Public Argument Analysis Questions

To begin the process of learning about the Public Argument, I read the chapter about Public Arguments in the book A Student's Guide to First Year Writing. The book has a sample of a public argument with questions following on page 220-221. The following are the answers to the questions asked in book:

-The tone of this letter is informative and helpful. Kassandra conveys this tone by clearly stating the problems with cutting funding to Medicaid and then she suggests ways to prevents the cuts while still balancing the state budget. She explained that by cutting the Medicaid budget tens of thousands of Arizonans would be put into serious debt. 

-The most important convention of this formal letter is that is concise and to the point. Kassandra begins by specifically stating the problem she sees and how to fix it rather than dancing around the topic. She also made a complaint, requested something, and made an enquiry. 

-Kassandra establishes her ethos by using specific research and statistics. This is very effective because it shows that she knows what she is talking about and one can look up the statistics for themselves to see if they are correct.

-Her overall claim is that cutting Medicaid would imperative to many Arizonans and there are better ways to budget without cutting funds to Medicaid. She uses evidence that proves cutting Medicaid will hurt people financially.

-Her call to action is asking the governor to not cut Medicaid funds and rethink the entire budgeting system while making changes to it.

-Reviewing her work, I would suggest that Kassandra should specifically state where she is getting her statistics and research information from.