New Hampshire Republican Primary Debate!

Welcome to our first class visit to the "blogosphere" of the semester! Since we're finishing up our unit on Elections & we're about to start looking at the process of campaigning, and since this will obviously be a story we follow throughout the semester, I thought a great topic for our 1st blog assignment would be the Republican debate that was held in New Hampshire (a key early primary state!) this past Tuesday evening, October 11, moderated by Charlie Rose. In case you didn't get to watch it live or recorded on TV (which I imagine applies to most of you!), click the topic title link above to watch online video of the entire debate--it runs about 90 minutes, and while I encourage you to watch the whole thing, if you can at least watch an hour or so of the debate, that should be enough for you to be able to thoughtfully participate in our discussion. After you watch the debate, please consider the following questions:

• What were your overall general thoughts/reactions to each of the candidates?



• Whom did you like and whom did you not like? Why?



• Who stood out to you the most? Who do you think did well in the debate and who didn't do as well? Why?



• Was there one line or one moment from the debate that really stood out to you? If so, what was it and why?

Remember, your assignment is to post TWO comments to the blog by the end of the day next Monday, October 17. Maybe you want to look at some previous topics and comments posted by last year's students to get a sense of about how long your posts should be; I don't have an exact minimum length in mind, but generally I would say a decent-sized paragraph would be required for you to adequately express your opinions and address all of my questions.

Your first post should be your answers to those questions I've posed above, and then your second post (this can be a couple days later if you want) needs to be a response/comment/agreement/disagreement on something that one of your classmates has posted. These second comments can be shorter than your initial answers to my questions in your first comment, but they do still need to be somewhat substantial with some thought put into them; simply saying "I agree with ________" or "________ is wrong in what she says" won't get the job done! Also, I hope at this point I don't need to tell you (though I will anyway!) that while I want you to passionately and enthusiastically express your opinions in this forum, please be sure to be respectful and appropriate in your comments, both about the Republican candidates as well as about the comments and opinions of your classmates.

Last thing: please make to sure to post your thoughts as "comments" on a continuing thread within and below this same topic--please DO NOT submit a "new post" which will appear at the top of the blog's home screen. The right way to do it is to click on the link down below where it says "0 comments" or "12 comments" or " 67 comments" in pink font--this will take you to a text box where you can post your own comments.

I look forward to seeing what you all have to say--good luck and have fun!

--Silvy :)