Garcia: The business of education

The source of this article is Arnold Garcia, Editorial Page Editor, Austin American-Statesman. His target audience is main stream Texans that read the local news. Garcia seems to try to back his core ideas with facts but most are lost in broad statements of opinion back with little factoids. Garcias arguments focused on the Texas education system. How it is funded, how effective it is and how it can be improved. He starts out with some interesting facts coving past Texas education success and then focuses the article on our dropout rates. Using real life numbers the author compares the economic impact a dropout has on the economy vs. that of high school graduate or college graduate. The author walks us though the dropout numbers from 2006 in the Austin school district. He then makes an assumption that a majority of these high school dropouts will be incarcerated. Then follows a factual numbers based explanation on how much that will cost society vs. someone who graduated high school. In a nutshell he states that while Texas public education has some problems it works and is still very important to kids. I personally feel that the argument is successful and backed by most of the facts listed. Garcia does lose some momentum when he adds in little "sound bites" of facts that offer no real information but are there to elicit an emotional response.

Again I see the political implications playing out in politician’s upcoming campaigns. This is a hot button for Texas voters and we want a viable solution that gets past partisan politics.

*Title is the stories link

Texas border mayors block access to proposed fence sites

Consider the source and the audience

Source of this article is Juan A. Lozanor, a reporter with the Associated Press. His target audience seems to be main stream Americans and general news readers. He focuses the core group with a mixture of factual statements that are informative for the target audience.


Lay out the argument and the underlying values and assumptions

The author’s arguments are: “Does the United States government have the right to build on private land” and “What are the rights of the cities who own the land being used”.

The assumptions presented in the form of a news article are that the cities have the right to block the federal government from building the fence, and that the federal government can build with changes in federal and state laws. With the amount of information provided to back the author’s article I do see a clearly defined set of information based on observations and factual reasoning.

Uncover the evidence

Facts and evidence. The facts in the information presented by the author are conclusive because they are all open records and can be found on the books as current state law protecting land owners. The border city Mayors do not agree with the federal government on the effectiveness of building a fence to keep out illegal immigrants. They plan to use the state and federal laws protecting personal property and city property rights to challenge the federal government in court. On the flip side the federal government plans to introduce federal legislation that will allow lands to be acquired for the project in the name of homeland security. Some interesting and hard facts are listed in the later part of the article that shows the differences between the city governments and the federal government’s arguments and add general facts on the border fence project.


Evaluate the conclusion

I do feel that the argument is successful and truly backed by the facts listed. What starts off as a critique of the fence project by a single mayor is expanded to include several boarder towns and speculative discussion on the legality issues raised. My personal opinion focuses on how effective a fence will be on keeping illegal immigrants out of our county without addressing the real issues that cause it. Monies spent on the fence and the upcoming legal challenges might be put to better use trying to understand why the US has an immigration issue with Mexico.


Sort out the political implications

The political implications of the boarder fence will be played out in both parties coming presidential campaigns. This drama will be on the national stage with strong trickle down effects to the state and local levels. We can expect to see facts mixed with sensational news and speculative reporting on all opinions concerning the border and immigration issues.

I hope that we as a nation can keep in mind that this is about people who have lives, families, and social economic situations that make becoming an illegal immigrant a positive outcome. How can a fence even begin to address that?