Very Rough Draft, Embarassed to Post it, but.......
Essay Three First Draft: Very Rough!!!
During an election year, many of the biggest issues affecting people get laid out before the American public. Each candidate comes up with their own platform that they feel will address these needs most sufficiently. In the book, UnSpun: Finding Facts in a World of [Disinformation], by Brooks Jackson and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, advise us that we can find useful information on the Internet regarding the political realm, in particular the election, but while searching for information, we must weigh “the trustworthiness of any particular website” (144). This aspect of “due diligence” should be utilized while searching the web to learn more about a particular candidates platform. Since there are a considerable amount of issues in this current election, an Internet search of each candidates website can yield a large amount of useful information. Through examination of Senator John McCain, the Republican candidates website, a person can gain a lot of insight into what type of structure he will attempt to incorporate if he is elected president.
A review of McCains website, reveals a lot of interesting information about this candidate. The site is biased, it is sponsored by John McCain, so the content of the site is presented to sell him as an exemplary candidate for President. The website is very user friendly, suited for an audience of middle school and on. The purpose of the website is to promote McCain and his agenda in this election. It is easy to use with neatly presented pull down menus that make it easy to locate any topic a person may want to learn about. It contains current information as well as historical facts. One can easily navigate between the menus to inside links and to outside links.
Upon opening the website, the viewer is presented with a royal blue screen, with stars in the background that blinks onto the home web page. The first message the viewer receives is McCain: COUNTRY FIRST. This first and most important message reveals that candidate mythologies one might expect to find will be on the way. The website contains many photos that house props and emotion communicating faces, and appeals to the American public.
There is a comprehensive page reviewing McCain’s Lexington Project, which is the name given to McCain’s energy program solutions. Also, included is a photo journal, that swirls the pictures around as it presents numerous photos of McCain with his family and growing up, photo’s of the campaign trail, photos of many different events he has attended, that portray him as a person who is concerned about America, and about the people of America.
Another very interesting item contained on the website is a timeline. It gives significant dates in McCain’s life and his accomplishment’s as well as a historical timeline of national events. It is laid out very nicely as you can hold down the mouse on a line and the information then moves across the screen like the credits rolling at the end of a movie. It is a very creative idea and very appealing to the viewer.
Cindy McCain is also presented on the website, she is presented as a first class citizen, a woman who has many accomplishments and interests in the welfare of women, children, she is a supporter of many organizations from the Red Cross to chartered schools, to feed the hungry, to women’s support organizations. She is presented through this website as an elegant, caring woman who would make a first class first lady.
The site includes video’s of commercials that are being presented to support McCain. These video’s are well presented. They do contain a lot of derogatory information about Obama, but that is to be expected since it is a website in support of McCain.
The structure of the website is set up well. It is creative, the photo album and the timeline being amongst some of the most creative I have seen on any website I have ever viewed. It has a lot of graphics in the form of movement. It does more than provide the viewer with still flat pictures. It presents them in an Imax movie theater presentation, as a descriptive sentence I would call it surround pictures, similar to surround sound, only in pictures. The pictures move up and down, side to side, zoom in, zoom out, it is unique. Perhaps people will equate the uniqueness of the website to uniqueness in McCain and elect him president.
All in all the website does accomplish it’s intended purpose. It is to appeal to the people of the U.S. to elect McCain for President. He is presented as tough enough to do the job, soft enough to have compassion, and versatile enough to understand the needs of the country, and maverick enough to make things happen that he wants to have happen.
A person who is seeking information about McCain, can learn a lot of useful information from this website. However, in order to do due diligence a person should also visit the website of Barak Obama, and then review some national information from the Senate and House of Representatives, and political analysts in order to truly be able to scrutinize the candidate you want to support, so that when you vote, you will have followed the advice of Jackson and Jamieson, and weighed the trustworthiness of the information against the sources that can prove or disprove it.
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Kelly,
The first two paragraphs strike me as being introductory in nature, mostly because the first provides some background and setup, along with the quote. The second provides something of a division of proofs, a list of the points that will be covered in the body of the essay. I'd say, don't try to cover them all. There is still a need for a thesis that ties those various points together, some unifying claim. The conclusion makes it clear (as does the intro to a lesser degree) that one won't get the whole story at the McCain site, but one must look elsewhere. In developing this essay, you don't need to go elsewhere so much as to spell out why the information is the McCain site is inadequate to getting the full picture.
What makes the draft rough-rough is the lack of paragraph development so far. The candidate mythology point is a good one, but it would make for a more effective paragraph to open with some mention of how sites construct candidate mythologies, among other things. Be sure to tell your reader just what the mythology is and then how it is constructed. Then explain why this is not the whole story, why someone might want to look elsewhere to see how valid or accurate this mythology is. If the props support the mythology, be sure to spell that out. If they are a separate point of discussion, give them a paragraph of their own.
Bradley
Introduction: You have a
Introduction: You have a good Intro,
Essay Focus, Thesis or Main point: Your thesis seems to need something, I think you could make it better, perhaps why it is a good site.
Conclusion: Ok but again I think you could fix it a bit. It does go along w/ your Intro, but maybe it's the lacking thesis that could help the conclusion.
Organization, structure and/or paragraphing: Very good but I felt like each paragraph didn't stick to the topic that it was on. The 1st sentence of the paragragh should set the guide for what is to be said.
Conventions of Standard American English and MLA:
Adequacy of response to assignment:
Good job, I agree w/ you on McCains' site, it was laid out pretty well w/ clear features and a neat picture gallary.
Appropriateness of topic treatment for college reading audience: Yes
Not such a rough draft after all! Good job just be clearer on the thesis, what's going to be talked about and tie it in w/ the conclusion more. :)
Your “very rough draft”
Your “very rough draft” is not so rough. You did a nice job narrowing in the introduction with a clear thesis statement. However, the line “In the book, UnSpun: Finding Facts in a World of [Disinformation], by Brooks Jackson and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, advise us that we can find useful information on the Internet regarding the political realm, in particular the election, but while searching for information, we must weigh “the trustworthiness of any particular website” (144),” is a run on sentence. Also, if you take out the book citing, you can see there’s a small grammar error.
Paragraph four needs a topic sentence. The first sentence of paragraph five needs to be broken up into more sentences.
Perhaps the last two paragraphs can be combined into one conclusive idea. I liked your use of the word “maverick.”
Be careful how you use apostrophes. In paragraph one, “candidates website” and “McCains website” are possessive, so they should be “candidate’s website” and “McCain’s website.”
Thank you for your comments.
Thank you for your comments. This has been a tough assignment for me, for some reason, I can't seem to get any feel for it. It feels like I keep writing the same essay over and over again, only a slightly different version of it and I feel pretty lost. But I appreciate your comments.
Kelly