How anyone who has seen even one photo of the fly-covered, starving children in Somalia can still believe in a loving, everpresent, omnipotent God is beyond intelligent reasoning.

The following selections were taken from the letters-to-the-editor section of a newspaper. Each can be interpreted as expressing one or more arguments. Begin by identifying the conclusion of each. Then disengage the covert assumptions, value claims, and other cognitive assertions from the emotive language and translate them into emotively neutral premises. Use the two examples in the text as models. Finally, evaluate the restructured arguments. Some may turn out to be good ones.