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Sam D Amato Rhetoric and Composition C. Meeks 20 September 2008 Less is Less Two story house in the suburbs, white picket fence, tw o car garage, maybe a yacht, and a couple of kids. All of the se contribute to an almost purely American desire to posses s more. In an excerpt from The Hunger for More: Searching f or Values in an Age of Greed, The More Factor, the author, Laurence Shames, writes about this gluttonous need America ns have for more everything: material things, land, money, p ride, etc. In order to express his opinions about this phenom enon and inform his fellow Americans of the downward spiral ing trend this want is creating, Shames uses syntax, diction, cited facts and quotes, and tone. By using these rhetorical d evices, Shames delivers his message with ease. So, who wants to read long serpentine sentences that l ead one in twenty different directions before finally coming to the point, only to then reveal to the reader that the subje ct matter is still muddled and unrevealed? The answer: no o ne, unless they are, by chance, one of the few fans of Henry James styled prose. Thankfully, Shames unleashes his ideas in an easy to follow format. His syntax is what makes the ex cerpt flow so smoothly. He uses medium length sentences th at simply state what he is trying to say, not long, complicat ed, wordy semblances of sentences that attempt to put the i neffable into words. For example, in a short summary of his entire subject, Shames writes [f]rontier; opportunity; more, a statement that, in only three simple words, expresses the entire idea behind speculation in the early days of our count ry. This simplistic, yet powerful, summarization would make even George Orwell proud.