Summary 11

Tamara Draut, in her article The Growing College Gap, argues for more government help for college students and for a closing in the college gap between the wealthy and more moderate backgrounds. Due to the dropping economy, community colleges have been losing funding and tuition rates for all colleges have sky rocketed. And it is becoming more apparent that a college education is the only way to have finical security in the middle class. What once was a high school diploma, is now the equal to today's bachelor degree. As a result of a growing need for higher education to made a good living in today's society and higher college rates with less finical assistance, the gap between the students with a wealthy background and students from middle or lower income families is expanding. Community colleges are over flowing with students who can't afford to go to a four year university. Universities and elite colleges are only full of students who can afford to attend. In the 70's, the government made an effort to make college affordable to every high school senior in America. The result was the doubling of enrollment rates of students from poor or moderate families, to universities. However, in recent years, scholarships and financial aid are being awarded to students based on performance, rather than on need. As a result, less college qualified students are applying to continue their education. And out of the ones who do decide to attend, only a small portion are graduating. Most of these students end up dropping school work, because they have to work full-time in order to afford it. By providing more aid to students based on needs and less for merits, we can begin to close the gap between the wealthy and the poorer and poor.

Summary 10

Karen Olsson describes the typical working scene at Wal-Mart, underpaid employees cramming to finish all of their assigned work, in her article Up Against Wal-Mart. Employees complain that their job is too stressful, because there aren't enough people to get the job done. However, these are common situations with other retail businesses. The difference between Wal-Mart and other retail stores is that Wal-Mart pressures employees to work overtime without pay and Wal-Mart actively avoids union organizations. Both managers and workers have testified of Wal-Mart's anti-union tactics. At the first sign of union organization, employees start to feel that they are being watched, even on their breaks. Managers hold long meetings showing videos about aversive effects of unions. A former manager testified that supervisors, pressured by the company, would ask clocked-out employees to stay late, without pay, to get the job done. These workers feel that if they refuse to stay, they will lose their job. Yet, every time employees try to organize to protest, union busters, sent from the company, come to discourage the workers, from getting involved with the union. Managers are taught to take personal offense to employees trying to organize a union and are then pressured to “work over” unhappy workers, who might want to join a union effort. One employee, Jennifer McLaughlin, is actively working to organize a union for the store she works at, in order to get better healthcare for her son. She as well as many others recognize that it will be a long and difficult process to organize a union, but they think it will be worth it.

Summary 9

Paul Krugman, in his article Confronting Inequality, explains how and why large differences between wages of the wealthy and the poor are a problem. Today, America's middle class is overextending themselves in an effort to give their children more opportunities Many middle class citizens are purchasing homes that they can't afford, so that their kids will be attending a good school so that their children can have more opportunities This shows the growing gap between the wealthy and the poor. Robert Frank reports that the rich are creating their own world, away from the middle class and the poor, which supports Krugman's thesis that there is a growing difference in social equality, which is being caused by the gap between wealth.
Another reason that inequality between the classes is important is because of politics. If politicians are able to buy and own the government, they will. Today, that is exactly what is happening. Politicians have enough wealth and influence that they are unaffected by the average joe who doesn't agree with them. One example of this can be seen in the tax break for the hedge fund managers. Many individuals disagreed with the tax break, yet politicians avoided taking action against it. Also, the more money the wealthy have, and the less of a middle class there is, the more influence the wealthy have in politics, which again increases the social inequality in America.
Some suggestions to solve this growing concern is to let these tax cuts expire as they are scheduled to in the near future. The next step is to close the loopholes that allowed the tax breaks in the first place. Once these suggestions are implemented, there will be more revenue for the government, so that lower income families can be assisted, and then social equality will resume.

Summary 8

“Generation y” is a gold mine for marketing for companies, according to Naomi Rockler-Gladen, in her article Me Against the Media: From the Trenches of a Media Lit Class. Much concern is expressed for this generation, because very few of them care that companies are trying to manipulate and use them. In fact, for many of them, they don't understand why it's a bad thing for there to be so much advertising around people all of the time. What these students fail to realize, is that companies are basically teaching people not to care about where or what they shop for. These students believe that when you buy a coffee from starbuks, you are simply buying a good mocha. In reality, these companies are influencing society “politically, economically, and ideologically.”

One example to illustrate this point is seen in the tv shows that many people from generation y remember watching as kids, such as Strawberry Shortcake, He-Man, and Care Bears. First one might think that they're just tv shows. However, these tv shows were created as an advertizement for toys. In order to get little girls to want to buy a stuffed bear, they made a cartoon. Other examples include advertizements in high schools and brand logos on clothing. Yet, generation y still has a hard time understanding why this could be a bad thing. Yet, if you were to ask them to give examples of how companies have “screwed them over,” they would be able to cite specific examples, such as prices of books and large insurance costs. What this generation needs to learn is these companies receive their power by individuals buying/using their product/service. And they get their customers from their advertizing. Once they understand this, media activists and generation y can work together to overcome it.

Summary 7

Roz Chast, who is a political cartoonist for the New Yorker published a cartoon titled The I.M.s of Romeo and Juliet in the year 2002. This cartoon depicts two teenagers, each in their own room, sitting and typing on a computer. In the center of the cartoon is a box, where their conversation is printed. In the background, one can see that both bedrooms are extremely messy.

Reading the text is difficult at first, because of all of the abbreviations that Romeo and Juliet use. While these abbreviations are meant to save time, it can be seen that the time teenagers 'save' by using texting lingo is wasted online, instead of being used more productively. Scattered around the room are test papers with poor grades on them, to show how little of their time is spent off of the computer. Thus it can be seen that technology is a distraction for teens and that they are losing sight of other things in their lives that should be important, such as grades and family.

One of the topics of conversation, between Romeo and Juliet, is their parents. Both Romeo and Juliet express that their parents do not like their son/daughter hanging out with that particular friend. However, Romeo and Juliet do not think that it's a big deal. Through the breezy way that this conversation happens between Romeo and Juliet, it is apparent that technology is bringing about distance in families. Neither of the two teens in the cartoon care to find out way they are disliked, which shows that they do not understand their parents' viewpoint. From this depiction of modern teenagers, it can be inferred that Roz disagrees with this teenage lifestyle, because technology is distracting teens from important aspects of their lives.

Summary 6

Thinking Outside the idiot Box was written by Dana Stevens as a direct response to Steven Johnson's article Watching TV Makes You Smarter. Johnson believes that TV shows have become more complicated, because the viewers have grown smarter from watching them. He argues that watching TV gives you “cognitive benefits... attention, patience, retention, and the parsing of narrative threads.” Stevens argues that television industries have complicated their storylines and filled their shows with rapid-fire information, in order to KEEP their viewers from thinking, so that the viewers will only think about the future shows.
24 is one example of how producers are keeping their audiences, with complicated plots and intense action. The show 24 has various plot lines which allude back to previous shows and keep the individual in suspense Thus, the viewer has to think back and make those connections, in order to keep up. This keeps the individual distracted from evaluating the “nutritional value” of the show.
Stevens then moves her argument on to discuss who should deem a show to be nutritional. Duringthe TV Turnoff Week in the year 2005, Kalle Lasn failed to turn off a TV in an airport, because it was a nature show. “Who decides?” which shows are better to watch? One individual could be offended by the living arrangements of a couple in a show, and thus deem the show to be inappropriate When we try to evaluate if a show is inappropriate versus appropriate, we are taking responsibility and freedom away from adults to make their own decisions. It should remain the individual's choice to decide if a show is worth viewing, just as the person should decide if watching TV is a smart thing for them to do. However, “There couldn't be a better time to test Steven Johnson's theory” than now. Just don't watch TV for a few days, and see if it makes you dumber.

Summary 5

Paul Campos, in his essay entitled Being Fat is OK, describes a “propaganda war” between individuals fighting against the dieting industry and the government. The government is supporting the dieting industry by releasing information that is misleading and incorrect. Starting with the Body Mass Index, or the BMI, the government is claiming that sixty one percent of Americans are overweight. Paul Campos points out that even though he runs thirty five to forty miles a week and is considered to overall have excellent health, he is fat to the government because he is five foot eight inches and weighs one hundred sixty five pounds.

Scientifically this information is incorrect, because it has not been proven that weight effects death. There have been some correlations between weight and death, however there is no data supporting the theory that weight can cause death. Yet, dieting industries have convinced people that thin individuals are healthier than fat people, when in fact, thin people have simply started out with less weight.

On top of no scientific evidence supporting that weight can cause death, there is little evidence to suggest whether or not losing weight is healthy. In order to prove this, an experiment would have to be conducted where half of the subjects kept off all of the lost weight. Since there is no known way to keep lost weight off, it cannot be proven.

Even though ninety to ninety eight percent of diets fail, it is widely believed that fat people can choose to be thinner. Thus the dieting industries are making about fifty billion dollars a year, convincing people to invest in dieting, when is it most likely that their dieting plan will fail. Scientifically, information regarding weight loss and dieting cannot be proven, yet the government is still supporting the dieting industry. Campos concludes by comparing diets to “ineffective cures for an imaginary disease.”

Summary 4

Radley Balko, author of What You Eat is Your Business, begins his article by introducing a three day summit on obesity. He judges that the program will promote government intervention of obesity. Then Balko moves on, by pointing out what the government and governmental officials are currently doing to fight obesity. For example, state legislators and school boards are banning junk food and soda pop from school vending machines. Also, President George W. Bush budgeted two hundred million dollars for anti-obesity measures.
Following these discussions, Radley Balko argues that these methods are “the wrong way to fight obesity.” He points out that government measures to solve obesity problems by limiting the available choices, take away the responsibility of the individual to manage their weight, by eating healthier foods. Balko then lists actions taken by lawmakers and politicians, which have caused America's health care system to move toward socialism. Some of these actions include candidates for presidency promising to make health care a part of the public sector and states preventing higher premium charges to overweight clients from private health insurance companies. Actions of this nature “effectively remove any financial incentive for maintaining a healthy lifestyle.” Balko discusses how individuals are not being held responsible for their own health, which causes them to lose motivation to stay healthy. Balko then talks about how this will pave the way for more government restrictions of personal responsibility and lose of individual freedoms.
Radley Balko concludes with some suggestions on how to solve the public health problem of obesity. Overall, he hopes to achieve this purpose by taking obesity out of the public health sector. He states that the only reason obesity is a public issue is because the public is paying for the choices of individuals. By liberating insurance companies to reward people for healthy lifestyles and allowing increased access to medical and health savings accounts, individuals will have more accountability for their own health and thus they will start making better choices.

Summary 3

Micheal D. Lemonick, author of Are We Losing Our Edge?, begins his argument that the United States of America is starting to decline, with a story about a scientist, who moves to a different country for better job experiences. Lemonick claims that America is losing ground to other countries, because businesses and the government are cutting back on research and knowledge to focus on short term goals, while other countries are working on improving their studies.
He presses this point, by discussing how the government downplayed the importance of improving science and technology, in the Bush administration. However, he also points out that after a five hundred five page report assessing the United States’ eroding superiority in science and technology, the government began taking steps to improve funding and support for scientific research. He names specific individuals and their actions, such as Nancy Pelosi and Donald Evens, who actively spoke out for science and technology.
Then, Lemonick addresses businesses and how they’re affecting this decline. By focusing on short term advances, they are losing their advanced research and updated information. In turn, this affects students and what career path they decide to study. With businesses showing a lack of interest in scientific research, students stopped studying science and technology in hopes of gaining a career that will be more profitable for them.
Lastly Lemonick portrays the effects of other countries to improve their economies by investing in research. After seeing how successful the United States is, they are beginning to copy America. By improving their research labs with updated equipment, proper funding for research projects, large salaries for scientists, and a free reign on the research projects, not only do they lure top scientists away from the United States, but they are enticing their students to stay.
Micheal Lemonick concludes by pointing out that the government may be listening to the warning signs. Laws and grants look like they will be pushed through, to once again keep science and technology a priority in America.

Summary 2

Fareed Zakaria quotes Andy Grove the founder of Intel, who says that America is declining the same way that Europe did, as a start to his article titled The Last Superpower. Fareed Zacaria responds to Andy Grove, as well as to many other observers and commentators, by pointing out that despite worrisome trends in America, which have been around for quite some time, “America's growth rate has averaged just over 3 percent,” which is higher than the other leading countries of today's global market. He continues to argue that America is only experiencing a setback because of the growth of other countries. He makes that point, by discussing the balance of world powers, America's past foreign policy, and how globalization will effect the various countries.
Fareed Zacaria describes the United States of America as a superpower, because of America's unipolarity relationship with other countries. “Since 1989, the power of the United States has defined the international order.” As other countries try to increase their own power, America grows suspicious of losing hers. In the past, the United States has always had the influence. Thus, America was able to feel isolated and protected. However, the growth and global expansion of other countries, such as Germany and India, takes away some of America's power. With new resources available to them, other countries are becoming less dependent on America. Compromise is becoming the popular foreign policy, which may be difficult for America. Zakaria concludes with the idea that America is strong and has survived in the past, because she adapted. As long as America adapts to the new challenges of globalization, the setbacks she is currently facing will not be consequential.

Summary 1

Bob Herbert begins his writing, A Fire in the Basement, with an effort to unify his readers and himself against a common enemy, the government. Herbert begins at a grassroots level by describing a scene from an interrogation room. He then continues with a list of other atrocities, caused by government officials. After a few stories, he stops to compare modern day America with America from the 1950's and the 60's, where he claims that America was better back then, because individuals tried to right the wrongs in our country. Herbert uses the remaining stories to emphasize that point.
After milking as much sympathy from his readers as he can, Herbert begins to describe his own philosophy relating to the decline of our country. He addresses many of our countries' current controversies; such as the good ole American ideals, and the politicians who claim to believe in them, while working for their own agendas. He assaults the morality of the war in Iraq and the “abuse” of war prisoners. He also addresses the economic problems of the day, starting with divisions among the classes and ending with the underpaid and the jobless. During these discussions, he quotes a few of the great leaders in our country's past, and compares their actions with those of the politicians in our era.
These brief quotes lead into the final portion of his writing, which is about leadership. He begins with Harry Truman and his attempts as president to rebuild our country. Herbert wishes for such leadership today, to wake up American citizens to the wrongs all around them. He closes with an analogy of a building, symbolizing America, whose basement is on fire. He points out that "we're behaving as if we cannot even smell the smoke." However there is more to it than that. We not only kmow that there is a problem, we know who started it. We can't wait for the fire-starters, who claim to be firemen, to put out the fire. We will lose too much. So, why not stop it ourselves?