K-pop popular but lacks diversity: survey

Korean pop culture such as music, film and TV dramas has become the most effective method to introduce Korean culture to foreigners. However, many foreigners feel the K-pop should be increased diversity. According to a joint survey of 604 foreigners by Yoo Ki-hong who is a Democratic Party lawmaker and the King Sejong Institute Foundation, 66.1 percent of them know about Korea through Korean pop culture on the Internet. Respondents answered the reasons that they liked Korean culture are Korean celebrities’ good looks or the uniqueness of the culture. They buy K-pop-related goods, want to learn the Korean language, or even visit Korea. Those who visited became interested in Korean culture overall like the Korean food and the country itself. However, lawnmaker Yoo said the whole pop culture industry should be changed hugely. Yoo said K-pop is focused heavily on dance-orientated music by idol groups. Gaon Chart in 2012 showed that 82 percent of songs are by boy or girl bands. Yoo said the phenomenon is completely different from the U.S. Billboard Chart. On Billboard Char, the contemporary pop takes up 31 percent, rock 26 percent, hip-hop and country 13 percent each. Yoo also said, “We should have a quota for indie or less popular genre musicians on TV programs and have music file distributors promote a wider range of music on their websites.”
The claim of this article is the Korean pop culture should be change as dynamic and diversely. The reasonable evidence is the survey jointed by 604 foreigners.

http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20131016000815

America’s debt ceiling Hitting the roof

The claim of this article is the subhead that “if congress fails to lift the limit on America’s debts, the consequences are uncertain but definitely unpleasant”. The author gave the current situation of “shutdown” in the beginning, and stated that even though both political and economic consequences are slight now, there is a possibility that some worse happen. There are some potential results given in the article as evidence to prove the claim. One is that the possibility to be unable to pay the bills would cause chaos in financial markets. Also the fear would play havoc with global financial system, even causing the markets to seize up. Meanwhile, the author argued that these results may not cause too much trouble. The evidence is both sides want to raise the debt limit before deadline. And if the debt ceiling is not raised, many people believed that America would pay the interest first, which won’t save the economy but won’t do too much harm. In conclusion, the author used many assumptions to demonstrate that the consequence of the debts may be not too severe.

http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21587795-if-congress-fails-lift-limit-americas-debts-consequences-are

Draft Regulation Raises Fines for Polluters

The article entitled “Draft regulation raises fines for polluters” stated a claim that China released the second draft of the Air Pollution Regulation to raise fines for polluters. The new regulation removed the 1-million-yuan ($163,396) limit of fines and added five categories of illegal behaviors to the list of fines. As a result, the fines would be doubled. The ground of the claim, as well as the regulation, was that many polluters found that obeying pollution regulations was more costly than paying the fines, so the new regulation aimed to correct this situation. As a backing of the claim, this article explained that illegally barbecuing food in the open air or dismantling the pollution control devices on motor vehicles without permission would result in doubled fines with no upper limits. This is because such acts greatly affect the air quality nearby, as a warrant of the claim. As a rebuttal, experts on environmental laws pointed out that calculating penalties by day was actually a more important item than removing the upper limit for fines, because the previous 1-million-yuan limit might already be hard enough to reach when the regulation was implemented. But the new regulation is still a breakthrough because it reflected that fines on pollution should be harsher on businesses than individuals.

http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2013-10/13/content_17029024.htm

Let's call our public schools what they really are -- ‘government’ schools

I read the article, “Let's call our public schools what they really are -- ‘government’ schools” on Fox News. The author, John Stossel, makes value claims that public school is one of the worst parts of America. He also makes a statement that ‘government school’ is a better name than ‘public school’. John supports his claim by pointing out the fact that public schools are rigid, boring, expensive, and more segregated than private schools while most other services improve (faster, better, and cheaper). He states that government does not want competition and stifles it through using their political clout while private schools, education tax credits, and even the Web offer competition. He insists that a competitive system will help all kids because competition makes bad alternatives die and good ones grow. I think this is a great warrant. John thinks that homeschooling is better than public school. Stossel backs his claim up by providing the fact which today homeschoolers fare better on tests and college admissions. He predicts that the government monopoly would claims that if kids are homeschooled, they will not be socialized properly. However, he refutes government’s claim, saying that homeschooled kids participate in all sorts of social events with other homeschooling families such as theater, ballet, karate, and other classes. He says homeschoolers may prosper without government control. He also expects a claim from defenders of public schools that public schools create the America ‘melting pot.’ He rebuts this claim by providing examination of education professor Jay Greene which public schools were more likely to be entirely white or entirely minority. Professor Greene found that students of different races were more likely to sit together at private schools. Stossel gets credibility by using ethos. At the end of the article, Stossel also makes policy claim that public schools should implement a competitive system. He requires public schools’ course of action by using a policy claim. I completely agree with John’s opinion. Government does not understand that market competition helps everyone. They need to understand the necessity of competition. Public schools should impose a competitive system to improve school and students.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/10/02/let-call-our-public-schools-what-really-are-government-schools/

'Despicable': Park Service chief dragged before House panel, ripped over closures

The article on Fox News is titled "'Despicable': Park Service chief dragged before House panel, ripped over closures." In the article the head of the National Park Service is called upon to answer questions about their activities during the government shutdown. Since the National Park Service shutdown all the parks, including national monuments in Washington DC. The Republicans claimed that the Park Service is trying to make the Government shutdown as visible as possible. Their grounds was that the parks wanted the public to see this and blame the Republicans for the shutdown. The republican’s warrant was that the government shutdown is necessary for the well being of the nation. They believe that the parks are trying to make it look like the Republicans are the negative body. The rebuttal of the head of the National Park Service is very simple. The parks thought it was necessary, because they did not have the manpower to keep the parks open, especially because most of their workers were sent home due to the shutdown.  The kairos of this article is very easy to see; the intended audience is the American people, to shed some more light on the government shutdown. The occasion is very obvious; it is because all people want to read about is the shutdown, its repercussions, and what is being done. The media is Fox News, which is often criticized. The ethos of this article is questionable, because it does not say who the author is directly, I searched throughout the article and could not find a name which seams very weird to me because it is coming from a very famous news source. Throughout the article there were mostly value statements and very few fact and policy claims.

 http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/10/16/despicable-park-service-chief-dragged-before-house-panel-ripped-over-closures/

Stephen King's Under the Dome

In Stephen King's novel Under the Dome, King makes a value claim about the current state of consumption in our society and its potential consequences. The claim (which is implicit in the storyline) is that we are using too many of our resources indiscriminately and that to keep doing so is to invite disaster and chaos. The grounds come in the plot line as the small town is cut off from the outside world and must rely on whatever resources were already in the town at the time, the most notable among these being propane. In the beginning propane use is near indiscriminate and as the story goes on propane becomes a much more valued commodity. The dwindling supply creates animosity between citizens of the town, as well as violence directed at securing more propane, which culminates in the townspeople looking towards a totalitarian ruler to control supply. Thus the ground is that by using so much propane, order has broken down and chaos has ensued. The two big warrants implicit in the story is that people cannot adapt, meaning that resources should not be used in the way they are because we have and will never have more efficient, and better meanings of going about our lives. The second warrant is a more obvious one, and that warrant is that the chaos that was created by the shortage of propane in Under the Dome is a negative occurrence that we should strive to avoid. If either warrant proves to be false, then Stephen King's value claim about the consumption of resources is faulty.