1. In the article, Edward Buckley suggest that there are many techniques to improve persuasion skills. However, when is it all about content and validity and not about strategies and tricks? Is it similar to voting for a candidate because he or she had more "swagg" as in strategy techniques as oppose to actual information about a certain policy?
2. When we think about lawyers in the courtroom, is it possible to separate persuasion techniques from lawyer knowledge? Is it two separate spheres like morality and justice?

Well,finding it hard to define between two things does not mean we should stop making decisions. By making the distinction between the two can be better for the polis. For instance, the Rodney King example was obviously unecessary force(even though Stone suggest otherwise, claiming posecutors had to use slow motion and freeze frames to argue unecessary force) and if the courts did not spend the time defning between the two, then it would happen more than usual. We cannot abandon making decisions because they bring order to society. Like Stone suggest, it is often hard to draw bright lines between social phenomena, especiall bright lines about moral and value differences, but it does not mean we should abandon rying to make distinctions. Politicians can use this form of persuasion because the clear lines will be hard to define completely and they can leave it undisputed and say that they will come back to that issue and try to solve it!

The line is obvious, it is helping, that it is why it is considered benefial. It is present in our modern issues today because the big CEO's and CFO's who have all the money are preceived as bad people(not in the sense of actions, but motives and achievement). However, we have medicare, medicaid, welfare and all other programs that help people. Celebrities who are campaigning to raise their taxes are looked at as "good." Yet, these same celebrities are in the top one percent, Bill Gates, Russell Simmons, and Jay z. So how do we decide what is negative and what is positive? Simply, becasue rewards by nature narrrow our minds and narrow our focus(Dan Pink's video). Money is negative if its not creative! Money that produces solutions is beneficial.

People get power through power. Powerful people employ other people to be powerful. Power hapens through networking and conections. There is a small part that is based on talent and skills, but the remaining steps to power includes our relations. Poeple just dont become powerful because they want it(ofcourse, we have those exceptions), but because of who they know. For instance, if we trace history, we can see those who were powerful, and we can look at who are powerful now, I guarantee there are some connections. People like Barack Obama becomes powerful because of the president title. I am not defeating working hard to get to powerful positions but I am saying that knowing other powerful people, helps others to be powerful. Working hard works too :)

I think money is important for development because without it countries cannot reach its fullest potential. Every aspect of development is connected. Human rights is not possible without freedom and not possible without money. But money is not the most important!

I dont feel i am being mislead because i like to think of myself as one of the informed citizens of this world. However, on isssues that do not interest me, it could be stretching the truth and simplifying the issue more than it should, and that could be misleading because I wont do further research. There is no way we would be better off if activists and politicians did not provide us with information because not all issues interest people. I guess people would have to find the information on their own, but that would not be effective since people wont even read the newspaper. we should be able to conduct our own research to make a decision on our own, but not to find the information. It is our job to figure out the truth and chose a side!

I think the information is not misleading in itself, but the presentation of the information is misleading. This is what politics is all about. The majority of American people do not understand the complex issues of politics and so it is someone's job to simplify the visuals and the the content. Any of us would use certain methods to persuade people on issues we care deeply about. It is not necessarliy manipulating, but more "dumbing down" the information. It is unfortunate, but that is whats happening. I would like to think if i was a politician, my passions would apply to certain people and to reach out to others i would have to manipulate the information a tad bit, but it would not be manipulating people's thinking. I would be a good politician :)

Well, he said, health is important but not as important as the environment because of future generations to come. Health is extremely important because it is the drive of life. Some of his arguments can be flawed but they are all connected in some way. I do disagree about education being of minimal importance because of the value of education. I guess in way we can live without education, but that is not as possible. Education is a universal need because without it, we would not be able to learn about the environment!

Great Question. It is not exactly saving Africa, but rather, helping Africans. Africa is in dire need of help. Yes, there is progress, but why do we want to highlight progress when there is so much progress that still needs to be made. I guess we can show the great things about Africa, but what good does that do? Africa is not being portrayed as a helpless nation, it is being portrayed for what it is, which is a country in need of help. There is no image damaging, there is image building.!

I think people who put effort into helping countries like Africa do it for their self-fullfillment. However, because of the spotlight on celebrities, those lens are intensified, it is not for redemption or salvation. As I mentioned before in my comment the media highlights certain celebrities with a motive in mind. Becasue African American celebrities do alot with Africa and other thrid world countries, but they are not being highlighted. America wants a good image and because of past image of discrimination and overt racism, it helps to highlight celebrities like Angelina and Bono because it helps shed the previous image. We as a people do it from the goodness of our hearts, but the media's job is make something interesting and Brangelina is definately more interesting than an actually African helping Africans.

Framing effects are human decision making that can be influenced by subtle cues in presentation, as opposed to the substitution of arguments or facts. MY view, everything we watch on tv are framed. Because of the word framing, it has a negative connotation, but it is a form of persuasion. Politicians have to get people to vote their way and so they frame bills in a way that people can understand. News stories are framed in a certain way for people to be empathetic. Con artists are less concerned with compassion and morality and therefore, the framing techniques they use are a bit manipulative. For instance, before Barack was elected president, his theme was encouraging people to vote for him because of the techniques his team used. It was time for change, it was young people time, first black president. All these were framed to attract voters, they made him relevant for the time, it seemed as if he had all the answers and the cures.

I would definately say Simon uses framing techniques to con his victims because without a plan and a motvie, he would not be able to con people. It is something he practices; therefore, he influence people with subtle cues in presentation as opposed to facts or arguments. For instance, he said one of his techniques was to tell a sob story, it was neither fact nor an argument, it was pure game. These techniques are similar to the ones in public sphere, because whether it is getting someone to like the product. Consumers can make a decision based on cues in presentation that are only illusions. However, these cues are not overt, they are subtle. Essentially, it is about what people want to hear and creative thinkers, con artist, experts and politicians all use framing techniques.