16 Matching Annotations
  1. Feb 2021
    1. We cannot and will not realize our full potential as a nation unless we have both parties working to forge a new sense of shared association that can enable a much more diverse America to journey together into the 21st century. Today, sadly, only one party is in that business.

      Friedman ties in his purpose once again at the end. He accentuates that the nation as a whole cannot develop or reach its full potential until the two political parties work together; until they both place importance to the diversity of the nation. This allows him to demonstrate that without change occurring in the Republican party, change cannot occur in the nation. He shows that the Republicans need to change and the parties need to work together to make nation better. He places emphasis to show that we are well into the 21st century and yet we are still not treating everyone equally, showing the importance of what his point of view is. Then he ends with a sentence that is almost demoralizing to emphasize that we cannot become diverse until the Republican party changes.

    2. Can you imagine how much healthier American politics would be if we had a center-right conservative party that was embracing diversity, inclusion, climate change mitigation, and common-sense health care and immigration reform — based on conservative, small-government, more market-oriented solutions — competing with a center-left party?

      He illustrates an image of a world where everyone is included. He forces the readers to imagine a world where politics was helping the people and not working against some of them. He shows how there would be changes within many of the topics and how the people would see an improved society: one that put the needs of the people at the highest.

    3. It tells you that there is a market for a center-right conservative party that appeals to today’s America, not yesterday’s. But is there such a party? It’s been suppressed.

      This is almost a call to action. He shows that there are people that are willing to make a change and have ideas that will benefit society, but they are being suppressed. Their ideas are not given importance and they are not being evaluated. Friedman shows that the time to act is now and that we need to do something to prevent this from occurring. He shows that there are people that believe in changes and that they need to become more prominent.

    4. Appealing to the grievances of a minority is easy. Is anyone surprised the Republicans keep choosing the easy path? If we want to revive American democracy, we have to close off that easy path for them once and for all.”

      Friedman highlights how the Republican party has been taking the easy way out. Instead of working to support the rights of the minority and get them more representation, the party is simply trying to deal with their grievances. He then asks a rhetorical question forcing the reader to really consider the impact of the Republican party. After giving various examples of what the Republican party has done and how they are really helping the nation, Friedman is able to emphasize their lack of change. He then brings up democracy, stating that if we want change, then we cannot allow them to have that easy path. Things that are worth doing and that are right for the people are hard, but in the end they are necessary.

    5. Why not, it asked? More and more, Republican members of the House were being elected from gerrymandered districts drawn up by Republican state legislators from gerrymandered districts. Meanwhile, the Senate overrepresented sparsely populated red states, meaning the Electoral College favored Republican presidential candidates, who could then stack the court system with conservative judges who would allow Republican politicians to suppress the votes of Black and other Democratic-leaning constituencies.

      Friedman asks a rhetorical question and then builds off of it. He gives more examples of what the Republican members were doing to infringe upon the rights of all the people. He once again shows the unfair practices of the Republican Party to emphasize his point of how democracy in the United States is no longer democracy.

    6. But instead of adopting that plan, the party doubled down on its old ways: It tried to gain and hold power one more time with a guy named Trump winking at white supremacy, defending Confederate statues and using every voter suppression trick in the book to protect a predominantly white Christian America.

      To develop his point of view further, Friedman brings up how in the past, the Republican Party was supposed to become inclusive to all people regardless of race, sexual orientation, and nationality. However, instead of doing that, the Party went back to white supremacy and stopped being inclusive. Through this, he once again emphasizes how our democracy has been breached. He brings attention to how everyone is not being treated equally and that change needs to come.

    7. My deer and San Francisco’s school board are local problems. The fact that one of our two national parties would stick with a leader who dispatched a mob to ransack the Capitol in hopes of overturning our last election is an acute national problem — a cancer, in fact.

      Now he ties them all in together. But his main point is Trump's administration. He states that deer and the school board are local problems, but the Republican party is national, making it much more influential. By making this small distinction, Friedman brings attention to how Trump's actions affect our country as a whole. This allows him to establish how Trump's administration is negatively affecting the country. To support this, he references the mob that ransacked the Capitol, demonstrating just how harmful their actions were. He even goes on to compare it to cancer, accentuating that this is no small thing. By specifically comparing the political party to cancer, he is showing the readers that this is not just bad, but it is dangerous. By slowly introducing the party's incompetence by comparing it to deer, then showing how Trump could do anything, and then comparing the party to cancer, Freidman effectively demonstrates his point of view to the audience in a way that is hard to deny.

    8. This reality, plus Trump’s warped character, made him so reckless that he believed that he could shoot a whole branch of the U.S. government in the middle of Pennsylvania Avenue and his base would stick with him. And he was right!

      Friedman brings the humor here once again to establish that Trump is just like the deer. He could behave thoughtlessly and without any reason and no one would do anything. Friedman's point of view becomes clear here. He does not agree with how Trump has been given the power to do whatever and how the government was just supporting him no matter what.

    9. That is a lot like Trump and his followers, whose attachment to him has become so cultlike that every other Republican leader knows that challenging Trump is potential political suicide. The result: He, too, has no serious predators

      Now Friedman ties in deer and the BOE to Trump and his followers. After already establishing the incompetence of both, by bringing up Trump and his followers, he makes the description apply to them too. He describes Trump and his followers as cultlike in an exaggerated way to highlight the flaws of the Republican Party. He makes the question arise in the readers, "Is this even democracy?" As a result, he is able to demonstrate the real reason behind his writing and show the readers that when one person has too much power and is unopposed, that person gains the power to do anything he wants.

    10. Well, those deer are like the San Francisco Board of Education when it recently decided — in a self-parody of political correctness — to prioritize renaming 44 public schools that had been named for people who, it argued, had exhibited racist behaviors in their lifetimes

      Based off of the way that the author compares the San Francisco Board of Education to deer, it becomes evident that he does not regard the BOE highly. He depicts their actions akin to deer that know nothing, emphasizing his view that the board does not know what it is doing and that what it is doing is not significant. He depicts the BOE as incompetent because instead of working to change something that actually helps the students, they are merely changing the names because they were racist people. He includes this almost in a humorous way to mock the ineffectiveness of the BOE.

    11. So, they do all sorts of stupid stuff, like walk into the middle of the road and get hit by cars, rub the bark off tree trunks and eat all our flowers.

      Once again, the author emphasizes his light-hearted tone. He begins by describing the deer first. Instead of making the article start off with its political nature, he brings in a humorous appeal to the readers. This style of writing slowly builds up to the main claim of the author by starting off with the least important content and working its way up.

    12. the future of American democracy rides

      This is a hyperbolic statement, but it shows that the author believes the comparison between the three is very important. This contributes to a more light-hearted tone, and creates persuasiveness in the writing as the author emphasizes the significance of these three on democracy.

    13. What do the left-wing San Francisco Board of Education, Donald Trump’s right-wing G.O.P. and all the deer that hang out in my neighborhood have in common?

      The article starts off with a funny hook. It is comparing San Francisco's Board of Education, Trump's G.O.P, and deer. This makes the reader interested in the rest of the article, while also setting up the rest of the article. The reader knows that the article is going to compare the Board of Education, G.O.P., and deer.

    14. That starts with getting rid of the filibuster so President Biden can enact his agenda for both reviving the economy and rebuilding our infrastructure. It also involves adding two senators each from D.C. and Puerto Rico — most likely Democrats at first. That will tell the G.O.P. that if it wants to hold power it has to once and for all abandon its fantasy of minority rule based largely on white voters — and take up the “growth and opportunity” strategy of that 2013 R.N.C. report.

      Next, he offers a solution. He tells the reader what type of changes need to occur in order to change the nation for the better and bring more equality. He goes from stating all the negatives of the nation and the political party to what needs to be done. He emphasize how change needs to occur after persuading the audience that change does need to occur.

    15. Liberal Democrats dominate politics there, so there’s no serious threat from a conservative alternative.

      At first, Friedman introduces the ineffectiveness of the BOE in a humorous way by comparing it to deer. Then he puts the humor aside and goes into his main point. He emphasizes that the Board has the power to do whatever it wants because there is no one standing against it. It is dominated by Liberal Democrats and as a result, no important change is occurring. Here, he is able to emphasize his main point on the democracy of the United States.

    16. Today, sadly, only one party is in that business.

      Overall, Friedman seeks to emphasize how the Republican party has not been taking the proper actions for the nation. He likens Trump and his administration to deer who are incompetent. He then brings in examples of how the Republican party failed to prioritize the needs of the people. He also then states some actions that need to be taken for the nation to become more developed. In the end, he shows that unless the two parties work together for the same purpose, there will not be improvements in diversity. All in all, he seeks to emphasize that democracy should include everyone and that democracy only exists if everyone works together. Democracy means that everyone is connected and all the problems are brought to attention so that actions can be taken.