Summary and Response of "Why the Rich Are Getting Richer"

Throughout this article Robert Reich talks about the growing gap between the upper half of society and the lower half of society. Reich uses a metaphor to explain how the economy is going down and up for the rich and the poor. He says it a boat we’re all in and that one is sinking rapidly, one is sinking slowly, and that one is rising. Here it’s talking about the lower class, middle class and upper class. The lower class keeps getting poorer because of job loss due to more automation and competition from other countries that are willing to work for less money. The middle class is kind of staying where they are, but are still slowly going down economically. This is because of machinery that is replacing workers, lower salaries because of the increased social security the government is taking out for the retired, and competition from immigrants who are looking for a job. The upper class is doing well and rising above everyone else because they are the ones who are thinking and selling their ideas to foreign countries who couldn’t think of them on their own. The upper class consists of engineers and architects who are in charge of designing and building the major structures for transportation and living. It is because of this that they are earning greater salaries and getting richer than the middle and lower classes. Reich talks about how there were things designed to keep the lower class’ salaries from dipping too low. But this was put into place only so they were able to continue buying the goods. Either way, the rich are still getting richer and the poor, poorer.
This article is entirely true. There is a growing gap between the rich and the poor and it is becoming more visible as the years pass. The rich are getting richer because they are the ones taking over all the lower paying jobs and doing what they want with them. Usually they fire all the workers and put in automatic machinery that is more efficient and cost less. There has also been an increase in immigrants over the past decade and it’s still rising today. They come over and then need to find jobs so they can support themselves and their families. This is why there is a loss of jobs among Americans. If the economy keeps up with this downhill slide there will soon be people in extreme poverty and people who are filthy rich. And many of the rich people will refuse to help the poor, even if they are more than capable of doing so.

Summary and Response of "Why Men Don't Last"

In the article "Why Men Don’t Last," Natalie Angier discusses the topic of why men don’t live as long as women; even though they almost always appear to be healthier. The first reason Angier gives as to why men die sooner than a woman is: they are stubborn about going to the doctors for regular check-ups. Men say they don’t need doctors and refuse; this leads to health problems that could heave been prevented. Next it's because men are more likely to either drive more recklessly than women or drunk after a night out. Men are also more likely than women to be alcoholics and drug addicts. Angier also states that men are more likely to carry out a suicide attempt. Women tend to think more about it; men tend to think about it and actually do it because they don’t want to admit that they failed at something. The final reason Angier gives is: men die sooner than women because they are bigger risk-takers. Men tend to do more things that can potentially be harmful. Another topic Angier discusses is how men perceive how they are supposed to act: tough, macho, independent, and that they shouldn’t cry or be a mama's boy and that they can survive on their own. But what men don’t know is that they really do need someone.
Before reading this article I thought that the main reason men die sooner than women is because they were stubborn and didn’t go to doctors. Therefore, they let curable illnesses go unchecked and later died because of them. After reading this article I learned some more reasons, such as: suicide, alcoholism, drug addictions, and risk-taking. I didn’t like the reason of suicide that Angier discussed. I think men need to learn how to fail and do it once in a while. Men need to be more like women in the suicide aspect; they need to think about it more instead of actually doing it. Men, especially the ones who are husbands and fathers, need to think about their actions better because it's not just their life they're affecting; it a woman's life and a child's life too.

Summary and Response of "National Prejudices"

In this article Oliver Goldsmith talks about his encounter with a group of men who were engaged in a conversation about the different characters of the nations of Europe. He then goes on to talk about how one of the men put negative prejudices on the Dutch, French, German, and Spanish and then said that the English were the best. At this remark no one at the table disagreed, but Goldsmith. He turned around and said positive things about the Dutch, French, German, and Spanish and said negative about the English. The point Goldsmith tries to get across is that we shouldn’t be people who believe and say we belong only to a certain group, region, or society; we should be people of the world. The second thing Goldsmith talks about is how everyone, even a gentleman, is guilty of putting prejudices on people. He says that prejudices infect the mind and influence conduct and that prejudices can only be fixed by reading, traveling, and conversing with foreigners.
Overall, I liked this article. It proves that there are prejudices all around us. Prejudices go on between the different races, heritages, and societies and classes. We don’t know or understand what its like for the other group or what they stand for so we place a prejudice on them. But, like Goldsmith said, it can be fixed through reading, traveling and conversing. If we did all this we could learn to appreciate each other and become united. Like the philosopher in Goldsmiths’ article said: we should be people of the world, not people of a group or society or specific origin.

Summary and Response of "Letter to President Pierce, 1855"

In this article Chief Seattle is mainly talking about how Indians don’t understand white men and how white men don’t understand Indians. One of the points Seattle discusses is how the value of land is seen differently among the two. Indians see the land as a sacred and prosperous place that is to be lived on and cherished. White men see land as being the same wherever they go, so they think they can take it from wherever or whomever, use it for a while, and then leave. The next point discussed is the two different styles of living. One style is peaceful, solitary, and laid back, while the other is loud and busy. One of the main underlying points is that the white men are expanding and intruding onto the Indian’s territory and the Indians can't understand why. They can't understand why the white men are taking their land, slaughtering the buffalo that the Indians use for their survival, steeling their horses and clearing their land for expansion. The final main point made is that they, the Indians and the white men, are both human beings and are all connected, in the sense that what happens to one affects all.
This article says a lot in the whole one page of it and it’s all true. White men did intrude on the Indians and they did organize buffalo hunting in order to kill the buffalo, the Indians’ major food source, and get the Indians to either move out or die of starvation. The white men also took a lot of the Indians land away from them. They sent them to live on reservations, when Indians were used to free roam and no rules or boundaries. The white men did come from the city where it was loud and didn’t appreciate the Indians way of life. It has been known that the white men drove the Indians away because they thought they were savages. But what I can't understand is how the white men could treat the Indians so cruelly when; in reality they were both human beings with the same purpose, to survive.

Summary and Response of "The Maker's Eye"

In this article Murray makes a point that writing shouldn’t be a one step process. It should be several steps and then some. Murray also talks about how many writers will write their work and then either leave it for a while or immediately read it from either a stranger’s or from a critic’s point of view, or both, and then begin to edit it. Writers will also often become their own critics when re-reading and editing their papers. Murray says that this is a good thing, but that it can also be bad because the writer can often be too harsh on himself or herself and end up with nothing because they don’t like the paper and end up destroying it in some way. Another point Murray makes is that writers tend to look for a lot of different things in their writing and are really never satisfied with it because they think and know deep down that it can be better. Another point made in this article is that many students will only write one draft and then say that they are done with it and that it is a good paper, but in reality it may not be because it probably lacks in a lot of areas because of the lack of editing and re-writing that many papers require.
My first thought when reading the title, “The Maker’s Eye” was that it was going to be an article dealing with God or some other religious affiliation. But to my surprise it was about writing and writers and how they value and edit and re-read and re-write their work multiple times. When Muller says that students often think they’re done after they’ve written their first draft I totally agree. Students think they are done because they often want to believe they are done because they are too lazy and lack the initiative to make the paper better by editing and re-writing. Students simply don’t want to do it because it’s too much work. To me this was one of Muller’s main points that I believe to be true because I know I have tried to get by with writing only one draft on several occasions. I had no idea how many times a professional writer re-reads, edits, and re-writes a paper before becoming satisfied with it, if they ever really become satisfied at all.

Summary and Response of "The Rival Conceptions of God"

C.S. Lewis’ article “The Rival Conceptions of God” is about different religions and what they believe in. Some believe that God is above all the good and bad in the. The article also talks about how a majority of humanity believes in some type of God or gods. Pantheists believe that everything in the universe is directly connected to God. If the universe didn’t exist, God wouldn’t exist. On the other hand, Christians believe that the universe would not exist if God had not made it. Another viewpoint the article talks about is how people see good and bad. Some say killing something that can be harmful is good, while others say killing something harmful is bad because you are killing it.
This article made me think. I had to think about and read it several times before I finally understood it. Even then I’m not sure how well I really do understand it. But, overall, I was fascinated with the ways people think of the world and the different ideas they have about God. I always thought there was just one way with different versions of how it happened, but after reading this article I now know that there is actually two very different versions. Consequently, this article has helped me learn more about my religion and its beliefs versus other religions and their beliefs.

Friends (compare and contrast essay)

All throughout life we have friends. Most of them will change as the years go by, but a few will remain the same. The friends that change are usually the ones who have wronged us and the friends that stay the same are the ones who are true. True friendship lasts, false friendship fades.
Friendship is shared between two people or a group of people that trust, support, care and are comfortable with each other ("Friendship"). Everyone wants to be a friend and have a friend because of the feelings it gives him or her. It makes them feel like they belong somewhere, like they have a place in the world, and it makes them feel secure and happy to be who they are (Vernon). These are the friends who you can depend on to be there for you, no matter what, and friends that you would be there for, in return. Even if you have fights on occasions, you will almost always make up and come back as the same or even stronger friends.
I know the meaning of true friendship because I have a friend whom I’ve had my whole life. We grew up with each other, trust each other, support each other, and genuinely care about each other. Consequently, we have been able to maintain our friendship over the years. My friend and I have also had a lot of fights, called each other names, and even refused to talk to each other for days. But we always came back and apologized and were friends again. To this very day we disagree on things and fight about it, but nothing can come in and break up our friendship.
Then there are the people who you are friends with one year, but then don’t see or talk to the next. Most of the time it’s because you find you have different things in common or different priorities and drift away from each other. But then there are always some friendships lost because of something that one of you did, intentionally or unintentionally, to get the other in trouble, make them upset or maybe it was a mean joke you played on the other person; a joke you thought was harmless and funny, but ended up hurting them.
I know what it’s like to lose a friend. I’ve had a couple of friends wrong me in ways I can't even begin to describe. Even through it all I don’t hate them for the things they did and I still talk to them from time to time, but I’m not as close to them. This is mainly because I lost all trust in them. Without trust you have nothing but acquaintanceship with the person.
Being a true friend doesn’t mean just saying hello and then walking on by or just talking to someone in one class period and then not at all for the rest of the day. A friend is someone who we can go to and discuss problems, give advice to, comfort when their feeling bad or had a bad day, and someone who you talk to on a daily basis. You shouldn’t be afraid to be seen talking to or hanging out with your friends. You should be loyal to your friends and be yourself around them because they are the ones who won't judge you or make cruel remarks about you behind your back.
The two things true friendship and false friendship, friends that come and go, have in common are: the two of you either are or once were friends and the two of you once had some things in common. They are and once were a person in whom you trusted, confided in, supported, cared for, felt comfortable with, and had some things in common with.
In conclusion, true friends and false friends have a lot of differences and only a couple of similarities. But because of the differences it makes it easier to see who your true and lifelong
friends are. We should also never forget our old friends and what they taught us, even if it was through a wrongdoing.

Works Cited
“Friendship.” En.wikipedia.org.12 June 2007. Wikimedia Foundation Inc. 12 June 2007
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship

Vernon, Mark. “ ‘You’ve Got a Friend’. But What Have You Got?” Markvernon.com. 29 Sept
2005. 12 June 2007 2005/09/29/109-you’ve-got-a-friend-but-what-have-you-got>