Washington Post: Obama Poll

Obama & the Economy Poll

By: Lauren Young

Since Steven proposed the idea in his last blog about how Americans always just blame the president for everything, and how Obama is losing approval ratings, I decided to do some research on the matter. Some polls I found from the Washington Post Online state that:

64% of Americans still have confidence in Obama

That there is an increase in the percentage of people who think we are headed in the right direction.

(Statistics based off a telephone survey of 1000 people)

I do not know how accurate this poll is since it might not have had good demographics and it was not conducted by a credible source like AP Nielson Statistics.

However, I find the general claim of this article to state that Americans are starting to think Obama is moving in the right direction. Many Americans still have faith, even if they blame him for problems.

My personal opinion on this article was that it seemed kind of biased. I know it was a survey, but it was still written to favor democrats. Overall, politics are very complicated and I believe it is just human nature to blame political leaders for problems. In my personal opinion, I think anyone in office right now would be blamed for the horrible economy.

Where is the common ground? by Steven Waugh

When will people start sticking to their preconceived notions? There is nothing I hate more than "fair weather fans." In the article "Poll: Public shifting blame for recession," the American people are shown to be following fair weather trends. The recession has been blamed on many things. For one, the housing crisis, and the auto industry has also bore the brunt of the blame. But people mainly blame the recession on either Republicans or Democrats. Republicans have been taking most of the heat for the past two years, but the statistics are showing that people are being swayed towards blaming the current crisis on Democrats.

Obama promised to fix the economy, and millions of people entrusted him with their votes. He has made considerable change with bills such as H.R. 3200 which will create a public option for healthcare. Obama and his "change" have made considerable headway, yet people still have doubts. After blaming Republicans for the economic downturn, some are claiming that Obama has done nothing to improve it, and now some are claiming that he has made the economy even worse! With midterm elections coming up, the American people have a decision to make. Will the Republicans get a second shot at redemption, or will the Democrats, who they are clearly unhappy with, continue to dominate congress? Will America make a stance, or continue to just blame whoever is in office for every problem that arises? Please let me know your stance on the subject at hand, and if you notice some of the same symptoms in our culture.

Public Option? by Steven Waugh

Ok I was going to try to tie in my healthcare argument with Phillips car argument, but I only came up with a few ways to do so. The recent economic downfall has created a revived drive in the governments efforts to reshape the American economy. The American car crisis has been at the forefront of these efforts. Pixars new smart-cars are a new idea that the American people have to look forward to in the future.

But what about healthcare? President Obama promised that "change" would drive his campaign, and a new healthcare platform was at the center of his promises. The house just passed the H.R. 3200 health care bill. For a good summary of the bill look at this summary. It is a great look at the new bill that may be turned into a law if it is successfully passed in the senate.

At the forefront of the healthcare argument is the public option. In theory, the public option is a great way to provide healthcare to everyone equally. But in reality, the public option provides many problems. The mere confusion that will arise with employers trying to figure out whether the incentives to provide the public option will surpass the benefits given by private employers is amazing. The thousand-plus pages of the bill provide people to have many grievances.

Glen Beck is upset with suggested government run parenting programs that would essentially allow government workers to come into your home and "teach" your parents how to run your house hold effectively.

So when is enough, enough? Will the Senate pass the bill? We entrust our leaders to make appropriate decisions that will affect the country in a positive way. In no way am I opposed to the bill because I am in no way educated enough on its contents. I just posted this because I am passionate about keeping tabs on our governments actions and policies. Please let me know your opinions on the bill so I can get a better grasp on how the mainstream student population feels about Obama's administration.

Pixar's Cars Prediction, by Phillip Miller

I apologize for the change in topic but this was too sticking to leave for another time
When are we going to design cars that can speak and hear?
We can do so much with technology these days why not design our traveling bodies with their own mouth and ears. We already have cars that can see......
Cars house our minds nearly as much as our bodies do, it would only make sense to start to design them with as much capabilities as our bodies.....and then some. This topic was sparked inside of me while trying to navigate myself through a car park/ shopping center in North Carolina.

There were not any sidewalks, pathways or pedestrian crosswalks. I felt as though the entire plaza was designed purely for the mobility of cars and not people. I must say though, the plaza well very well landscaped so that made it ok.
It was unbelievable. The day was beautiful and sunny. Not too cold and not too hot, just right. There was not a soul outside unless they were walking to their cars. Everyone jumped out of their cars ran over to where they were about to spend some of their oh so scarce green and then run back into their little safe zones on wheels.
This was a beautiful state with vast amounts of open space all ready to be used for sports and activities but no. Everyone chose to spend their Sunday hiding form the sun and the world outdoors that has not already been processed and deep fried for them.

Atlanta Graffiti

In class, many of our groups had talked about how graffiti can actually make a community closer if everyone accepts it. In the video ATL Graffiti, a girl goes traveling around Atlanta taking pictures and looking at all of the different graffiti. This video shows the interest of not only the people within the neighborhood, but people outside as well. It could even be said that graffiti in a neighborhood, if elaborate enough, can actually attract tourism and people from out of town.

This video does a good job of being consistant and keeping the audience's attention. The music and the cinematographic techniques it uses, such as having the girl walk by the wall several times, grab the attention and keep the interesting flow of the video going. The video focuses on using emotional and visual appeals to persuade the audience that Atlanta is filled with unique and interesting neighborhoods. The artistic perspective it give by the black and white up until the graffiti is seen is an emotional appeal, making the neighborhoods have hip or trendy vibes. The graffiti art itself is the visual appeal. Both of these aspects blend together to maintain its purpose, which is to show the Atlanta community in a unique and trendy light.

Suburban Sprawl - Sprawling From Grace; Driven To Madness Review

Video Link
This video was a trailer for a movie, so the goal of it was to advertise, and to portray the movie in an intersting way for the audience. Tone. The tone of the music is ther first thing that catches the audience's attention. The sound throughout the whole clip is a very fast paced violin with a repetitive beat. This creates an intense and interesting feeling for the audience, which is the goal of the video. Another thing that is intended to keep the audience's attention is the imagery. All of the 5 second clips of images show pollution, clutter, and spread out interstates and houses to create a serious setting. The combination of voice overs and fast paced music in the background, and the images of pollution and crowding provide a powerful message that is both interesting and showing the point of the film itself.

As far as the content within the video, there are a lot of good points. The voice overs describe and layout some of the general problems with sprawl. They also stress repetitiveness of sprawl, and how we keep making the same mistakes over and over. Another point made is that we are hurting both humanity and the world we live in by constantly increasing sprawl. This is appealing to our attachment to the people around us and the world we live in. A very good point is made that "the human being has to be the essential planning component and the scale around which everything is measured, not the automobile." This point is a logos appeal, because it is saying logically the scale that we build everything should be based on what it is being built for, humans. The fact that this is a trailer for a legitimate movie actually shows credibility to the audience. In end of the video, an Einstein quote is used to emphasize their message of repetitiveness, which could be both a logical appeal and an emotional appeal. This allows the video to end on a powerful sure fire message to send out to the audience.

By: Stephen Sealy

Trash & Sprawl: An Artistic Twist

By: Lauren Young

There are several ways in which humans are effecting the environment in a bad way. Two of these seven themes fit in with my main two focuses of my blog posts this semester: Sprawl and Trash. First, watch this video about a man who expresses his opinions through 3D art.

His artwork is created based off seven themes: urban Sprawl, energy, trash, soil depletion, deforestation, plastics, finally red fluid for death and destruction. Each of these themes gets a layer in the original box that is displayed. He then rips off seven strips, layer by layer, and each layers creates trash or debris that goes crashing to the floor. When he's done, there is just a tone of trash on the group, and behind where the strips were in a destructed American flag.

This artwork is amazing because it finds a way to read very clearly to the audience. The audience can tell that all the trash and waste is bad for the environment not only because it is trash, but because he presents it in a negative way just letting it all fall to the ground. As he peels off each strip, it is like he is starting to reveal more and more truths. Lasly, the image of the bent and beat up American flag at the end is so symbolic of the corruption that America is leaving on this earth. I was so happy to discover this video because it shows a very strong piece of artwork that ties into the themes I'm focusing on this year.