Obama's Inauguration

“The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.”

I choose this section of Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address because it reminds me of how we’re all in this together. I think that we as the people of America have to work together to get through the hard times. I also think that this part of Obama’s speech refers strongly to the past, as the problems that we have faced as a country, and to the present as to how we’re going to face problems together as a country. I think that Obama’s words relate to everyday life because we need to remember that we are one as a country and we all have a small part in making the country the way that it is.

GWB & the Environment Blog

Lets face it George Bush most likely won't be missed, he hasn’t really done much to be thanked for and now with Obama coming in it'll be a fresh start. In the article "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" author Katharine Mieszkowski focuses on the bad things that Bush has done throughout his two terms that he served and she states Obama's mission and how he will fix Bush's mistakes. In the article "Bush to Protest Three Areas in Pacific" it focuses on how Bush is now creating three new marine national monuments in the Pacific Ocean. The article focuses on how Bush is now to have protected more ocean than any person in the world and how he's trying to leave his seat in office with at least doing one memorable thing.

In the "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" and in the news story of "Bush to Protest Three Areas in Pacific" they both acknowledge how George Bush has resisted to making greenhouse gas emission reductions. "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" focuses more on making him look bad for it and "Bush to Protest Three Areas in Pacific"

Also in "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" it was said "Not once during the Bush administration has the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service voluntarily sought to list a species as endangered or threatened, offering it more protections." In" Bush to protest three areas in pacific" it states," President Bush will create three new marine national monuments in the Pacific Ocean today, according to his top aides, a move that will help preserve sprawling sea and island ecosystems"

The "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" article was made November 8th 2008 and the "Bush to Protest Three Areas in Pacific" was January 6th 2009. Considering that the "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" article was made before, but even if the article was made when this new information of Bush creating three new marine national monuments in the Pacific Ocean was released, I think that the "Bush's Seven Deadly Sins" would still focus on the bad and say how Bush is trying to make up for his faults with this but I don’t think that they would thank him.

Internship

What do you hope to learn or discover about the "adult" world of work while you are at your internship?

• What I hope to discover about the "adult" world of work while at my internship is whether or not I want to pursue a career similar or like my internship. I hope to discover how it is like working at doing something I hopefully like.

2. What do you hope to learn or discover about yourself and your identity while you are at your internship this semester?

• What I hope to discover about myself while the internship is whether or not I could handle it. I want to see if I could handle working in a new enviroment with new people. I hope to discover whether or not I could be creative with the projects I might be assigned at my internship.

What goals do you have for yourself for your internship experience?

• The goals that I have for myself at the internship experience is to enjoy it and do my best. I want my internship experience to be a good one and the way that I think I could do this is if I were to go into the internship with a good attitude.
  

Semester Reflection Part 1

I am really proud of my American Icon project because it was actually good. I had a hard time choosing my American Icon and when I thought of one I would keep changing it. I finally decided that my parents were my American Icons. I was proud that I choose my parents because not that much people choose their parents and I also actually knew my icons.
The process of choosing my icon was the hardest part because I didn’t really know who to choose. Once I chose my icons then I had to write why they were my icons. I knew why my parents were my icons but I didn’t really know how I could get it down on paper. When I finally wrote why my parents were my icons I felt that I used the best example possible which was when they encourage me to never give up. The last step in the process was taking a picture that would depict two people in one photo. The way that I choose to take my picture I was in my dads cap and gown and I was looking towards to the future just like my mom is always telling me to do.

Im most proud of my blogs. Im most proud of my blog because at first I thought that I wouldn’t be able to keep up with them. The blog that I am most proud of are my honors blog because I get to tell people about the books I read and what they are about and what I thought about them.

The process of doing the blogs is to follow the directions of the assigned blogs on Randy’s blog. To do the honors blog you have to read a book and then complete an assigned honors blog by Randy based on the book. Usually for an honors blog you have to find the theme and choose three literary terms that connect with the theme of the book. So far I have completed blogs for Invisible Man, and War of the Worlds.

Check out my War of the Worlds and Invisible Man honors blog by looking in the previous posts

Blog #24

The three literary techniques that I found in Neptune’s Navy: Paul Watson’s wild crusade to save the oceans that I might want to use in my paper is context, point-of-view, and theme.

Context is a literary technique that uses social/historical background, time and place surrounding a given situations. Raffi Khatchadourian uses this in page 1 paragraph 3. “There are a number of rules belonging to civilization that outrage his sense of morality, among them the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which asserts that sovereign states alone are the ocean’s enforcers.” Raffi uses it to explain the rules of slaughtering whales and when they were enforced. Raffi uses this technique through out the paper and I think it makes his points stronger. I want to use this in my reviews for the beaches because I want to give my reader some background info on the beach so they know more about that specific beach.

The next technique that I found was point of view. The article is in third person. I think that in my review I would use this but I would use first person as if I was actually talking to the person reading the beach review and saying this is what I think about the beach.

The third technique that I found was theme. The theme that I found in Raffi’s was
“They belonged to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, a vigilante organization founded by Paul Watson, thirty years ago, to protect the world’s marine life from the destructive habits and the voracious appetites of humankind.” In paragraph 1. In my beach review the theme will be beaches, of course.

Context, Literary Devices." Mr. Braiman's English Online. 5 Dec. 2008 .

Point of View, Literary Devices." Mr. Braiman's English Online. 5 Dec. 2008 .

Theme , Literary Devices." Mr. Braiman's English Online. 5 Dec. 2008 .

Blog

I think that Arana is right when she says, "Isn't it time for the language to move on?” When Arana says this I see it as her saying that its time for us to stop identifying with one race like Obama he isn’t only African American he’s also ½ Caucasian. I agree that the language should move because we shouldn't base our decision or opinions based on race. In my opinion I think that most people voted for Obama because he was different he wasn't the typical president and I think most races felt that they could connect with him since he's African American and Caucasian, or how Arana describes him as biracial and bicultural. I didn't really know who I was for, one day I'd be for Obama then I would change my mind back and forth; I just found it kind of ignorant how most based their choice on race; it should be more than that race is like how Arana explains it, “an unreliable marker, a deceptive form of packaging”. Most look at Obama as our first black president; I look at him as our first half Caucasian and half African American president so that's why I agree with Arana.

war of the worlds

I think that the theme of War of the worlds is survival of the fittest. The reason I think this is because its either the humans that will live off the aliens. The aliens die though since they cant live with the bacteria that the humans can so they die. So the aliens start out as the fittest and then they start to die off and the humans become the fittest again. The three literary techniques that contribute to the theme is conflict/plot, nemesis, foreshadowing.

The literary terms that I found were conflict/plot , a struggle found in fiction[i]. I thought that this literary term fits in because the conflict is that the humans are trying to stay alive and they are trying to destroy the aliens. “forthwith flashes of actual flame, a bright glare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of men. It was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them and flashed into white flame. It was as each man were suddenly and momentarily tuned to fire.” Here the aliens have just started attacking and the men soon after start attacking.

I think that nemesis is another literary term because the good characters are rewarded and the bad characters are punished[ii]. The way that I see it the good characters are human and they are being rewarded with being able to live and not all dying out. The bad characters are the aliens they are punished by dying off.

I think that there is some foreshadowing in War of the Worlds in the beginning. Foreshadowing is the use of hints or clues to suggest what will happen later in the story[iii] When the star, which was actually the aliens, had fallen the author describes it as “He did not remember hearing any birds that morning, there was certainly no breeze stirring…” basically its like something bad is going to happen and you could tell by the mood and the surroundings.

[i] CONFLICT/PLOT." The Nellen Family Jewels. 21 Nov. 2008
[ii] Nemesis." The Nellen Family Jewels. 21 Nov. 2008 .
[iii] FORESHADOWING." The Nellen Family Jewels. 21 Nov. 2008 .