The violent crime rate (number of violent crimes per 1,000 residents) in meadowbrook is 60 percent higher now than it was four years ago. the corresponding increase for parkdale is only 10 percent. these figures support the conclusion that residents of meadowbrook are more likely to become victims of violent crime than are residents of parkdale.
the argument above is flawed because it fails to take into account
(a) changes in the population density of both parkdale and meadowbrook over the past four years
(b) how the rate of population growth in meadowbrook over the past four years compares to the corresponding rate for parkdale
(c) the ratio of violent to nonviolent crimes committed during the past four years in meadowbrook and parkdale
(d) the violent crime rates in meadowbrook and parkdale four years ago
(e) how meadowbrook’s expenditures for crime prevention over the past four years compare to parkdale’s expenditures

[1] nothing that comes from the desert expresses its extremes better than the unhappy growth of the tree yuccas. tormented, thin forests of it stalk drearily in the high mesas, particularly in that triangular slip that fans out eastward from the meeting of the sierras and coastwise hills. the yucca bristles with bayonet-pointed leaves, dull green, growing shaggy with age like an old [5] man's tangled gray beard, tipped with panicles of foul, greenish blooms. after its death, which is slow, the ghostly hollow network of its woody skeleton, with hardly power to rot, makes even the moonlight fearful. but it isn't always this way. before the yucca has come to flower, while yet its bloom is a luxurious, creamy, cone-shaped bud of the size of a small cabbage, full of sugary sap. the indians twist it deftly out of its fence of daggers and roast the prize for their [10] own delectation why does the author use the words "bayonet-pointed" (line 4) and "fence of daggers" (line 9) to describe the leaves of the yucca tree? . to create an image of the sharp edges of the plant to emphasize how beautiful the plant's leaves are to explain when and where the plant grows to show how afraid the author is of the plant