, corporations, non-profits, and even religious groups. However, isn't it a good things to allow everyone to speak their mind in an open environment. By keeping people from saying what they want in elections, it only allows certain people to have their voice heard. Whether you are rich or you are poor, you have the same voice. Someone who is rich may be able to make a television ad that costs $10 million, but someone who is poor can go door to door in their neighborhood and give their opinion.

So, by allowing our campaigns to be more open, with less interference from the government, and more input from our citizens, we will be able to elect officials that are doing what we want them to. You may say that with these big interests spending all this money it is going to cause more politicians to "owe" their contributors, but I think that if there is someone else on the other side with the same amount of money ready to attack them for listening to the "big money interests," then there will be a lot less to worry about. Everyone will be held accountable for what they have done because they will have to answer to the other side even more than they have in the past. So, if you want truth and honesty in politics, and you want everyone's freedom of speech to be upheld, then join me in supporting the recent Supreme Court Case decision that repealed the McCain/Feingold campaign finance reform.

Supreme our Ruling Threatens Democracy

“Ordinary Americans will be able to vote, but they will not be represented” --Miller

Senator Mark Miller hypothesizes the negative consequences of the Supreme Court’s ruling this year that permits corporations to spend uncapped amounts on elections in an opinion piece from the Isthmus.

Senator Miller believes that money buys power, and monopolizing politics into the “megacorporate players” means “drowning out the will of the people,” which is his ethical appeal against this ruling. He believes it is unconstitutional to muffle out the voice of the citizens, which is what this ruling does; the voices that matter are the ones coming from corporate checkbooks, and the ruling broke 100 years of precedent keeping the people paramount in making political choices. “Bloodless corporations will not be able to vote,” Miller writes, “but they will most certainly be represented, at all levels of government.” It seems as though the act of voting itself will become an empty gesture.

Elections and political campaigns today are races to spread information to the voters, which is one of the reasons campaigns spend so much funding on telecommunications. The Supreme Court’s ruling “opens the floodgates for corporate political spending,” which Miller suggests was an inevitable outcome of the Bush administration. When corporations control the candidates, they can promote or prohibit political progress by sponsorship (or threat to cease sponsorship). Miller sees this as detrimental to the basic freedoms of a U.S. citizen.

He blames the Bush administration’s corporate-friendly attitude for “the Great Recession of 2008” and claims that Wall Street and pharmaceutical companies actually “drafted legislation for Congress to pass.” While Miller’s intent is to encourage voters to be wary of protecting their constitutional rights, he states his conclusions about the Bush legacy without any specificities. This makes his attack seem more like an elephant jab than substantial, irrevocable evidence for his case. A warning without proof is scary, maybe effective (like yelling ‘shark!’ at a beach), but not going to save anyone if it is not backed up factually.

Miller’s biggest fallacy is the contingent train of conclusions that begins reasonably and ends, well, who quite knows where: the Supreme Court now allows corporations to donate to elections unrestrictedly→these corporations will become bigger motivators for candidates than the citizen opinion→America will go into an economic recession→there is no check on the Supreme Court, which is out of balance and taking away our freedoms→the government will no longer belong to the people, and instead will become a corporate puppet. While it is one possible outcome for the ruling, it is a scare tactic to raise awareness and communicate a sense of communal outrage and camaraderie, not an appeal to logos.

“Let’s not revert…” Miller urges his audience. Let’s not, as if we are a collective democratic portrait of America. While his claim is effective in empowering the reader to be part of his protest, he assumes that his audience is on his side and is democratic. “As voters, we need to be very critical…we need to insist…we need to be very angry…” he says. He writes as if he—an elected official—is not part of the politics but part of the vulnerable citizens. It nearly seems deceitful for him to not admit his office or consider it with his argument.

In Interesting Link for Iran Freedom Issues

This is an article about Iran's people marking their 30-year anniversary for their national revolution from the shah. But it seems that their new government is just as forceful, perverse, and delusional as the last one. So, it has potential. A lot of people were abused in the attempt to quiet the protest. Check it out HERE.

What Genre fits you?

In a few situations in my life, I have found that the way in which you speak can do a lot or a little for you. The genre in which you choose to speak can completely change how you are going to say something. Do you want to be serious, satirical, poetic, or anything else. I agree that this limits the speaker a great deal.

How is a person supposed to speak at a formal engagement as opposed to a casual dinner with friends. You may not notice that you change your speech or tone, but it does happen to everyone. This is not always do to the fact that we want to change how we are perceived, but we do it unconsciously due to our audience.

An audience can change our genre a lot. Not only do we try to spin what we are trying to say to impress a certain audience, we are also making sure that we do not do anything inappropriate. Would it be appropriate for a Senator to give a speech on clean energy in the style of an Old English poem? Probably not. However, if he were giving a speech at the National Poet Society, they may get a kick out of it.

So, as you can tell, the genre you choose to speak in can be a huge determination of how you are perceived and how you want to be perceived. The audience is a big constraint that keeps you from talking in the way you may want to, but it is also a great way to step out of your element. It is my hope that speaking in different genres will challenge every speaker.

Analyzing Genre

I would argue that Genre can at the same time be both limiting and enabling. The key is that we must understand our audience as well as the context of the situation.

Sometimes Genre can limit what we are allowed to say or do in our presentation. For example, take the Presidential address; although the President may crack a few jokes, it would be highly inappropriate to render the speech in a satirical way. The President is basically stuck talking about big ideas, giving vague reports of how the country is doing, and sticking in many uplifting and cliche statements meant to get the viewers fired up. He doesn't have time to delve into detailed analysis of each issue, and he is forced to give the speech in a positive, uplifting manner.

On the other hand, in many situations Genre opens up a world of possibilities to us. For example, satire often allows us the freedom to do and say things that otherwise would be wildly inappropriate. If we are trying to point out the absurdity of wrongness of a particular candidate's views, we could just write an article about how everything they say is wrong and no one should vote for them. A few people would probably read it, write us off as biased nuts, and move on to the next article. However, we could instead do a satirical piece on the issue. Satire is often very entertaining- it gets people to read it because it's not just facts and opinions, but it's humor. More people would read our article, and would be much less likely to get offended at what we are saying, since after all it's just satire. However, they would also be listening to what we were saying, and there would be a much greater chance for them to internalize our words and not just write us off .

An interesting place where Genre can be used in new ways is video games. Historically, video games have been a form of entertainment, fun to mash buttons and shoot nazis or chop orcs in half. However, more and more, companies are using video games to tell a story instead of just entertain. The graphics and options open to developers now allows them great freedom in this respect; often video games now are more compelling story wise than many movies. This is a great example of a Genre being changed and used in new ways.

These are good examples of how Genre can really help or hinder you, depending on the circumstances.

Genre is the Mother of All Rhetoric

Genre is a limiting force because of audience.

I believe most people feel and act one particular way depending on the social milieu around them (one way at home, another at school, another at work perhaps, etc.). Hopefully without sounding too schizophrenic, I can admit that I do this as well. I will swear and joke around with friends in a casual setting but at home I speak plainly and calmly with my parents. More than making a statement about people’s personalities or lifestyles, I know that I do this consciously because of my audience.

I choose not swear at home because I know my dad hates swearing and will be upset and not listen to me. Or considering that my mom has multiple sclerosis I know that it is hard for her to remember things, so when I tell her something, I tell her about four times in four different ways over the course of an hour. Both an audience’s attitude and mental capacity/state in any genre is crucial for inspiring or inhibiting rhetorical success.

Genre is an excellent opportunity for tailoring a rhetorical strategy to the sympathies or outrages of a particular audience.

Genre can also be an excellent tool for the origination of exigencies and be the window for rhetoric to work in. For example, it is easier to write an essay on a prompt than on a concept you come up with vaguely in your head from many places. I can write right now about T.S. Eliot’s modernist influence but I cannot write about the economy. Sometimes a specific problem that you either know about or can research directly encourages the best-written papers. If necessity is the mother of invention, certainly genre is similarly the mother of rhetorical approach.

People are problem-solvers. We want to be able to explain why something is happening or decide what should be done about ‘x.’ When there is no problem ‘x’ there can be no solution ‘y’ and people continue on without the need for rhetoric. In this sense genre is the fountain for all rhetoric because genre and situation create a need for a solution and an audience for rhetoriticians to jump into (and in front of).

If a speaker must address an audience, as all speakers must—like Obama addressing an entire nation, he/she must use the audience as both a constraint and a clue for how to best employ rhetoric strategy. Obama had to look at issues and explain them in terms that the American people would understand and generally agree with if he wanted their support.

A good speaker or writer should use this to his/her advantage and trampoline from the constraint of genre into the possibilities of genre (like the ad we saw in class with the check and the homeless man geared toward persuading older women to donate money). In that sense genre is a beneficial set of cues for how best to get a message across considering that each audience has a different attitude and mental state which should be taken into account when discerning the best rhetorical strategy.