The Napalm Girl

The photograph shows a flat scenery where only grass and small shrubs and bushes grow. Right through this flat wasteland runs a broad street and a small house can be seen in the background. The background is filled by an enormous wall of smoke, like the ones caused by huge explosions. In the foreground you can see 5 children, of which three seem to be crying, one completely naked, one dressed in a shirt and underpants, one dressed in what seems to be pyjamas, one dressed in a shirt and what seems to be either long, airy pants or a skirt and one smaller child apparently in just a shirt. Behind them, there are five American soldiers in full Vietnam war gear, seemingly completely unfazed by the suffering children as they do not seem to have any intention of intervening or helping them. The soldiers also do not expect any attacks as three of them carry their weapons at least partly concealed.

Teacher's Feedback on my Summary

Summary of "Europe already has one foot in the 'Japanese' deflation grave"

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, in The Telegraph of October 23, 2013 analyses the risk of deflation for the Eurozone.

According to the author, Europe is at risk of deflation which would cause the debt in the affected countries to rise. This would be devastating for countries like Spain or Italy that are already having serious debt issues. Their chances to stabilize the national debt decrease sharply with every percentage point inflation drops. Furthermore, austerity measures are widely unpopular in these countries, making it even more unlikely that they will ever be able to achieve a balanced budget.

Evens-Pritchard thinks that a rising inflation rate would prevent deflation from happening, but Germany wants inflation to stay low, because a low inflation rate helps their economy in the short run. However, if deflation settles within the Eurozone, it could soon spread to Germany as well. The author states that the Club Med allies, including France and Italy, should unite in the European Central Bank’s governing council and force Germany to accept a higher inflation rate of around two percent. Instead of imposing counter-measures against deflation the European policy leaders seem to hope for a decade of global growth to help them solve their debt-crisis.

Here's the version that incorporates my teacher's feedback:

Summary of "Europe already has one foot in the 'Japanese' deflation grave"

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, in The Telegraph of October 23, 2013 analyses the risk of deflation for the Eurozone.

According to the author, Europe is at risk of deflation which would cause the debt in the affected countries to rise. This would be devastating for countries like Spain or Italy that already have serious debt issues. Their chances to stabilize the national debt decrease sharply with every percentage point inflation drops. Furthermore, austerity measures are widely unpopular in these countries, making it even more unlikely that they will ever be able to achieve a balanced budget.

Evans-Pritchard thinks that a rising inflation rate would prevent deflation from happening, but Germany wants inflation to stay low, because a low inflation rate helps their economy in the short run. However, if deflation settles within the Eurozone, it could soon spread to Germany as well. The author states that the Club Med allies, including France and Italy, should unite in the European Central Bank’s governing council and force Germany to accept a higher inflation rate of around two percent. Instead of imposing counter-measures against deflation the European policy leaders seem to hope for a decade of global growth to help them solve their debt-crisis.

Summary Critique

SUMMARY OF EUROPE ALREADY HAS ONE FOOT IN ‘JAPANESE‘ DEFLATION

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, in the Telegraph of October 23, 2013, discusses the aspects of
the European Debt crisis while suggesting potential pertinent solutions. He dissects this
economic dilemma by providing a wide range of specific examples to expose its nature.
Evans-Pritchard proves that such a crisis is not preliminary by illustrating his article with
examples of events such as the American Revolution and the US agrarian revolt of the late
20th century, which according to author were induced by the economic policy errors. These
errors are being committed even nowadays.
Accordingly, the risks of deflation are highly underestimated, particularly in low debt
countries. While the inflation has been subsiding, there has been an upsurge of deflation. If
the latter exceeds 300%, severe consequences are to be expected. The Eurozone countries
are on the verge of experiencing the Japanese-style deflation.
Moreover, the symptoms are already there but attempts to eradicate the deflation problems
are not undertaken. Although, there are potential solutions such as forcing Germany to
accept inflation, the country is tentative to do so, due to its strong economy. Therefore,
apathy is chosen with a hope for a salvation by the next global growth.

My Critique:

I don't think that this summary is particularly good. It starts off very well, though. 

While I really like the first two sentences, I think that the rest of the first paragraph is fluff. The American Revolution and the agrarian revolt are just briefly mentioned and are not important for the message of the text at all. 

I also think that the author should have described the effects of deflation. They just go on and on about how bad deflation would be for Europe but don't explain why. "[...] severe consequences are to be expected", yeah but what consequences??

I don't believe that "moreover" is the right linking word to start the third paragraph. I wouldn't have used a linking word at all, but if the author wants to use on "furthermore" would be a better choice. I also wouldn't have written "with a hope for" but rather "in hope of".