second blog

Day of Anti-War Protests and Arrests in the United States
Granma International
March 19th 2008
http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/marzo/juev20/protests.html

Summary:
This article is basically telling the reader about anti-war protests in the United States. Recently. We marked the five year marking period of being in war with Iraq. This caused a lot of people to react and fight to end the war that’s been going on for too long. In result, many people were arrested. The author also says that the entrances to federal buildings were blocked off with giant yellow tape like those used to isolate a crime scene. President Bush stated that he “had no regrets over the unpopular military action despite the high cost in lives and wealth”.

Reactions:
A) This article relates to the theme ‘State-building, expansion and conflict’ because many people in the United States have had feelings of anti-war since the beginning. The idea of revolting against this major political issue is a part of this theme.
B) This issue has a lot of historical background including the attack on the world trade center and the thoughts of nuclear bombs. There are also tensions between the two worlds from past conflict that has been going on for nearly 15 years or more.
C) The point of view of this article is not actually given but is probably an outsider on the issue. They tell everything from the point of view of someone who isn’t fully informed on the issue but knows enough to write about it.
D) Since the author is an outsider, he or she is giving their automatic opinion since they probably only know what they’ve heard in the news and what they researched for the article. This affects the bias of the article since it is obviously leaning more towards the side that they believe is right than what the issue really is.
E) It would be helpful to hear from someone who lives in the United States or Iraq to hear what they think about the continuing of the war. Everyone has different opinions but maybe doing a survey on a group of people from each country and use that information in the article.
F) I feel very strongly about ending the war in Iraq so I agree with the people who were protesting. The war has been going on far too long and just needs to find a way to end peacefully. I also feel like the way the article was being written, the person might feel that the war is okay and wants it to continue. The way they talk about the yellow tape and connecting it to a crime scene is making it seem like the way the people were acting was a crime. This is more bias towards the war, which is totally against what I believe in.