Tanmayee Yenumula: Outside Readings (Set 3): Editorial 1.9.11

Timothy Egan’s The Can’t Do Nation is an editorial piece discussing his opinion about Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell’s comments about the nation, following the cancellation of a football game due to snow.  Governor Rendell had commented that, “‘we’ve become a nation of wusses’”. This comment was what irked Egan and what became the backboard for Egan’s own rebuttals.

One of the very first things that one would notice about this piece is its title. Mysterious and interesting, you have to read the article to understand what the title means. After reading the editorial, you can understand that the title serves the function of acting as the opposition’s (Rendell’s) argument. Egan uses this to highlight exactly what he is attempting to disprove.

As to the actual rebuttal, well, let’s just say that it is a giant heap of examples dripping with sarcasm. Right off the bat, Egan comes off in an attacking stance. As he was summarizing Rendell’s comments (for those who might not have heard them yet), he didn’t hesitate to attack as he stated that, “A miserable trade balance. Loss of manly essence. Decline of the republic. All of this [was] because the game between the Philadelphia Eagles at their adequate outdoor stadium and the visiting Minnesota Vikings was moved when the big snowstorm hammered the East Coast”. And, that was just Mr. Egan getting started. He goes on to rebut Rendell’s comparison between China and the US, his rebuttal dripping with the same stinging sarcasm as before.

Egan’s sarcastic tone was created by his word choice, the diction choices. Egan carefully chose the words that would come as daggers towards Rendell’s comments. In his rebuttals, he would say things like “The most articulate of scolds can warn about how far behind the rest of the world our students are falling, about the frightening implications of a three-fold rise in child obesity, about the importance of a work ethic coupled with American creativity — and the country is barely stirred. But let someone suggest that a football game can’t be played in the snow, and you’ve got real trouble”. The switch from the fancier words to the simpler, everyday words helped to create the sarcastic tone so important to the rebuttal of this piece.

The sharp criticism coming from the paragraphs, disguised poorly in the form of sarcasm, definitely allowed me to understand where was coming from and persuading me. The smart diction choices all worked very well in creating the very obvious sarcastic tone.

This piece contained many strengths and few weaknesses. The strengths were that the title was very interesting a served a valid purpose, the diction choices were very influential, and the tone was very strong and worked very well with the overall purpose of this piece. I didn’t notice any major weaknesses.

This piece would work well on the AP because it has a very strong stance, definitely acknowledges the opposition, and makes appropriate use of literary devices (mainly diction choices).