The Guardian: Hurricane Sandy barrels towards the US

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/25/hurricanes-sandy-us-east-coast/print

This article from the UK provides a fascinating perspective of the incoming Hurricane Sandy approaching the east coast early this week. It summarizes a lot of the outside factors that may intensify this storm, such as the jet stream heading north and the cold front slowly moving south. Although the storm is only predicted to be categorized as a tropical storm by the time it hits places like Philadelphia and New York, the author continuously suggests to keep the uncertainty in mind while keeping track of the storm.
Harry J Enten, writer for the Guardian and author of the article, is a graduate from Dartmouth and has interned at NBC. In addition, the Guardian is a major worldwide newspaper as well as in the UK.
The context of this article is the potential danger of Hurricane Sandy and perhaps the ongoing discussion of climate change, since the author opens with a comparison to Hurricane Irene, a storm that hit the same area at around the same time last year. The two purposes of this article are to inform his audience of readers about the hurricane in the US and advise readers that are residents of that area to stay safe.
In order to accomplish his goals, Enten appropriately uses logical evidence through facts to support his argument. For example, he states that in comparison to Hurricane Isaac, which at its lowest pressure earlier this year was 968 millibars, Hurricane Sandy has the potential to reach 935 millibars. This means the storm will hit harder and in a larger area.
Enten successfully accomplished his goals because he used facts and comparisons to support very sweeping statements about Sandy. This ensures to the readers that the author is not just using hyperbole to rile them up, but actually cares for their safety in this treacherous storm.
  

Walmart Muddy Kid Commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgIZHvMWVao

This 30-second ad shows a bunch of Walmart cleaning products being purchased and then a young boy denying to his mom that he used her towels while making mud pies. The context around this commercial is the background that moms often clean up after their kids, which also connects to the target market of this commercial, moms of young kids or customers that deal with dirty laundry very frequently.
The purpose that this commercial was created for is to attract consumers into buying Walmart products. In this commercial, although the advertising was more specifically centered around cleaning products, perhaps the more important purpose was to just persuade customers to go to the store. The audience was anyone watching on their television.  
One of the most prominent and generally most effective rhetorical devices in this ad is the use of a small boy which many people would find adorable and funny. This keeps the consumer interested and also very happy, which is exactly what the advertisers want out of the ad. Another factor that stuck out to me was that almost cause-and-effect structure of the commercial. In other words, if you buy these products at Walmart, you will be better prepared and will not have to stress out the next time your cute little child uses your towels to make mud pies in the backyard.
In my opinion, the advertisers for Walmart successfully accomplished their task in this commercial. I believe they connected and drew the attention of their target market through the incorporation of common but useful rhetorical device and strategies. In addition, I think they used the strategies appropriately and effectively enough to the point that the commercial will draw more customers to Walmart stores.     

Time Magazine: Einstein and the Suicide Star

http://science.time.com/2012/10/11/einstein-and-the-suicide-star/

Thanks to humankind's modern-day telescopes, the center of the Milky Way galaxy is now being turned into a giant physics laboratory.

A massive black hole in the center of our galaxy named Sagittarius A is currently pulling two bright, fast-orbiting stars, SO-2 and SO-102, very close with its large gravitational influence. What scientists want to test is if the black hole's gravitational pull actually affects the brightness of the stars, just as Albert Einstein predicted. More specifically, the star's path of light ultimately perceived by our telescopes should theoretically be disrupted by the black hole. By about 2018, SO-2 will be close enough to the black hole for astronomers to test whether Einstein's theory, establishing the laws of physics, is demoted and suitable for revision.

Daniel Cray, the author of this article, began contributing to Time Magazine when he won their national student essay. Over his years writing articles, he has authored more than 250 Time Magazine articles and has landed over 60 cover stories. 

This is an appropriate article for today's context because, as it states in the article, over three record-breaking new telescopes are to be implemented within the next 10 years. The author's objective was to show to science readers that today is an exciting time in astrophysics and retesting laws that have been in place for a long time. A rhetorical device that prominently stood out was the tone of skepticism that almost wanted to challenge Einstein's legacy. For example, the author uses the phrase "if at all" as a phase in a sentence describing how scientists will measure any change in light direction. The author successfully achieved his purpose of proving that Einstein's theory can be up for question because of his influence through his cynical tone.        

Op-Ed: Two Presidents, Smoking and Scheming

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/opinion/sunday/dowd-two-presidents-smoking-and-scheming.html?ref=todayspaper

This NY Times piece by Maureen Dowd illustrates a scene in which the famous Aaron Sorkin TV character, Jed Bartlet, gives President Obama some debating tips and ideas while still in the aftermath of the first Presidential Debate. Bartlet, who has some experience of debating throughout his seasons on "The West Wing", sets him up with spectacular rebuttals against Romney's points. The real breakthrough was when Bartlet suggested that the prepping for the next debate should consist of nothing more than "Governor, you're lying." 

Maureen Dowd won the Pulitzer prize in 1999 for distinguished commentary and has been writing for the Op-Ed section of the Times for over 16 years. Her audience is a very consistent flow of opinion readers, since this piece is the first selection on the NY Times Op-Ed page. It is based around the Presidential Election and her conversation with Aaron Sorkin about the recent debate. The purpose was to entertain her readers by bringing Jed Bartlet back to life and also shooting down many of Romney's arguments used to sling mud at toward the President's image. 

The rhetorical element that stood out the most to me was the light, comedic tone about the piece that kept the reader laughing. For example, Dowd incorporated Sorkin's new character, Will McAvoy, into the piece by having him shouting at moderator Jim Lehrer about his poor performance while holding him in a hammerlock. I imagine all of "The Newsroom" fans like myself hollering in laughter at that picture.