GRE写作成为横在中国学生的理想和现实之间的一大障碍，因此，如何攻克写作这道屏障，成为摆在我们面前的首要任务。
To sum up, I agree with the speaker insofar as a theory based on no data is not a theory but
mere whimsy and fancy, and insofar as by theorizing first we tend to distort the extent to which
data collected thereafter supports our own theory. Nevertheless, we put ourselves in equal
peril by mistaking data for knowledge and progress, which require us not only to theorize but
also to act upon our theories with some useful end in mind.
102
Issue 93
"Scandals---whether in politics, academia, or other areas---can be useful. They focus our
attention on problems in ways that no speaker or reformer ever could."
Are scandals useful in calling our attention to important problems, as this statement
suggests? I agree that in many cases scandals can serve to reveal larger problems that a
community or society should address. On the other hand, scandals can sometimes distract us
from more important societal issues.
On the one hand, scandals can sometimes serve to call our attention to pervasive social or
political problems that we would otherwise neglect. Perhaps the paradigmatic modern example
is the Watergate scandal. Early in that scandal it would have been tempting to dismiss it as
involving one isolated incidence of underhanded campaign tactics. But, in retrospect the
scandal forever increased the level of scrutiny and accountability to which our public officials
are held, thereby working a significant and lasting benefit to our society. More recently, the
Clinton-Gore fundraising scandal sparked a renewed call for campaign-finance reform. In fact
the scandal might result in the passage of a congressional bill outlawing private campaign
contributions altogether, thereby rendering presidential candidates far less susceptible to
undue influence of special-interest groups. Our society would be the dear beneficiary of such
reform. Surely, no public speaker or reformer could have called our nation's collective attention
to the problem of presidential misconduct unless these two scandals had surfaced.
On the other hand, scandals can sometimes serve chiefly to distract us from more pressing
community or societal problems. At the community level, for example, several years ago the
chancellor of a university located in my city was expelled from office for misusing university
funds to renovate his posh personal residence. Every new development during the scandal
became front-page news in the campus newspaper. But did this scandal serve any useful
purpose? No. The scandal did not reveal any pervasive problem with university accounting
practices. It did not result in any sort of useful system-wide reform. Rather, it was merely one
incidence of petty misappropriation. Moreover, the scandal distracted the university community
from far more important issues, such as affu'mative action and campus safety, which were
relegated to the second page of the campus news paper during the scandal.
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