A decision put into place 18 years ago has recently come back onto the fore front of conversation as President Obama makes another change in his first one hundred days.
Along with massive bailouts, giving the war in Iraq a new direction, and changing the rules for which foreign countries we give aide to, the Obama administration has lifted the ban on taking pictures of our fallen soldiers' caskets returning home. This decision has been met with much debate; and though there are two sides to every story, this decision seems long over due.
On February 26, 2009, Defense Secretary Robert Gates lifted the near 20-year ban put in place by Dick Cheney during George Bush Sr.'s Presidency. The ban took away the right to take pictures of the flag-draped caskets returning home from war.
Before the various issues involving this subject are even discussed, it is important to know the history of this ban. This ban was not put into place to protect privacy. It was not put into place because family members of fallen soliers had asked for it. The ban was put into place by George Bush Sr. after he was seen on a news station's split-screen laughing about something as caskets of our dead soldiers were being unloaded at an air force base on the second screen.
This moment made Bush Sr. seem insensitive and out of touch with the reality of war, so in an attempt to manage his public relations, a ban was placed on photographing the caskets of soldiers.
It is incredible that such a bold move to manipulate reality and the news was successful for so long. The issue was turned away from an issue of censorship and was made into a matter of "privacy". The arguements we hear now about the family's right to privacy and stopping left-wing anti-war propaganda were never really an arguement until the pictures made Bush Sr. look bad.
Though they weren't the real reasons this ban was put into place, it would be good to address some of these excuses for censorship now. Privacy versus the public's right to know is a main factor in the present-day debate over war time pictures and what the media can and should publish.
Privacy is important to everyone. It is important to protect the soldiers' family's privacy as well as the privacy of our soldiers. However, pictures taken of caskets are just that... caskets. This ban does not give reporters the right to follow the families home, go to the soldier's funerals, open up the caskets and snap a shot, etc.
Our nation's war-time coverage is PG-rated, to put it nicely. We are not exposed to the carnage of war, the vivid images of death, homelessness, and starvation war often causes. We do not witness the injured women and children, the demolished homes and schools, or the missing limbs of the elderly.
We don't witness these horrific images because CNN, FOX, and NBC don't feel like they pass the "breakfast test", where you could see the images while eating your morning meal without regurgitating your cereal all over your kitchen table.
We are censored from seeing these images and are given a rediculous arguement to chew over instead, on whether or not photographing a casket is appropriate or not. Maybe if we get all worked up over casket photos we will forget about the real issue of censorship, death, and needless wars... at least that's what the government is hoping for.
Naturally it worries the government that if the American people see the number of American soldiers dying, they will lose support for war. This idea brings me back to my childhood. One of the many lessons my parents tried to teach me was that if you're doing something you think you need to sugar-coat, lie about, or cover-up, you probably shouldn't be doing it.
This idea seems to be fitting in a lot of different areas, including the government and media censorship. If the government feels the need to hide pictures from the people in order to keep public opinion up, then something is probably wrong with what the governement is trying to do.
Aside from government accountability, the way the media handles its reporting of war doesn't fit with reporting standards for other news. The media is constantly reporting an unproportional amount of violence in the news. Murder, robberies, and kidnappings are eaten up my the big news stations. The more dramatic a story is the better, even if it is not a real representation of current crime trends.
The news will talk for days about the mutilation a chimp causes to its neighbor, but start to get into coverage of a war where more than 4,000 troops have died, and the media is suddenly put under a silencer.
Sure the news outlets will give a nice watered-down update of the war's status, casualties, and new changes, but until we are able to see the images war produces, the caskets of our soldiers being brought home, we will not grasp the reality that people are dying. Our brothers, husbands, and fathers are dying.
A child has to be accountable to his parents, a husband to his wife, and a government to its people. And our country cannot live in a false reality where we don't see the true cost of our actions. By lifting this ban, President Obama is finally bringing back a measure of accountability and reality that is owed to the American people.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
No Loyalty to Potter
Loyalty, 'eh? Oh, loyalty... what a pain in the ass. You see, loyalty is nothing but one big problem... it hinders us from just being able to do whatever the hell we want to do without feeling bad about it. It's always a struggle in life to find the middle ground; to decifer between what is right and wrong, what's ethical or immoral, and where our boundaries and loyalties lie.
One of the hardest parts of being loyal is that your loyalties change based on the situation you're in. I think this was a main point the book was trying to hit on, especially in the area where it discussed the problems with having loyalty as a single ethical guide. You can have your loyalties, but that loyalty can and often will be taken advantage of, and at that point in time it is your ethics, standards, and morals that matter... not your loyalty. Loyalty is just the fog that makes ethical decisions so tricky.
"A spirit of democratic cooperation is needed for Royce's view of loyalty to result in ethical action." In order for loyalty to help in making the right decision, by Royce's standards, we must be sheep. Sheep. Blind, majority-following sheep. As annoying as this is, it is even more annoying that Royce gives "no way to balance among conflicting loyalties." So, Royce has layed out a map of loyalty... be a sheep, and if you have a problem, well, I'm not really sure about what to do then... Thanks Royce, that's just what we rebel college kids wanted to hear. Screw a revolution, let's float around with the majority! Who cares if "the majority" wants to bring back seperate-but-equal for homosexuals, our loyalty is to the community and therefore the majority; so if the majority hates the gays and gives a shit less about real civil rights, that's what the majority wants, then so be it! ...
WHAT?!?!?!?! Sorry Royce, I disagree. Loyalty is not always to the majority, or to who you think it should be to, or to who you would have thought you'd be loyal to. Loyalty plays a role up and until ethics have to take over. So I guess the real issue is that hopefully people are only loyal to trying to make an ethical decision based on the given situation.
I think the Potter Box tries to make this ethical-decision-making-based-on-loyalties stuff a little easier, but it may be making a simple process a bit too complicated. Instead of a near "12-step program" for journalists needing to make decisions, why not just weigh over the pros and cons? What happened to the good 'ol two column list of good vs. bad? Maybe that was a simpler day in age, back before loyalties were taken advantage of and manipulated. There is always a gray zone though, I will give the Potter Box credit for taking that into account, but I don't think I will think to go through the Potter Box next time I'm stuck trying to figure out who's side I'm really on or where my loyalty really lies...
One of the hardest parts of being loyal is that your loyalties change based on the situation you're in. I think this was a main point the book was trying to hit on, especially in the area where it discussed the problems with having loyalty as a single ethical guide. You can have your loyalties, but that loyalty can and often will be taken advantage of, and at that point in time it is your ethics, standards, and morals that matter... not your loyalty. Loyalty is just the fog that makes ethical decisions so tricky.
"A spirit of democratic cooperation is needed for Royce's view of loyalty to result in ethical action." In order for loyalty to help in making the right decision, by Royce's standards, we must be sheep. Sheep. Blind, majority-following sheep. As annoying as this is, it is even more annoying that Royce gives "no way to balance among conflicting loyalties." So, Royce has layed out a map of loyalty... be a sheep, and if you have a problem, well, I'm not really sure about what to do then... Thanks Royce, that's just what we rebel college kids wanted to hear. Screw a revolution, let's float around with the majority! Who cares if "the majority" wants to bring back seperate-but-equal for homosexuals, our loyalty is to the community and therefore the majority; so if the majority hates the gays and gives a shit less about real civil rights, that's what the majority wants, then so be it! ...
WHAT?!?!?!?! Sorry Royce, I disagree. Loyalty is not always to the majority, or to who you think it should be to, or to who you would have thought you'd be loyal to. Loyalty plays a role up and until ethics have to take over. So I guess the real issue is that hopefully people are only loyal to trying to make an ethical decision based on the given situation.
I think the Potter Box tries to make this ethical-decision-making-based-on-loyalties stuff a little easier, but it may be making a simple process a bit too complicated. Instead of a near "12-step program" for journalists needing to make decisions, why not just weigh over the pros and cons? What happened to the good 'ol two column list of good vs. bad? Maybe that was a simpler day in age, back before loyalties were taken advantage of and manipulated. There is always a gray zone though, I will give the Potter Box credit for taking that into account, but I don't think I will think to go through the Potter Box next time I'm stuck trying to figure out who's side I'm really on or where my loyalty really lies...
Thursday, February 19, 2009
New Semester, New Class, ANOTHER Blog...
This Blog post is going to be an incredible work of deep "independant" insight from me... After reviewing Chapters 1 and 2 from the only book Amazon decided to send me I came up with the following conclusions...
I though that Bok (a girl... who I thought was a boy... oops!) was interesting with her focus on alternatives. I think it is a great idea to look at what the options are when deciding ethical issues (obvious don'tcha think? Okay, I'm sorry about that improper grammar... Sarah Palin is still tormenting me) and I was glad that right off the bat the book made it clear that ethical decision making is not cut and dry with a right or wrong answer. There is always grey area, and a lot of it.
I felt like Aristotle's evaluation of ethics made the most sense. His focus on practicality and middle ground seemed the most "practical" and helpful when it comes to ethical decision making. I liked when the book said, "Seeking the golden mean implies that individual acts are not disconnected from one another, but rather that they form a whole that a person of good character should aspire to." By seeking this "golden mean" one can make a good decision while keeping focus on the two possible extremes.
Though I like Aristotle's model, I align mostly with Kant in the way I make decisions. I've always tried to live by the golden rule. Acting in a way you would want others to act is a good way to keep a sort of system of checks and balances; unless, of course, a given bowl has more ice cream than the next, and in that case I can't say that the golden rule applies. There is the problem, however, of people having very differing ideals of what is right and wrong and what is okay to do to others and oneself.
Should we be suprised though that I think Mill is kind of a &#@$ head? I think this ethics model is an easy way to devalue individual rights and basic ethics. When you start trying to decide if the end justifies the means you get atomic bombs dropped on foreign cities killing thousands and spreading radiation for years. Though the end result has to be considered it can be a slippery slope in enabling people to dismiss certain ethical standards.
I thought Ross has a good point that coincides with what I said about grey area with Aristotle where there is "more than one ethical value simultaneously competing for preeminece in our ethical decision making." There's never a right or wrong when it comes to ethics. Usually just a kind of good-slash-kind of crappy vs. another kind of good-slash-kind of crappy outcome.
THREE CHEERS FOR COMMUNITARIANISM!!!!! Another shocker, right? "Communitarianism focuses on the outcome of individual ethical decisions, understood not as disconnected choices but analyzed as the impact of the sum of the choices on society." And I sure think that's a great thing to consider! This also goes along nicely with what Kant talked about. Do unto others as you would want them to do to you and realize it's impact on society... this should be the golden rule and ethical plumbline of the 21st century.
And now onto chapter 2... I loved the paragraph that explained what a contradiction journalists face these days in having to try to be "neutral, yet investigative". I believe pretty strongly (though this opinion could probably be swayed) that objectivity is dangerous to truth in journalism. I think that when an opion is put into a piece of work it gives people something to think about. People don't hold their beliefs in the "middle of the road". We make opinions and we argue our points, research our topics, and look at what the other side is saying. The differing of opinions is what is valuable truth in journalism. Not the faking of objectivity to allow people to "make up their own minds."
Another part of this chapter that stood out to me was the section titled "Packaging the story: News as Manufactured Product". While I was reading the part about T.V. news being based on the best video clip I pondered what that meant for politics, laws, and the role the media plays in keeping people uninformed. The making of laws, and what's in such laws isn't very glittery or fun. And it's definitely not a great video clip. And therefore is not really reported on very thoroughly and in turn keeps the public uninformed, which is a very sad outcome. So then is T.V. reporting a good thing or a bad thing? I'm not really sure.
***In the same section there was a sentence that read, "reporting an election as a contest fails to focus on the policy issues, which is what democratic elections are supposed to be about." This single sentence made me think entirely differently about the way we follow elections. It is kind of bogus to report the polls as often as is done.***
And finally on page 33 (4th paragraph) the book talks about a study done to see how different journalists feel about different ethical situations. The data seemed to line up with Aristotle's idea of ethical decision making. The journalists, for the most part, seemed to have a sense of looking for practicality and middle ground.
Now as much as I love to passionately blog, my kitty wants to play fetch and I have an ethical decision to make... Quit blogging and sadden my readers but spare the wrath of a little feline OR go play fetch with the cute fur ball and suffer the audiences backlash... FETCH IT IS!!!
I though that Bok (a girl... who I thought was a boy... oops!) was interesting with her focus on alternatives. I think it is a great idea to look at what the options are when deciding ethical issues (obvious don'tcha think? Okay, I'm sorry about that improper grammar... Sarah Palin is still tormenting me) and I was glad that right off the bat the book made it clear that ethical decision making is not cut and dry with a right or wrong answer. There is always grey area, and a lot of it.
I felt like Aristotle's evaluation of ethics made the most sense. His focus on practicality and middle ground seemed the most "practical" and helpful when it comes to ethical decision making. I liked when the book said, "Seeking the golden mean implies that individual acts are not disconnected from one another, but rather that they form a whole that a person of good character should aspire to." By seeking this "golden mean" one can make a good decision while keeping focus on the two possible extremes.
Though I like Aristotle's model, I align mostly with Kant in the way I make decisions. I've always tried to live by the golden rule. Acting in a way you would want others to act is a good way to keep a sort of system of checks and balances; unless, of course, a given bowl has more ice cream than the next, and in that case I can't say that the golden rule applies. There is the problem, however, of people having very differing ideals of what is right and wrong and what is okay to do to others and oneself.
Should we be suprised though that I think Mill is kind of a &#@$ head? I think this ethics model is an easy way to devalue individual rights and basic ethics. When you start trying to decide if the end justifies the means you get atomic bombs dropped on foreign cities killing thousands and spreading radiation for years. Though the end result has to be considered it can be a slippery slope in enabling people to dismiss certain ethical standards.
I thought Ross has a good point that coincides with what I said about grey area with Aristotle where there is "more than one ethical value simultaneously competing for preeminece in our ethical decision making." There's never a right or wrong when it comes to ethics. Usually just a kind of good-slash-kind of crappy vs. another kind of good-slash-kind of crappy outcome.
THREE CHEERS FOR COMMUNITARIANISM!!!!! Another shocker, right? "Communitarianism focuses on the outcome of individual ethical decisions, understood not as disconnected choices but analyzed as the impact of the sum of the choices on society." And I sure think that's a great thing to consider! This also goes along nicely with what Kant talked about. Do unto others as you would want them to do to you and realize it's impact on society... this should be the golden rule and ethical plumbline of the 21st century.
And now onto chapter 2... I loved the paragraph that explained what a contradiction journalists face these days in having to try to be "neutral, yet investigative". I believe pretty strongly (though this opinion could probably be swayed) that objectivity is dangerous to truth in journalism. I think that when an opion is put into a piece of work it gives people something to think about. People don't hold their beliefs in the "middle of the road". We make opinions and we argue our points, research our topics, and look at what the other side is saying. The differing of opinions is what is valuable truth in journalism. Not the faking of objectivity to allow people to "make up their own minds."
Another part of this chapter that stood out to me was the section titled "Packaging the story: News as Manufactured Product". While I was reading the part about T.V. news being based on the best video clip I pondered what that meant for politics, laws, and the role the media plays in keeping people uninformed. The making of laws, and what's in such laws isn't very glittery or fun. And it's definitely not a great video clip. And therefore is not really reported on very thoroughly and in turn keeps the public uninformed, which is a very sad outcome. So then is T.V. reporting a good thing or a bad thing? I'm not really sure.
***In the same section there was a sentence that read, "reporting an election as a contest fails to focus on the policy issues, which is what democratic elections are supposed to be about." This single sentence made me think entirely differently about the way we follow elections. It is kind of bogus to report the polls as often as is done.***
And finally on page 33 (4th paragraph) the book talks about a study done to see how different journalists feel about different ethical situations. The data seemed to line up with Aristotle's idea of ethical decision making. The journalists, for the most part, seemed to have a sense of looking for practicality and middle ground.
Now as much as I love to passionately blog, my kitty wants to play fetch and I have an ethical decision to make... Quit blogging and sadden my readers but spare the wrath of a little feline OR go play fetch with the cute fur ball and suffer the audiences backlash... FETCH IT IS!!!
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Media & Govt. Term Paper
Amuse News
Alduous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s 1984 are two of the greatest novels of the last century. When these novels were written the authors shed light on what the future could hold. These futures were dark and bleak. In one, we’re controlled by our dictators, in a state of mental and physical slavery we are forced into believing and doing whatever it is we are told. In the other, we don’t need to be controlled by a higher office; we give up on all that matters in search of what’s fun and entertaining. It has long since been debated which of the two novels was more accurate, and when 1985 rolled around, author Neil Postman weighed in. In Postman’s book Amusing Ourselves to Death, he explains why Orwell missed the mark and Huxley was spot on.
We live in a society where we are bombarded by the newest technologies, our televisions are filled with “reality” TV, and alcohol is used in constant excess. We are controlled not by our dictator, but by ourselves and the clutter we’ve allowed to engulf our lives. The clutter is not forced, it is something we accept, we love, we crave. Postman relates this self-indulgence and mindlessness to what we’re seeing in today’s news coverage; and what he sees is a grim picture. Now Postman, like Orwell and Huxley, wrote his book with fear of the future and this fear shines through with every word. Like Postman was able to be in the future looking back on Huxley and Orwell’s works, we are able to do the same with Postman’s. Amusing Ourselves to Death was published in 1985. A lot has changed since then, and like the two novels before, the actual outcome seems to not be quite as harsh as the prediction. Though these authors were slightly off in their predictions, Postman is accurate in his beliefs that some forms of news have been watered-down, turned into entertainment, and do not hold the basic journalistic elements they should; but however dangerous this may be, there are ways, seen in this election, to fix the problem by using technology and entertainment to educate, inform, and act.
In Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel’s book, The Elements of Journalism, ten fundamentals are laid out that make up the essentials of excellent journalism. This book was also written because of the concern several journalists had about the direction journalism and news is going.
According to Kovach and Rosenstiel’s list, “Journalism’s first obligation is to the truth.” We’ve seen a wealth of coverage of this year’s presidential election. Some of it was undoubtedly false, but most of it was probably true. The problem is that news stations, cable news in particular, often seem more concerned with competing with each other, their ideals, and their rival anchors than providing basic facts, truth, and straightforward journalism. MSNBC and Fox News are perfect examples of this competition. Fox News has long been regarded as the conservative channel, pushing their own agenda, spinning their stories, and taking on those dirty liberals. Just in the last couple of years, however, has MSNBC begun to fill its new role as the liberal counter to Fox News. This competition and bickering is entertaining and exciting of course, but is this real journalism? Bias is fun if it’s slanted to your side, but it doesn’t offer up real, objectionable reporting that allows the viewer to decide for him or herself what they believe. We saw this contrast between these two news channels constantly in this election when it came to the matter of William Ayers. Fox News screams for us to learn more of Obama’s terrorist friends while MSNBC wishes they could hire Ayers on as a full-time staffer. These slants and spins are a form of entertainment that clouds the reality of what is really going on in the world, diminishing the role truth and objectivity plays in journalism.
Journalism’s first obligation may be to the truth, but “its first loyalty”, as Kovach and Rosenstiel say, “is to citizens.” Journalism is the connection between the government and the rest of the nation. It is the gatekeeper, muckraker, and informer of all that is important. This role is huge, but more and more we can see that this loyalty is changing from the people to money. “The bonuses of newsroom executives today are based in large part on how much profit their companies make.” And because of this, we see our news coverage driven by ratings and company profits. The news coverage provided is not about the details of the latest tax bill being passed or the way healthcare may effect long-term and short-term infant mortality rates; the coverage hovers around who called who a pig, what Sarah Palin’s teenagers are doing, and what shot of liquor Hillary Clinton is taking with the locals. Crown Royal? Good, that’s what I like. With journalism being controlled by these profit driven motives, we lose sight of the importance of this freedom we have. News becomes petty and un-important. We lose our sense of duty; the duty to inform, the duty to provide substance, and the duty to keep the people active and aware.
The third plumb line of excellent journalism is that its “essence is a discipline of verification.” Verification is a necessity of journalism, without it, journalists literally may as well be making things up. Until recently, journalists just had to worry about verifying their leads and sources and doing some policy run-downs and fact-checking of the latest gory attack ad, which Postman reports former New York Mayor John Lindsay wisely proposed be prohibited. Then came the internet. Hello, world-wide web. Hello, blogs. Hello, personal web-pages. And all of a sudden, everyone is a journalist. Countless stories were shot all over the web this election. Obama went to a Muslim terrorist school, Palin’s youngest son wasn’t hers, and John Edwards was a cheater. Like most stories on the internet, few of these held any ground. This web participation, however, caused journalists a great deal of extra work. Story after story was being uncovered via liberal and conservative blogs, and while some were sheer lunacy, others were incredibly alarming when it surfaced that they were true. The internet added a mass amount of verification work and also took out some of the credibility of certain forms of journalism.
The internet also created a gray area in another sense. The “practitioners [of journalism] must maintain an independence from those they cover.” The internet clouded up this fundamental by clouding up the lines that differentiated a journalist from the consuming public. In the news day in age we are in, every one is a journalist and every one is a commentator. You see this on cable news networks as well. On MSNBC, show hosts Rachel Maddow and Keith Olberman regularly fill positions on each other’s shows as guest commentators. Mike Huckabee, at one time in this election round a presidential candidate, now holds his own show on Fox News. Campaign employees are also used as commentators and regulars on the entertainment news venue. Granted these campaign advisors are great sources, but is it really “maintaining an independence” when you can see them on the same one or two shows three times a week?
Along the lines of maintaining independence is the fifth essential element of journalism, “It must serve as an independent monitor of power.” Though blogs have caused journalists a great deal of headaches when it comes to verifying, they have served a valuable purpose as well. Much like our government, blogs and the internet help set up a system of checks and balances. The press monitors the government and the internet bloggers monitor the press. However, as explained by Kovach and Rosenstiel, this “watchdog principle is being threatened in contemporary journalism by overuse and by a faux watchdogism aimed more at pandering to audiences than doing public service.” And furthermore, “the watchdog role is threatened by a new kind of corporate conglomeration, which effectively may destroy the independence required of the press to perform their monitoring role.” When driven by money, profits become the monitor of what is covered in the newsroom.
When it comes to some of the more helpful areas of journalism, we are at great risk of seeing them slip away. Journalism is to “provide a forum for public criticism and compromise.” Journalism is open to criticism and this facet of the media has been greatly helped along by the internet. Blogs, websites, and mass networking has enabled the criticism of the media in a more conversational and apparent way. TV, in the past, has been a medium difficult to publicly criticize in a timely manner because, after all, it’s hard to converse with your TV; however, with new technologies such as twitter and text messaging, television has taken on a much more conversational tone. This was seen extensively in this election on CNN. CNN had various shows incorporating technology which promoted a dialogue. On “The Situation Room”, viewers were able to e-mail responses, thoughts, and criticism to a segment called “The Cafferty File”, which comes on several times periodically throughout the two-hour program. During the show, viewer responses are selected to be aired. Also on CNN, viewers could text, Facebook message, MySpace comment, and post to the Twitter board during Rick Sanchez’ news hour. This technology helped promote and nourish one of the very important parts of journalism, however, when it comes to being a forum for compromise the media seems to be taking a step backwards. As discussed earlier, cable news often takes on a rivalry tone, promoting division and partisan thinking rather than compromise and understanding.
Journalism must also “make the significant interesting and relevant.” We can see the effort to make news exciting in today’s journalism anytime one of the major cable news channels is flipped on. Flashy graphics and dramatic headlines grace every story. Beautiful women conduct interviews at rapid speed. Catchy titles, constantly changing, are a must for every show. Just recently we’ve seen “Road to the White House” change to “1600 Pennsylvania Avenue”. It’s catchy, of course, but it is this sort of shallow entertainment that Postman writes so fearfully about. It changes journalism and news into something that is entertaining. Somewhat interesting and somewhat relevant, but most of all, it is pure entertainment.
This is also an area of journalism in which satire is given an important and vital role. Satire, though very entertaining, serves a much higher purpose, as we’ve seen recently, that gives a voice to a certain kind of taboo journalism. Journalists have an integrity to uphold, and that integrity involves being politically correct. When Sarah Palin first burst onto the scene this election, many were dumb-founded by her rhetoric, divisive policies, and “peculiar” background. Any good journalist knew better than to comment on her ridiculous “don’t-chya-know” joe-six-pack attitude and her self-absorption, however, the satirical world could do more than comment, and they took up that opportunity right away.
With the first appearance of Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on “Saturday Night Live” the Sarah Palin frenzy took a dramatic turn. Up until that point journalists were trying to take Palin seriously. It was at that point that satire was allowed to take over and “report” to the world the real absurdity of Sarah Palin’s Vice-Presidential bid. As Tina Fey strutted around SNL’s “Oval Office” set, interviewed with “Katie Couric” and out-performed “Joe Biden” in the talent portion of the “Vice-Presidential Debate” SNL managed to express what was on everyone’s mind, something that the news couldn’t do. It is this form of entertainment news that has healthy outcomes. Satire, though an entertainment, is a strong tool when it comes to analyzing the political world.
There was another form of entertainment news we saw this election that helped more than hindered in making the work of journalism and news interesting and relevant. Shows like “The Colbert Report” and “The Daily Show with John Stewart” parodied the ridiculousness of the everyday campaign bickering, poked fun at the many faces of the media, and along the way gained the attention of countless young Americans who, otherwise, would have had zero involvement in this year’s election. Some forms of entertainment, such as these two shows, are necessary to educate those who have engulfed themselves in the entertainment world.
As well as making significant news interesting and relevant, journalism “must keep the news comprehensive and in proportion.” This is one of the hardest parts of journalism. It can be incredibly difficult to make political topics comprehensive. Most stories are very involved, detailed, and layered; but with our fast-paced, self-indulged, entertainment-is-everything society, there is little time to squeeze in all of the elements of a real story into a two-minute interview, news package, or CNN “political ticker” article. Three articles published in The New Yorker magazine, “Battle Plans”, “The New Liberalism”, and “The Joshua Generation”, were excellent works of written journalism focusing on the ins and outs of Obama’s history, his rise to power, and his campaign. The shortest of these three articles ran about eight pages. Journalists for mainstream news outlets are not given the opportunity that writers for The New Yorker are given. They are forced to eliminate important details, glitter-up tragic events, and skip from one unrelated story to the next. The world of entertainment is drowning out the type of journalism that truly gives an understanding of issues to its readers.
Journalists are to be objective, but being objective does not mean disregarding one’s convictions. Journalism’s “practitioners have an obligation to exercise their personal conscience.” After the run-up to the war in Iraq, the media found a new sense of the importance of reporting what they knew was true and ethical. They developed a conscience. This is one way to argue that Fox News’ Sean Hannity and MSNBC’s Keith Olberman are getting it right. They are both clearly opinionate on what they each “feel” is the right thing in any given situation, however, their “conscience” seems to pull in a large amount of ratings, money, and entertainment; and therefore, is not a necessary element of journalism, but rather just another faction of the entertainment market.
And finally, Kovach and Rosenstiel bring up the often forgotten key element in journalism, “citizens, too, have right and responsibilities when it comes to the news.” As Postman’s title reads, “Amusing Ourselves to Death”, he makes the point that we are doing this to ourselves. There is no “Big Brother” is forcing us to fill our minds with useless content. We are not made to delve into the world of entertainment twenty-four hours a day. And we are certainly not required to shell out our precious ratings to the most superficial news sources. We are, in fact, amusing ourselves. We have the power to decide to stop consuming whatever entertainment is shoveled out to us and start demanding a standard in journalism, the standard that recently has been increasingly cast by the way-side. Audiences are being held captive because we have disregarded our role as active listeners. We need to demand the truth. We need to demand loyalty. We need to demand accuracy, consciousness, relevance, verification, and independence. Without the involvement of the people, the audience, journalists and their work are only accountable to their ratings and profits, which are easily gained with a few wordy headlines.
With that said, there is a solution to the decline in quality of the necessary elements of journalism and part of it is the audience’s involvement. By using the internet and new technology a whole new forum for discussion can be opened up. We have seen the beginning of what these new mediums can do these past two years, especially when it came to election coverage. Another area in which an excellent example was set was by Obama’s own campaign. Obama’s campaign took the things that have brought journalism’s standards down, changed them around, and got people involved. Through text messaging, websites, e-mails, networking sites, television shows, literature, etc. Obama was able to rally a coalition of people who were not just entertained, but were involved. Entertainment does not have to be the demise of journalism. Entertainment, when harnessed, can be an effective tool in educating and reaching those who would not usually be interested in what journalism and the news has to offer. Like “The Colbert Report” and “The Daily Show” have mastered entertainment news segments, and SNL has given a voice to political incorrectness, Obama’s campaign used various forms of entertainment, added substance, and made a new generation of voters aware of the political world around them. As Postman explains, he “must appear on television to promote a book that warns people against television.” To try to eliminate entertainment is irrational, impossible, and quite idiotic to even attempt. Therefore, entertainment must be transformed to reach its full potential as a helpful, necessary tool for communication.
Looking back at Postman, Orwell, and Huxley’s predictions, it is easy to see that they were slightly extreme in their apocalyptic outlooks. And after seeing the coverage of this year’s election it is clear that there are many issues in the way journalism is being conducted, however, there was also a hope given that there is a way to work with our entertaining world. After all, there will always be advances in technology and it is the job of journalists to maintain the basic standards of their work; and it is also the job of the masses to be involved and to stop amusing ourselves to death.
Alduous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s 1984 are two of the greatest novels of the last century. When these novels were written the authors shed light on what the future could hold. These futures were dark and bleak. In one, we’re controlled by our dictators, in a state of mental and physical slavery we are forced into believing and doing whatever it is we are told. In the other, we don’t need to be controlled by a higher office; we give up on all that matters in search of what’s fun and entertaining. It has long since been debated which of the two novels was more accurate, and when 1985 rolled around, author Neil Postman weighed in. In Postman’s book Amusing Ourselves to Death, he explains why Orwell missed the mark and Huxley was spot on.
We live in a society where we are bombarded by the newest technologies, our televisions are filled with “reality” TV, and alcohol is used in constant excess. We are controlled not by our dictator, but by ourselves and the clutter we’ve allowed to engulf our lives. The clutter is not forced, it is something we accept, we love, we crave. Postman relates this self-indulgence and mindlessness to what we’re seeing in today’s news coverage; and what he sees is a grim picture. Now Postman, like Orwell and Huxley, wrote his book with fear of the future and this fear shines through with every word. Like Postman was able to be in the future looking back on Huxley and Orwell’s works, we are able to do the same with Postman’s. Amusing Ourselves to Death was published in 1985. A lot has changed since then, and like the two novels before, the actual outcome seems to not be quite as harsh as the prediction. Though these authors were slightly off in their predictions, Postman is accurate in his beliefs that some forms of news have been watered-down, turned into entertainment, and do not hold the basic journalistic elements they should; but however dangerous this may be, there are ways, seen in this election, to fix the problem by using technology and entertainment to educate, inform, and act.
In Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel’s book, The Elements of Journalism, ten fundamentals are laid out that make up the essentials of excellent journalism. This book was also written because of the concern several journalists had about the direction journalism and news is going.
According to Kovach and Rosenstiel’s list, “Journalism’s first obligation is to the truth.” We’ve seen a wealth of coverage of this year’s presidential election. Some of it was undoubtedly false, but most of it was probably true. The problem is that news stations, cable news in particular, often seem more concerned with competing with each other, their ideals, and their rival anchors than providing basic facts, truth, and straightforward journalism. MSNBC and Fox News are perfect examples of this competition. Fox News has long been regarded as the conservative channel, pushing their own agenda, spinning their stories, and taking on those dirty liberals. Just in the last couple of years, however, has MSNBC begun to fill its new role as the liberal counter to Fox News. This competition and bickering is entertaining and exciting of course, but is this real journalism? Bias is fun if it’s slanted to your side, but it doesn’t offer up real, objectionable reporting that allows the viewer to decide for him or herself what they believe. We saw this contrast between these two news channels constantly in this election when it came to the matter of William Ayers. Fox News screams for us to learn more of Obama’s terrorist friends while MSNBC wishes they could hire Ayers on as a full-time staffer. These slants and spins are a form of entertainment that clouds the reality of what is really going on in the world, diminishing the role truth and objectivity plays in journalism.
Journalism’s first obligation may be to the truth, but “its first loyalty”, as Kovach and Rosenstiel say, “is to citizens.” Journalism is the connection between the government and the rest of the nation. It is the gatekeeper, muckraker, and informer of all that is important. This role is huge, but more and more we can see that this loyalty is changing from the people to money. “The bonuses of newsroom executives today are based in large part on how much profit their companies make.” And because of this, we see our news coverage driven by ratings and company profits. The news coverage provided is not about the details of the latest tax bill being passed or the way healthcare may effect long-term and short-term infant mortality rates; the coverage hovers around who called who a pig, what Sarah Palin’s teenagers are doing, and what shot of liquor Hillary Clinton is taking with the locals. Crown Royal? Good, that’s what I like. With journalism being controlled by these profit driven motives, we lose sight of the importance of this freedom we have. News becomes petty and un-important. We lose our sense of duty; the duty to inform, the duty to provide substance, and the duty to keep the people active and aware.
The third plumb line of excellent journalism is that its “essence is a discipline of verification.” Verification is a necessity of journalism, without it, journalists literally may as well be making things up. Until recently, journalists just had to worry about verifying their leads and sources and doing some policy run-downs and fact-checking of the latest gory attack ad, which Postman reports former New York Mayor John Lindsay wisely proposed be prohibited. Then came the internet. Hello, world-wide web. Hello, blogs. Hello, personal web-pages. And all of a sudden, everyone is a journalist. Countless stories were shot all over the web this election. Obama went to a Muslim terrorist school, Palin’s youngest son wasn’t hers, and John Edwards was a cheater. Like most stories on the internet, few of these held any ground. This web participation, however, caused journalists a great deal of extra work. Story after story was being uncovered via liberal and conservative blogs, and while some were sheer lunacy, others were incredibly alarming when it surfaced that they were true. The internet added a mass amount of verification work and also took out some of the credibility of certain forms of journalism.
The internet also created a gray area in another sense. The “practitioners [of journalism] must maintain an independence from those they cover.” The internet clouded up this fundamental by clouding up the lines that differentiated a journalist from the consuming public. In the news day in age we are in, every one is a journalist and every one is a commentator. You see this on cable news networks as well. On MSNBC, show hosts Rachel Maddow and Keith Olberman regularly fill positions on each other’s shows as guest commentators. Mike Huckabee, at one time in this election round a presidential candidate, now holds his own show on Fox News. Campaign employees are also used as commentators and regulars on the entertainment news venue. Granted these campaign advisors are great sources, but is it really “maintaining an independence” when you can see them on the same one or two shows three times a week?
Along the lines of maintaining independence is the fifth essential element of journalism, “It must serve as an independent monitor of power.” Though blogs have caused journalists a great deal of headaches when it comes to verifying, they have served a valuable purpose as well. Much like our government, blogs and the internet help set up a system of checks and balances. The press monitors the government and the internet bloggers monitor the press. However, as explained by Kovach and Rosenstiel, this “watchdog principle is being threatened in contemporary journalism by overuse and by a faux watchdogism aimed more at pandering to audiences than doing public service.” And furthermore, “the watchdog role is threatened by a new kind of corporate conglomeration, which effectively may destroy the independence required of the press to perform their monitoring role.” When driven by money, profits become the monitor of what is covered in the newsroom.
When it comes to some of the more helpful areas of journalism, we are at great risk of seeing them slip away. Journalism is to “provide a forum for public criticism and compromise.” Journalism is open to criticism and this facet of the media has been greatly helped along by the internet. Blogs, websites, and mass networking has enabled the criticism of the media in a more conversational and apparent way. TV, in the past, has been a medium difficult to publicly criticize in a timely manner because, after all, it’s hard to converse with your TV; however, with new technologies such as twitter and text messaging, television has taken on a much more conversational tone. This was seen extensively in this election on CNN. CNN had various shows incorporating technology which promoted a dialogue. On “The Situation Room”, viewers were able to e-mail responses, thoughts, and criticism to a segment called “The Cafferty File”, which comes on several times periodically throughout the two-hour program. During the show, viewer responses are selected to be aired. Also on CNN, viewers could text, Facebook message, MySpace comment, and post to the Twitter board during Rick Sanchez’ news hour. This technology helped promote and nourish one of the very important parts of journalism, however, when it comes to being a forum for compromise the media seems to be taking a step backwards. As discussed earlier, cable news often takes on a rivalry tone, promoting division and partisan thinking rather than compromise and understanding.
Journalism must also “make the significant interesting and relevant.” We can see the effort to make news exciting in today’s journalism anytime one of the major cable news channels is flipped on. Flashy graphics and dramatic headlines grace every story. Beautiful women conduct interviews at rapid speed. Catchy titles, constantly changing, are a must for every show. Just recently we’ve seen “Road to the White House” change to “1600 Pennsylvania Avenue”. It’s catchy, of course, but it is this sort of shallow entertainment that Postman writes so fearfully about. It changes journalism and news into something that is entertaining. Somewhat interesting and somewhat relevant, but most of all, it is pure entertainment.
This is also an area of journalism in which satire is given an important and vital role. Satire, though very entertaining, serves a much higher purpose, as we’ve seen recently, that gives a voice to a certain kind of taboo journalism. Journalists have an integrity to uphold, and that integrity involves being politically correct. When Sarah Palin first burst onto the scene this election, many were dumb-founded by her rhetoric, divisive policies, and “peculiar” background. Any good journalist knew better than to comment on her ridiculous “don’t-chya-know” joe-six-pack attitude and her self-absorption, however, the satirical world could do more than comment, and they took up that opportunity right away.
With the first appearance of Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on “Saturday Night Live” the Sarah Palin frenzy took a dramatic turn. Up until that point journalists were trying to take Palin seriously. It was at that point that satire was allowed to take over and “report” to the world the real absurdity of Sarah Palin’s Vice-Presidential bid. As Tina Fey strutted around SNL’s “Oval Office” set, interviewed with “Katie Couric” and out-performed “Joe Biden” in the talent portion of the “Vice-Presidential Debate” SNL managed to express what was on everyone’s mind, something that the news couldn’t do. It is this form of entertainment news that has healthy outcomes. Satire, though an entertainment, is a strong tool when it comes to analyzing the political world.
There was another form of entertainment news we saw this election that helped more than hindered in making the work of journalism and news interesting and relevant. Shows like “The Colbert Report” and “The Daily Show with John Stewart” parodied the ridiculousness of the everyday campaign bickering, poked fun at the many faces of the media, and along the way gained the attention of countless young Americans who, otherwise, would have had zero involvement in this year’s election. Some forms of entertainment, such as these two shows, are necessary to educate those who have engulfed themselves in the entertainment world.
As well as making significant news interesting and relevant, journalism “must keep the news comprehensive and in proportion.” This is one of the hardest parts of journalism. It can be incredibly difficult to make political topics comprehensive. Most stories are very involved, detailed, and layered; but with our fast-paced, self-indulged, entertainment-is-everything society, there is little time to squeeze in all of the elements of a real story into a two-minute interview, news package, or CNN “political ticker” article. Three articles published in The New Yorker magazine, “Battle Plans”, “The New Liberalism”, and “The Joshua Generation”, were excellent works of written journalism focusing on the ins and outs of Obama’s history, his rise to power, and his campaign. The shortest of these three articles ran about eight pages. Journalists for mainstream news outlets are not given the opportunity that writers for The New Yorker are given. They are forced to eliminate important details, glitter-up tragic events, and skip from one unrelated story to the next. The world of entertainment is drowning out the type of journalism that truly gives an understanding of issues to its readers.
Journalists are to be objective, but being objective does not mean disregarding one’s convictions. Journalism’s “practitioners have an obligation to exercise their personal conscience.” After the run-up to the war in Iraq, the media found a new sense of the importance of reporting what they knew was true and ethical. They developed a conscience. This is one way to argue that Fox News’ Sean Hannity and MSNBC’s Keith Olberman are getting it right. They are both clearly opinionate on what they each “feel” is the right thing in any given situation, however, their “conscience” seems to pull in a large amount of ratings, money, and entertainment; and therefore, is not a necessary element of journalism, but rather just another faction of the entertainment market.
And finally, Kovach and Rosenstiel bring up the often forgotten key element in journalism, “citizens, too, have right and responsibilities when it comes to the news.” As Postman’s title reads, “Amusing Ourselves to Death”, he makes the point that we are doing this to ourselves. There is no “Big Brother” is forcing us to fill our minds with useless content. We are not made to delve into the world of entertainment twenty-four hours a day. And we are certainly not required to shell out our precious ratings to the most superficial news sources. We are, in fact, amusing ourselves. We have the power to decide to stop consuming whatever entertainment is shoveled out to us and start demanding a standard in journalism, the standard that recently has been increasingly cast by the way-side. Audiences are being held captive because we have disregarded our role as active listeners. We need to demand the truth. We need to demand loyalty. We need to demand accuracy, consciousness, relevance, verification, and independence. Without the involvement of the people, the audience, journalists and their work are only accountable to their ratings and profits, which are easily gained with a few wordy headlines.
With that said, there is a solution to the decline in quality of the necessary elements of journalism and part of it is the audience’s involvement. By using the internet and new technology a whole new forum for discussion can be opened up. We have seen the beginning of what these new mediums can do these past two years, especially when it came to election coverage. Another area in which an excellent example was set was by Obama’s own campaign. Obama’s campaign took the things that have brought journalism’s standards down, changed them around, and got people involved. Through text messaging, websites, e-mails, networking sites, television shows, literature, etc. Obama was able to rally a coalition of people who were not just entertained, but were involved. Entertainment does not have to be the demise of journalism. Entertainment, when harnessed, can be an effective tool in educating and reaching those who would not usually be interested in what journalism and the news has to offer. Like “The Colbert Report” and “The Daily Show” have mastered entertainment news segments, and SNL has given a voice to political incorrectness, Obama’s campaign used various forms of entertainment, added substance, and made a new generation of voters aware of the political world around them. As Postman explains, he “must appear on television to promote a book that warns people against television.” To try to eliminate entertainment is irrational, impossible, and quite idiotic to even attempt. Therefore, entertainment must be transformed to reach its full potential as a helpful, necessary tool for communication.
Looking back at Postman, Orwell, and Huxley’s predictions, it is easy to see that they were slightly extreme in their apocalyptic outlooks. And after seeing the coverage of this year’s election it is clear that there are many issues in the way journalism is being conducted, however, there was also a hope given that there is a way to work with our entertaining world. After all, there will always be advances in technology and it is the job of journalists to maintain the basic standards of their work; and it is also the job of the masses to be involved and to stop amusing ourselves to death.
Media & Govt. Final
Governing Ourselves: The Election, The Media, The Lack-of-Bias
This year’s election has been a dramatic election in every way. History was made, reputations were shattered, lies were spread, and heroes emerged. The media was scrutinized while Sarah Palin shopped and Barack Obama probably sold more T-shirts than Macy’s. Now that all the back-and-forth has ended; the election can be reflected on, analyzed, and seen with 20/20 vision. Howard Kurtz’ article for the Washington Post, “The Pulse of the Pol”, though written in October, is much like a scrapbook of this year’s election. He pulls together clips of various interviews, polls, articles, and analyses which paint a picture of the way the media has handled this year’s Presidential race. Kurtz’ article along with an article by Elizabeth Drew, “The Truth about the Election”, also give way to explaining one subject constantly brought up in this election, media bias. Neil Postman’s book “Amusing Ourselves to Death”, argues that news has become solely a means of entertainment and Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel raise a similar concern in their book, “The Elements of Journalism”. Kurtz’ and Drew’s articles, however, show that the media, though focused primarily on entertainment, did a fine job of providing American’s the information needed to make an informed decision on election day, which is a vital key to the participation in American democracy.
From the very beginning of the race, even in the primaries, Obama set the tone for how his campaign would be run. As Drew shows, Obama understood the concept of thinking long-term when running for the Presidency. He knew that people wanted to see a leader, someone who could govern. “The best way to judge presidential candidates - aside from whether one basically agrees with their values - are to try to envision them governing. Will they inspire people to follow them? What kind of people do they have around them? How do they run their campaign?” She goes on, “In Obama’s case, from what we have been able to observe… there will be a straight line from his campaigning to his governing.” This “straight line” was seen by millions of voters and picked up on by the media and bloggers alike. It was this conceptual understanding that differentiated Obama’s run from all the others.
Kurtz also hits on this concept in his piece. Kurtz cites Matt Bai from the NYT magazine when discussing Obama’s calm demeanor. Bai explains how Obama lets people come to him, he doesn’t chase the voter. This kind of confidence mixed with his understanding of the long-term stood out in stark contrast to McCain’s erratic, whatever-needs-to-be-done-for-now tactics. As Drew put it, “Obama seemed unshakeable throughout the campaign. He quite evidently unnerved both Clinton and McCain, because they couldn’t rattle him.”
Kurtz’ article does a good job of showing the media’s reception and understanding of Obama’s calm throughout the election. He reports that Paul Waldman, in American Prospect, says “While McCain’s campaign is showing who he is and what he’ll stoop to, voters are discovering that whatever else you think about Barack Obama, the man is calm.”
Obama played to the idea that people want what they can’t have, and in doing so, David Brooks makes clear, “at Obama rallies, the candidate is the wooed not the wooer.”
After Kurtz scrapbooks the media’s response to Obama’s collected manner, he paints a very accurate portrayal of the Sarah Palin dilemma. Citing a then-recent poll, Kurtz explains America’s security in Palin is very low, but aside from that, voters became disheartened and confused when reports came out regarding Palin’s stump-speech hypocrisies. First, she’s just your average “hockey mom” who can relate to all the “Joe-six-packs” then she’s spending $150,000 on clothes. She touts her reputation as a reformer and maverick, then the Associate Press reports that she’s charging the state to fly her children around.
Then, with obvious irony, the McCain campaign began attacking the amount of money Obama’s campaign was collecting. The campaign failed to realize that Obama’s money was donated by small amounts given by every-day, average-income citizens, not the monstrous corporate donors that are typical of the Republican Party. The race had gotten petty, and Kurtz showed that with his ensuing collage of reports by Rich Lowry, Joe Klein, and Rick Moran.
Klein is essentially kicked off the McCain campaign’s planes for his criticisms of the Maverick while Moran tries to reason with the ludicrous accusations being flung at Obama by the Republican Party, “Obama will not turn America into a Marxist state… Obama will not cancel future elections… place his smiling visage on 10 story high office buildings… ‘take away’ your guns, close churches… shut down Fox News… or any other actions that would smack of dictatorship…”
Drew makes a similar case, “He won’t do many of the things that Democrats usually call for: the reform of health care will be less sweeping than what’s been proposed in the past… and there won’t be dramatic cuts in defense spending.”
Kurtz’ article also does well in showing the two sides of the media seen in the election. He cites Tina Brown’s defense of Sarah Palin, a large task that was commonly being undertaken. “They treated her as a retard and wouldn’t let her talk to a reporter. The Couric debacle was just about those idiots giving her the wrong lines…” Kurtz then contrasts Brown’s defense with the scrutiny of Christopher Hitchens. “The problem with Gov. Palin is not that she lacks experience. It’s that she quite plainly lacks intellectual curiosity.”
Along with giving a great overview of the election, Kurtz’ piece offered up a lot of evidence on the subject of media bias, or lack thereof.
Fox News and MSNBC will shine through as the champions for their chosen candidates, despite how “Fair & Balanced” either “tried” to be. However, aside from the obviously biased media outlets, the McCain campaign was complaining at just about every chance he got this election that the media as a whole was out to get him, or rather to praise Obama’s every move. Never mind that, as Tom Ferrick reported, the Inquirer’s endorsement of Obama had “a dissenting opinion that ran below the main editorial that stated the case for John McCain.” And “Insiders at the paper told [Ferrick] that was added at the insistence of Brian Tierney, a life-long Republican who also happens to be the newspaper’s publisher.”
Various reports have shown that it was not a matter of the media favoring Obama as it was Obama doing more newsworthy things in order to gain positive airtime. Obama draws in crowds of 200,000 in Berlin, masters the internet, changes the electoral map, and sets record after record in raising money, voter turn-out, etc. Meanwhile, McCain kicks journalists off his plane, sequesters Palin from the media, and fake-suspends his campaign while claiming the economy’s fundamentals were strong.
This was not a matter of media bias as much as it was a study of whose campaign was more newsworthy and whose was a train wreck. Drew’s article explained this issue in detail. “The fundamentals of the race favored Obama all along. The objective facts were that he had a far superior campaign organization, with more people on the ground and more money to spend on campaign workers and ads.”
With the media reporting on what was actually happening in both camps, the American people were enabled to see the stark differences between the two candidates. It was not a bias showing through, nor was it an exaggeration of events. Journalists reported what they saw. And what they saw was a calm, collected leader on one side, who was making dramatic changes in this election in areas such as raising money; and they also saw another candidate striving to find some way to get voters, whether it be campaign suspension, pandering to the “Joe-six-packs” of America, or shunning the media. The people were given the information, the information that Kurtz gave us a sampling of, and the people were then left to decide their candidate of choice. Some voted for McCain, some voted for third parties, but most voted for Barack Obama, and it wasn’t because the “liberal” media was in his corner. It was because American’s are not stupid. We learned our lesson last time.
This year’s election has been a dramatic election in every way. History was made, reputations were shattered, lies were spread, and heroes emerged. The media was scrutinized while Sarah Palin shopped and Barack Obama probably sold more T-shirts than Macy’s. Now that all the back-and-forth has ended; the election can be reflected on, analyzed, and seen with 20/20 vision. Howard Kurtz’ article for the Washington Post, “The Pulse of the Pol”, though written in October, is much like a scrapbook of this year’s election. He pulls together clips of various interviews, polls, articles, and analyses which paint a picture of the way the media has handled this year’s Presidential race. Kurtz’ article along with an article by Elizabeth Drew, “The Truth about the Election”, also give way to explaining one subject constantly brought up in this election, media bias. Neil Postman’s book “Amusing Ourselves to Death”, argues that news has become solely a means of entertainment and Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel raise a similar concern in their book, “The Elements of Journalism”. Kurtz’ and Drew’s articles, however, show that the media, though focused primarily on entertainment, did a fine job of providing American’s the information needed to make an informed decision on election day, which is a vital key to the participation in American democracy.
From the very beginning of the race, even in the primaries, Obama set the tone for how his campaign would be run. As Drew shows, Obama understood the concept of thinking long-term when running for the Presidency. He knew that people wanted to see a leader, someone who could govern. “The best way to judge presidential candidates - aside from whether one basically agrees with their values - are to try to envision them governing. Will they inspire people to follow them? What kind of people do they have around them? How do they run their campaign?” She goes on, “In Obama’s case, from what we have been able to observe… there will be a straight line from his campaigning to his governing.” This “straight line” was seen by millions of voters and picked up on by the media and bloggers alike. It was this conceptual understanding that differentiated Obama’s run from all the others.
Kurtz also hits on this concept in his piece. Kurtz cites Matt Bai from the NYT magazine when discussing Obama’s calm demeanor. Bai explains how Obama lets people come to him, he doesn’t chase the voter. This kind of confidence mixed with his understanding of the long-term stood out in stark contrast to McCain’s erratic, whatever-needs-to-be-done-for-now tactics. As Drew put it, “Obama seemed unshakeable throughout the campaign. He quite evidently unnerved both Clinton and McCain, because they couldn’t rattle him.”
Kurtz’ article does a good job of showing the media’s reception and understanding of Obama’s calm throughout the election. He reports that Paul Waldman, in American Prospect, says “While McCain’s campaign is showing who he is and what he’ll stoop to, voters are discovering that whatever else you think about Barack Obama, the man is calm.”
Obama played to the idea that people want what they can’t have, and in doing so, David Brooks makes clear, “at Obama rallies, the candidate is the wooed not the wooer.”
After Kurtz scrapbooks the media’s response to Obama’s collected manner, he paints a very accurate portrayal of the Sarah Palin dilemma. Citing a then-recent poll, Kurtz explains America’s security in Palin is very low, but aside from that, voters became disheartened and confused when reports came out regarding Palin’s stump-speech hypocrisies. First, she’s just your average “hockey mom” who can relate to all the “Joe-six-packs” then she’s spending $150,000 on clothes. She touts her reputation as a reformer and maverick, then the Associate Press reports that she’s charging the state to fly her children around.
Then, with obvious irony, the McCain campaign began attacking the amount of money Obama’s campaign was collecting. The campaign failed to realize that Obama’s money was donated by small amounts given by every-day, average-income citizens, not the monstrous corporate donors that are typical of the Republican Party. The race had gotten petty, and Kurtz showed that with his ensuing collage of reports by Rich Lowry, Joe Klein, and Rick Moran.
Klein is essentially kicked off the McCain campaign’s planes for his criticisms of the Maverick while Moran tries to reason with the ludicrous accusations being flung at Obama by the Republican Party, “Obama will not turn America into a Marxist state… Obama will not cancel future elections… place his smiling visage on 10 story high office buildings… ‘take away’ your guns, close churches… shut down Fox News… or any other actions that would smack of dictatorship…”
Drew makes a similar case, “He won’t do many of the things that Democrats usually call for: the reform of health care will be less sweeping than what’s been proposed in the past… and there won’t be dramatic cuts in defense spending.”
Kurtz’ article also does well in showing the two sides of the media seen in the election. He cites Tina Brown’s defense of Sarah Palin, a large task that was commonly being undertaken. “They treated her as a retard and wouldn’t let her talk to a reporter. The Couric debacle was just about those idiots giving her the wrong lines…” Kurtz then contrasts Brown’s defense with the scrutiny of Christopher Hitchens. “The problem with Gov. Palin is not that she lacks experience. It’s that she quite plainly lacks intellectual curiosity.”
Along with giving a great overview of the election, Kurtz’ piece offered up a lot of evidence on the subject of media bias, or lack thereof.
Fox News and MSNBC will shine through as the champions for their chosen candidates, despite how “Fair & Balanced” either “tried” to be. However, aside from the obviously biased media outlets, the McCain campaign was complaining at just about every chance he got this election that the media as a whole was out to get him, or rather to praise Obama’s every move. Never mind that, as Tom Ferrick reported, the Inquirer’s endorsement of Obama had “a dissenting opinion that ran below the main editorial that stated the case for John McCain.” And “Insiders at the paper told [Ferrick] that was added at the insistence of Brian Tierney, a life-long Republican who also happens to be the newspaper’s publisher.”
Various reports have shown that it was not a matter of the media favoring Obama as it was Obama doing more newsworthy things in order to gain positive airtime. Obama draws in crowds of 200,000 in Berlin, masters the internet, changes the electoral map, and sets record after record in raising money, voter turn-out, etc. Meanwhile, McCain kicks journalists off his plane, sequesters Palin from the media, and fake-suspends his campaign while claiming the economy’s fundamentals were strong.
This was not a matter of media bias as much as it was a study of whose campaign was more newsworthy and whose was a train wreck. Drew’s article explained this issue in detail. “The fundamentals of the race favored Obama all along. The objective facts were that he had a far superior campaign organization, with more people on the ground and more money to spend on campaign workers and ads.”
With the media reporting on what was actually happening in both camps, the American people were enabled to see the stark differences between the two candidates. It was not a bias showing through, nor was it an exaggeration of events. Journalists reported what they saw. And what they saw was a calm, collected leader on one side, who was making dramatic changes in this election in areas such as raising money; and they also saw another candidate striving to find some way to get voters, whether it be campaign suspension, pandering to the “Joe-six-packs” of America, or shunning the media. The people were given the information, the information that Kurtz gave us a sampling of, and the people were then left to decide their candidate of choice. Some voted for McCain, some voted for third parties, but most voted for Barack Obama, and it wasn’t because the “liberal” media was in his corner. It was because American’s are not stupid. We learned our lesson last time.
Extra Credit Obama/McCain Write-Up (From WAAYYY back in the day, when McCain still thought he had a chance!)
McCain/Obama Reps Grace Resource Center
I requested off of work, anticipated the big day, and forced my boyfriend to come with me to see Obama and McCain representatives speak in the Resource Center as part of SCI’s Yappa Week. I was mildly disappointed to see the representatives were not much older than myself, for some reason I seem to count out my own generation, but it was nothing that wasn’t taken forgotten at the sight of the buttons and posters I realized I was going to get to take home.
Right off the bat I noticed the stark contrast between the two men. One, dressed up, matching his button with his pants, typed notes, solid leather folder, laid back dress, calm, excited, happy; the other, dressed for business, hand-scribbled notes on a single sheet of paper, no button, nervous, and as we would later find, not too knowledgeable about his material. These two people, hardly associated with the actual Obama and McCain campaigns, stood in our little resource center, perfectly depicting the characteristics of each of the campaigns in their entirety.
This debate, if that’s what it was, was so telling of what we have seen over the last several months. Obama’s campaign has shown a historical organization. The organization, enthusiasm, and calm collectiveness of his campaign is something that will be the envy of politicians for decades to come. McCain’s, on the other hand, and probably a big factor in his losing the presidency, was quite opposite from Obama’s. The McCain campaign, like this young representative, often seemed nervous, unsure, wobbly, if you will.
We constantly see the two campaigns under the media’s microscope, and I often wonder if the depiction of the steady versus the erratic is fair. I realized in this back-and-forth how accurate that depiction really was. Granted these two people were volunteering to help speak at SCI without actually being campaign spokespeople, but to see the characteristics of the larger campaigns translate over to the small scale was something incredible.
I requested off of work, anticipated the big day, and forced my boyfriend to come with me to see Obama and McCain representatives speak in the Resource Center as part of SCI’s Yappa Week. I was mildly disappointed to see the representatives were not much older than myself, for some reason I seem to count out my own generation, but it was nothing that wasn’t taken forgotten at the sight of the buttons and posters I realized I was going to get to take home.
Right off the bat I noticed the stark contrast between the two men. One, dressed up, matching his button with his pants, typed notes, solid leather folder, laid back dress, calm, excited, happy; the other, dressed for business, hand-scribbled notes on a single sheet of paper, no button, nervous, and as we would later find, not too knowledgeable about his material. These two people, hardly associated with the actual Obama and McCain campaigns, stood in our little resource center, perfectly depicting the characteristics of each of the campaigns in their entirety.
This debate, if that’s what it was, was so telling of what we have seen over the last several months. Obama’s campaign has shown a historical organization. The organization, enthusiasm, and calm collectiveness of his campaign is something that will be the envy of politicians for decades to come. McCain’s, on the other hand, and probably a big factor in his losing the presidency, was quite opposite from Obama’s. The McCain campaign, like this young representative, often seemed nervous, unsure, wobbly, if you will.
We constantly see the two campaigns under the media’s microscope, and I often wonder if the depiction of the steady versus the erratic is fair. I realized in this back-and-forth how accurate that depiction really was. Granted these two people were volunteering to help speak at SCI without actually being campaign spokespeople, but to see the characteristics of the larger campaigns translate over to the small scale was something incredible.
Journalism Final
Before taking Advanced Journalism, I had felt like I was a pretty good writer. In high school and college I had had papers, poems, and essays nominated for various awards, and on special occasions, sometimes I would win. I am a stickler on grammar, and I have a tendency to create long sentences with the help of my favorite writing tool, the comma. Writing had become second nature to me and rarely was I intimidated by a written assignment, that is, until I took my first journalism class.
I was introduced to AP style, which, I must admit, I completely despise. An entire book chuck full of new rules I had never heard of? AP style was definitely not my style. I struggled through my first AP style experience with frustration, grammar errors, and a colorful bruise to my ego.
Needless to say, I wasn’t exactly thrilled to see “Advanced Journalism” on my class line-up for this semester. However, once in the class, I found a new appreciation for journalism, my knowledge of the AP style began to expand, I started to find my tone and style when it comes to writing for journalism.
Throughout my experience in Advanced Journalism, Google helped me extensively. With the help of this tool I was able to find an answer to nearly all of my AP style questions with lighting speed. Well, I guess I’m still not clear on ordinal numbers. Aside from needing to conquer AP style, I also needed help in understanding the formatting of articles. I had long since mastered the inverted pyramid of my original Journalism classes, and I had a feeling there had to be a little variety somewhere. I found this format variety in Donald Murray’s book, “Writing to Deadline: The Journalist as Work”.
About a fourth of the way into his book I landed on a few simply illustrated pages that opened my eyes to the world beyond the inverted paragraph. Murray explained the structure of articles as looking like everything from linear boxes to mountains to crosses. It was finding this part of Murray’s book that helped me realize, there is no wrong way to structure a story. The story, more often than not, will have a set-up all its own without any of your input or guidance.
I am a person who works well with rules, structure, guidelines, etc. Journalistic writing works much to the contrary of my personal preferences. This was another hurdle I had to overcome in my thinking when it came to writing articles. The idea that there’s no wrong way to write an article was something that became apparent to me over the course of the semester. Some articles, such as Bill Turque’s account of the election painted vivid pictures starting with the lead, “When history landed, it was with car horns, tears, gunfire, and echoes from historic corners of the city.” Other’s, like Paul Krugman, took a bit less “fluffy” tone in their writing/blogging. After reading and reviewing more stories than I can count, the picture became more and more clear. I could write however I wanted.
For weeks, Doc had been beating his brains out trying to get us students to realize the importance of finding a “new angle on a story”. Stephanie McCrummen’s account of the election stood out to me as a landmark article for helping me understand the value of finding a different point of view. Though it was far into the semester when it was posted to the class blog, its topic was something that grabbed me. “KOGELO, Kenya, Nov. 5—The news arrived in this rural village as the sun rose Wednesday…” While reporters were in a frenzy covering the election and its implications and meaning to Americans, McCrummen was not writing about the election, but rather, the feelings the day after the election. And not only that, but she was writing about Kenyan’s the day after the election. She was on a deadline, and she came up with a piece that stood out among the other election accounts. It was this article that showed me small changes to the norm keeps a journalistic piece exciting and fresh.
One of the biggest things I learned not to do from this class was found when searching for ways to get my free-lance work published. I found on a small how-to publishing website something I had never heard before, “Don’t write anything that has been covered by the publication in the last three years.” This was baffling to me. THREE YEARS? But the more I thought about it, like most things in life, the more it made sense. Publications are looking for something new, original and exciting, not something that has been done before.
This piece of information was, I thought, eye-opening. However, along with that being eye-opening, so was everything else I heard about free-lance writing. Free-lance writing was one of those things that I guess I knew existed, but I had never actually put any thought what-so-ever as to people actually doing it, how it worked, or the fact that I could do it myself. As we learned more and more about free-lance writing the more I realized what good basic knowledge it was to have, even if never to be put into practice. It was especially interesting and incredibly relevant to read Peter Ellertsen’s article, who also just happens to be our teacher, “Minding the Store as New Salem”, published in the Illinois Times. This experience put free-lance writing into a real setting. It really could be done. Publications really would except “outsiders” work. This idea had been so foreign to me up until this point.
Towards the end of the semester it came time to put all of my hard earned knowledge to the test. All of the AP style exposure, story structure struggles (I still love to alliterate.), and my new-found understanding of free-lance was about to be put to the test. I had a feature story to write. I contemplated for weeks on how to write my story, what to write about, who the main subject would be, etc. All through the semester I had been writing analysis of major feature articles such as an article in the Rolling Stone by Matt Taibbi, “The Death of a Red State”; or Francis Fukuyama’s article, “The Fall of America, Inc.” But my favorite, by far, and the inspiration for my own feature story, was an article on Salon.com, “Obama When No One is Watching”. The article told the story of Obama’s daughter’s soccer game; a simple story, but very telling. Lines like, “we of the city are just a million small town kid’s soccer game scenes all strung together.” stood out to me as great metaphors, poetic writing, and a different edge on such a simple scenario.
Now here I am, at the end of the semester, and I have been shocked to find that I actually really enjoyed myself. AP style was not the end of me after all, the extensive amount of writing didn’t get the best of me, and I’ve met my deadlines. I still need help in mastering the world of AP writing and I doubt you’ll be seeing any of my work published anytime soon; but I have found my voice in journalism. I have discovered my tone.
Conversation is what moves my writing. I want my readers to feel like I am speaking directly to and with them. I like accuracy, fluid story lines, and structure. But most of all, I like writing about things that are important to me, things that other people may not have seen. Aside from the basics of writing for publication, finding my journalistic voice was, this semester, my greatest accomplishment.
I was introduced to AP style, which, I must admit, I completely despise. An entire book chuck full of new rules I had never heard of? AP style was definitely not my style. I struggled through my first AP style experience with frustration, grammar errors, and a colorful bruise to my ego.
Needless to say, I wasn’t exactly thrilled to see “Advanced Journalism” on my class line-up for this semester. However, once in the class, I found a new appreciation for journalism, my knowledge of the AP style began to expand, I started to find my tone and style when it comes to writing for journalism.
Throughout my experience in Advanced Journalism, Google helped me extensively. With the help of this tool I was able to find an answer to nearly all of my AP style questions with lighting speed. Well, I guess I’m still not clear on ordinal numbers. Aside from needing to conquer AP style, I also needed help in understanding the formatting of articles. I had long since mastered the inverted pyramid of my original Journalism classes, and I had a feeling there had to be a little variety somewhere. I found this format variety in Donald Murray’s book, “Writing to Deadline: The Journalist as Work”.
About a fourth of the way into his book I landed on a few simply illustrated pages that opened my eyes to the world beyond the inverted paragraph. Murray explained the structure of articles as looking like everything from linear boxes to mountains to crosses. It was finding this part of Murray’s book that helped me realize, there is no wrong way to structure a story. The story, more often than not, will have a set-up all its own without any of your input or guidance.
I am a person who works well with rules, structure, guidelines, etc. Journalistic writing works much to the contrary of my personal preferences. This was another hurdle I had to overcome in my thinking when it came to writing articles. The idea that there’s no wrong way to write an article was something that became apparent to me over the course of the semester. Some articles, such as Bill Turque’s account of the election painted vivid pictures starting with the lead, “When history landed, it was with car horns, tears, gunfire, and echoes from historic corners of the city.” Other’s, like Paul Krugman, took a bit less “fluffy” tone in their writing/blogging. After reading and reviewing more stories than I can count, the picture became more and more clear. I could write however I wanted.
For weeks, Doc had been beating his brains out trying to get us students to realize the importance of finding a “new angle on a story”. Stephanie McCrummen’s account of the election stood out to me as a landmark article for helping me understand the value of finding a different point of view. Though it was far into the semester when it was posted to the class blog, its topic was something that grabbed me. “KOGELO, Kenya, Nov. 5—The news arrived in this rural village as the sun rose Wednesday…” While reporters were in a frenzy covering the election and its implications and meaning to Americans, McCrummen was not writing about the election, but rather, the feelings the day after the election. And not only that, but she was writing about Kenyan’s the day after the election. She was on a deadline, and she came up with a piece that stood out among the other election accounts. It was this article that showed me small changes to the norm keeps a journalistic piece exciting and fresh.
One of the biggest things I learned not to do from this class was found when searching for ways to get my free-lance work published. I found on a small how-to publishing website something I had never heard before, “Don’t write anything that has been covered by the publication in the last three years.” This was baffling to me. THREE YEARS? But the more I thought about it, like most things in life, the more it made sense. Publications are looking for something new, original and exciting, not something that has been done before.
This piece of information was, I thought, eye-opening. However, along with that being eye-opening, so was everything else I heard about free-lance writing. Free-lance writing was one of those things that I guess I knew existed, but I had never actually put any thought what-so-ever as to people actually doing it, how it worked, or the fact that I could do it myself. As we learned more and more about free-lance writing the more I realized what good basic knowledge it was to have, even if never to be put into practice. It was especially interesting and incredibly relevant to read Peter Ellertsen’s article, who also just happens to be our teacher, “Minding the Store as New Salem”, published in the Illinois Times. This experience put free-lance writing into a real setting. It really could be done. Publications really would except “outsiders” work. This idea had been so foreign to me up until this point.
Towards the end of the semester it came time to put all of my hard earned knowledge to the test. All of the AP style exposure, story structure struggles (I still love to alliterate.), and my new-found understanding of free-lance was about to be put to the test. I had a feature story to write. I contemplated for weeks on how to write my story, what to write about, who the main subject would be, etc. All through the semester I had been writing analysis of major feature articles such as an article in the Rolling Stone by Matt Taibbi, “The Death of a Red State”; or Francis Fukuyama’s article, “The Fall of America, Inc.” But my favorite, by far, and the inspiration for my own feature story, was an article on Salon.com, “Obama When No One is Watching”. The article told the story of Obama’s daughter’s soccer game; a simple story, but very telling. Lines like, “we of the city are just a million small town kid’s soccer game scenes all strung together.” stood out to me as great metaphors, poetic writing, and a different edge on such a simple scenario.
Now here I am, at the end of the semester, and I have been shocked to find that I actually really enjoyed myself. AP style was not the end of me after all, the extensive amount of writing didn’t get the best of me, and I’ve met my deadlines. I still need help in mastering the world of AP writing and I doubt you’ll be seeing any of my work published anytime soon; but I have found my voice in journalism. I have discovered my tone.
Conversation is what moves my writing. I want my readers to feel like I am speaking directly to and with them. I like accuracy, fluid story lines, and structure. But most of all, I like writing about things that are important to me, things that other people may not have seen. Aside from the basics of writing for publication, finding my journalistic voice was, this semester, my greatest accomplishment.
Feature Story
Journey into History
After a grueling two years, it has all come down to this. A crowd of more than 250,000 have gathered together with the hope of “Yes, we can”. The air is thick with anticipation as the returns roll in. With each new projection, the nation comes closer and closer to electing their new president.
It was late July in 2004. An African American man, hardly known to anyone outside of the Chicago political arena, was to give the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention. As the country watched, Barack Obama captivated his audience.
Chris Trudeau, a Springfield, Illinois native and political enthusiast, watched in awe as Obama delivered his now famous speech, The Audacity of Hope. “I remember watching him and thinking, ‘Wow, this is incredible. This guy’s gonna be our president some day.’”
After the well-received speech and John Kerry’s general election loss, speculation circulated. In Chicago, as well as around the nation, Obama’s name was being discussed as a possible presidential candidate for 2008. The Democrats had lost two big elections, and everyone was wondering if Obama could be who they needed.
February 10, 2007 was bitter cold. Heavy coats, stocking hats, and gloves were a necessity. Thousands gathered, including Trudeau, to hear Obama announce, after much speculation; that he would, in fact, be running as a presidential candidate. “None of my friends would go with me because it was so cold out, but I didn’t care, I just went by myself.” Trudeau showed up to the announcement about three hours early with a blue ticket in hand. A blue ticket guaranteed a spot near the giant TV screens; red tickets were for those near the stage.
Trudeau got lucky, as he did throughout Obama’s campaign, and happened to meet a group of people from Seattle, Washington. “These three people had come from Seattle with four red tickets, but I guess someone ended up not coming with them. They saw me standing alone and asked if I wanted their extra ticket.”
Once inside the VIP area, Trudeau was able to squeeze his way to the front left side of the stage. He had a perfect view of Obama and CNN had a perfect view of Trudeau. It was not long after that Trudeau was approached by a campaign event coordinator. “He came up to me and said something like ‘Barack’s going to exit here, he’ll come to you and shake your hand first, so be ready.’ I couldn’t believe it. Here I was, getting this red ticket on a fluke, and now I’m being told Obama’s going to be shaking my hand.”
This announcement was the starting point of a 21 month long presidential race. Obama, the supposed underdog of the primaries, fought long and hard through the primary season and Trudeau watched every debate, followed the polls, and got more and more excited with every primary.
For part of the election season, Trudeau was attending Emily Carr University in Vancouver, Canada. “It was great being in Canada for that time because they follow our elections really closely and everyone loved Obama. That was also when I saw what a difference he could make world-wide if we elected him.”
The primary season came to a close and in an incredible chain of events Obama beat the Clinton machine and became the Democrat’s candidate of choice. As the Democratic Convention drew near, rumors were flying as to who the Vice Presidential pick would be. Only days before the pick was revealed, it was made known that the announcement would take place, again, in Springfield.
Trudeau called his girlfriend and told her he couldn’t make it to her brother’s engagement party. “This is a once in a lifetime event. I can’t miss it. I just can’t miss it.” He made it downtown to camp out at 8:30 at night, roughly 17 hours before Obama was scheduled to speak.
As he sat on his coat in the middle of the sidewalk, eating a pizza an area resident had cooked him; he received a text message, “Barack has chosen Senator Joe Biden to be our VP nominee…” Trudeau said he had “known it all along.”
While waiting first in line, Trudeau was asked by the Chicago Tribune why he supported Obama, “Eventually we come around and do the right thing, and Obama’s a big step in coming around and doing the right thing.”
Sunset turned to dark, and dark to light. A line finally started to form behind Trudeau, a line that would later reach upwards of 30,000 people. Trudeau made friends with many people that night; a couple of rappers from Chicago wearing Obama and McCain costumes, a kid from Georgia, and few hippies from Indiana. They sat for hours talking about Obama and his policies and how they thought the general election was going to go. “I thought it would be really hard to stay awake the whole night, but time flew by. The people around me were all really aware of what was going on in the campaign.”
Trudeau made it front and center in the crowd, up against a barricade directly in front of the podium. The crowd roared through the entire speech and nearly broke the metal barrier when Obama came down to greet his cheering fans. Trudeau managed to get his bright green T-shirt signed by Michelle, Barack, and Joe Biden… something that had become a rarity at campaign events. “Each of them grabbed the marker when they passed by and signed the shoulder of my shirt. The signatures from the markers were so close to my nose that the fumes made me sick and a secret service officer had to make the crowd clear a path for me to get out.”
Being such an avid supporter of the democratic candidate, Trudeau wanted to find a way to help Obama’s campaign. “Everyone knows Illinois is going to Obama; and being from Illinois, I wanted to find a way to help out that would actually matter… something that goes beyond just donating money.” Trudeau did just that. “I got a text saying they needed help this one weekend canvassing in Missouri. I knew that was my chance.” Missouri was an important swing state that ended up having one of the closest outcomes of the entire election.
His weekend was spent in St. Louis going door to door giving out information to undecided voters about Obama and his policies. “The people were really inviting. A few of them asked for yard signs, but the campaign wasn’t giving those out.” Fortunately for the neighborhood residents, Trudeau had some extras in his truck he had purchased the night before.
Obama’s campaign was gaining ground, and lots of it, but back in Illinois restlessness was starting to set in. Trudeau wanted to get the election over with and have Obama as his next president, but November 4th was still a month away. “I was on my way to St. Louis for a David Byrne concert and I just happened to get on Obama’s website the night before to see what was up. I couldn’t believe it. He was having a rally that next morning under the Arch.”
At six in the morning, Trudeau was on his way. He made it to St. Louis just seconds before the metro dropped off the first of many enormous loads of rally-goers. “I got so lucky again. I just happened to find out about the rally, just happened to get there at the right time, and ended up making it about ten people away from the stage.” The St. Louis rally drew an estimated crowd of 100,000 people.
November 2nd, Trudeau received an e-mail alert on his I-phone. At this point Obama e-mails had become an everyday event, but this e-mail was special. The subject line read, “Update: Election Night Tickets”. Inside the e-mail, “Your ticket will be e-mailed to you on Monday, November 3rd…” Trudeau was one of 65,000 people to receive a ticket to Obama’s election night rally in Grant Park.
The next evening Trudeau arrived in Chicago, a nearly two year journey was about to reach its climax and Trudeau planned to be front and center again. “I had watched so many of the rallies on TV and I had started to see the patterns of what you had to wear to be noticed in the crowd. I bought a bright yellow baseball hat and matching long-sleeved shirt.”
Trudeau made it to the entrance of Grant Park in the afternoon of November 4th; he had already early voted. He quickly sought out a security worker to ask a question about ticket identification rules. “Out of no where, Star Wars music started blaring, news cameras kicked on, the line went crazy and security opened the first checkpoint.” Once again, Trudeau was in the right place at the right time.
“Getting through the first checkpoint was cool, but there were four of them in all so I still had to wait awhile.” While waiting, Trudeau spotted a couple people from some of the other Obama events he had attended. While the crowd waited, one lady turned on a baby monitor she had tuned in to a local radio station frequency. “She was picking up this weird signal through a baby monitor she had brought and every now and then she’d scream an update to everyone.”
It was a mad dash to the front row once the fourth and final checkpoint was passed. On CSPAN, a bright yellow dot could be seen sprinting to its place against the metal barricade. That yellow dot was Chris Trudeau.
Reporters and camera men quickly caught glimpse of the banana-esc figure. It was a matter of moments before Trudeau was approached by a reporter wanting an interview. “Now what’s your name? Where are you from? Oh, you volunteered for the campaign? Great! I’d like to interview you when we get a chance if that’s alright?”
The crowd stretched further back than anyone in the front row could see and American flags painted the human landscape. The crowd was a perfect depiction of Obama’s 2004 keynote address orated four years earlier. There was not “a liberal America and a conservative America… a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America” it was the United States of America.
With each new CNN projection declared across the JumboTrons, the mass of Obama supporters danced with excitement. Pennsylvania sent the multitudes into an all out frenzy. “We were all looking at each other screaming, ‘That’s it. That’s it. Obama won. It’s over. It’s him.’ there was just no way, at that point, McCain could win and we all knew it but we were in disbelief.”
Everything over the course of the last two years had led up to this moment. Obama was leading the popular and electoral votes, Pennsylvania had been projected for Obama, and the west coast was closing in a matter of seconds.
The deafening roars of the crowd drowned out Wolf Blitzer’s voice. “We couldn’t hear anything. We didn’t hear when Blitzer said they may be making a big projection right when the [west coast] polls closed. We just knew all those states were Obama’s.”
A quarter million people counted down the final poll’s closing. Five… Four… Three… Two… “Projected Winner: Barack Obama” flashed across the screen as a confirmation to what everyone already knew. Euphoria swept through Grant Park and continued across the country going on to every corner of the world. As Kenyan’s celebrated 8,000 miles away, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s church exploded with excitement, and tears poured out in nearly every living room across America, Barack Obama was elected the 44th President of the United States of America.
Trudeau was as close as you could be, the reporter had his story, America had their president, and all the crowd could manage to cheer was, “Yes, we DID!"
After a grueling two years, it has all come down to this. A crowd of more than 250,000 have gathered together with the hope of “Yes, we can”. The air is thick with anticipation as the returns roll in. With each new projection, the nation comes closer and closer to electing their new president.
It was late July in 2004. An African American man, hardly known to anyone outside of the Chicago political arena, was to give the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention. As the country watched, Barack Obama captivated his audience.
Chris Trudeau, a Springfield, Illinois native and political enthusiast, watched in awe as Obama delivered his now famous speech, The Audacity of Hope. “I remember watching him and thinking, ‘Wow, this is incredible. This guy’s gonna be our president some day.’”
After the well-received speech and John Kerry’s general election loss, speculation circulated. In Chicago, as well as around the nation, Obama’s name was being discussed as a possible presidential candidate for 2008. The Democrats had lost two big elections, and everyone was wondering if Obama could be who they needed.
February 10, 2007 was bitter cold. Heavy coats, stocking hats, and gloves were a necessity. Thousands gathered, including Trudeau, to hear Obama announce, after much speculation; that he would, in fact, be running as a presidential candidate. “None of my friends would go with me because it was so cold out, but I didn’t care, I just went by myself.” Trudeau showed up to the announcement about three hours early with a blue ticket in hand. A blue ticket guaranteed a spot near the giant TV screens; red tickets were for those near the stage.
Trudeau got lucky, as he did throughout Obama’s campaign, and happened to meet a group of people from Seattle, Washington. “These three people had come from Seattle with four red tickets, but I guess someone ended up not coming with them. They saw me standing alone and asked if I wanted their extra ticket.”
Once inside the VIP area, Trudeau was able to squeeze his way to the front left side of the stage. He had a perfect view of Obama and CNN had a perfect view of Trudeau. It was not long after that Trudeau was approached by a campaign event coordinator. “He came up to me and said something like ‘Barack’s going to exit here, he’ll come to you and shake your hand first, so be ready.’ I couldn’t believe it. Here I was, getting this red ticket on a fluke, and now I’m being told Obama’s going to be shaking my hand.”
This announcement was the starting point of a 21 month long presidential race. Obama, the supposed underdog of the primaries, fought long and hard through the primary season and Trudeau watched every debate, followed the polls, and got more and more excited with every primary.
For part of the election season, Trudeau was attending Emily Carr University in Vancouver, Canada. “It was great being in Canada for that time because they follow our elections really closely and everyone loved Obama. That was also when I saw what a difference he could make world-wide if we elected him.”
The primary season came to a close and in an incredible chain of events Obama beat the Clinton machine and became the Democrat’s candidate of choice. As the Democratic Convention drew near, rumors were flying as to who the Vice Presidential pick would be. Only days before the pick was revealed, it was made known that the announcement would take place, again, in Springfield.
Trudeau called his girlfriend and told her he couldn’t make it to her brother’s engagement party. “This is a once in a lifetime event. I can’t miss it. I just can’t miss it.” He made it downtown to camp out at 8:30 at night, roughly 17 hours before Obama was scheduled to speak.
As he sat on his coat in the middle of the sidewalk, eating a pizza an area resident had cooked him; he received a text message, “Barack has chosen Senator Joe Biden to be our VP nominee…” Trudeau said he had “known it all along.”
While waiting first in line, Trudeau was asked by the Chicago Tribune why he supported Obama, “Eventually we come around and do the right thing, and Obama’s a big step in coming around and doing the right thing.”
Sunset turned to dark, and dark to light. A line finally started to form behind Trudeau, a line that would later reach upwards of 30,000 people. Trudeau made friends with many people that night; a couple of rappers from Chicago wearing Obama and McCain costumes, a kid from Georgia, and few hippies from Indiana. They sat for hours talking about Obama and his policies and how they thought the general election was going to go. “I thought it would be really hard to stay awake the whole night, but time flew by. The people around me were all really aware of what was going on in the campaign.”
Trudeau made it front and center in the crowd, up against a barricade directly in front of the podium. The crowd roared through the entire speech and nearly broke the metal barrier when Obama came down to greet his cheering fans. Trudeau managed to get his bright green T-shirt signed by Michelle, Barack, and Joe Biden… something that had become a rarity at campaign events. “Each of them grabbed the marker when they passed by and signed the shoulder of my shirt. The signatures from the markers were so close to my nose that the fumes made me sick and a secret service officer had to make the crowd clear a path for me to get out.”
Being such an avid supporter of the democratic candidate, Trudeau wanted to find a way to help Obama’s campaign. “Everyone knows Illinois is going to Obama; and being from Illinois, I wanted to find a way to help out that would actually matter… something that goes beyond just donating money.” Trudeau did just that. “I got a text saying they needed help this one weekend canvassing in Missouri. I knew that was my chance.” Missouri was an important swing state that ended up having one of the closest outcomes of the entire election.
His weekend was spent in St. Louis going door to door giving out information to undecided voters about Obama and his policies. “The people were really inviting. A few of them asked for yard signs, but the campaign wasn’t giving those out.” Fortunately for the neighborhood residents, Trudeau had some extras in his truck he had purchased the night before.
Obama’s campaign was gaining ground, and lots of it, but back in Illinois restlessness was starting to set in. Trudeau wanted to get the election over with and have Obama as his next president, but November 4th was still a month away. “I was on my way to St. Louis for a David Byrne concert and I just happened to get on Obama’s website the night before to see what was up. I couldn’t believe it. He was having a rally that next morning under the Arch.”
At six in the morning, Trudeau was on his way. He made it to St. Louis just seconds before the metro dropped off the first of many enormous loads of rally-goers. “I got so lucky again. I just happened to find out about the rally, just happened to get there at the right time, and ended up making it about ten people away from the stage.” The St. Louis rally drew an estimated crowd of 100,000 people.
November 2nd, Trudeau received an e-mail alert on his I-phone. At this point Obama e-mails had become an everyday event, but this e-mail was special. The subject line read, “Update: Election Night Tickets”. Inside the e-mail, “Your ticket will be e-mailed to you on Monday, November 3rd…” Trudeau was one of 65,000 people to receive a ticket to Obama’s election night rally in Grant Park.
The next evening Trudeau arrived in Chicago, a nearly two year journey was about to reach its climax and Trudeau planned to be front and center again. “I had watched so many of the rallies on TV and I had started to see the patterns of what you had to wear to be noticed in the crowd. I bought a bright yellow baseball hat and matching long-sleeved shirt.”
Trudeau made it to the entrance of Grant Park in the afternoon of November 4th; he had already early voted. He quickly sought out a security worker to ask a question about ticket identification rules. “Out of no where, Star Wars music started blaring, news cameras kicked on, the line went crazy and security opened the first checkpoint.” Once again, Trudeau was in the right place at the right time.
“Getting through the first checkpoint was cool, but there were four of them in all so I still had to wait awhile.” While waiting, Trudeau spotted a couple people from some of the other Obama events he had attended. While the crowd waited, one lady turned on a baby monitor she had tuned in to a local radio station frequency. “She was picking up this weird signal through a baby monitor she had brought and every now and then she’d scream an update to everyone.”
It was a mad dash to the front row once the fourth and final checkpoint was passed. On CSPAN, a bright yellow dot could be seen sprinting to its place against the metal barricade. That yellow dot was Chris Trudeau.
Reporters and camera men quickly caught glimpse of the banana-esc figure. It was a matter of moments before Trudeau was approached by a reporter wanting an interview. “Now what’s your name? Where are you from? Oh, you volunteered for the campaign? Great! I’d like to interview you when we get a chance if that’s alright?”
The crowd stretched further back than anyone in the front row could see and American flags painted the human landscape. The crowd was a perfect depiction of Obama’s 2004 keynote address orated four years earlier. There was not “a liberal America and a conservative America… a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America” it was the United States of America.
With each new CNN projection declared across the JumboTrons, the mass of Obama supporters danced with excitement. Pennsylvania sent the multitudes into an all out frenzy. “We were all looking at each other screaming, ‘That’s it. That’s it. Obama won. It’s over. It’s him.’ there was just no way, at that point, McCain could win and we all knew it but we were in disbelief.”
Everything over the course of the last two years had led up to this moment. Obama was leading the popular and electoral votes, Pennsylvania had been projected for Obama, and the west coast was closing in a matter of seconds.
The deafening roars of the crowd drowned out Wolf Blitzer’s voice. “We couldn’t hear anything. We didn’t hear when Blitzer said they may be making a big projection right when the [west coast] polls closed. We just knew all those states were Obama’s.”
A quarter million people counted down the final poll’s closing. Five… Four… Three… Two… “Projected Winner: Barack Obama” flashed across the screen as a confirmation to what everyone already knew. Euphoria swept through Grant Park and continued across the country going on to every corner of the world. As Kenyan’s celebrated 8,000 miles away, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s church exploded with excitement, and tears poured out in nearly every living room across America, Barack Obama was elected the 44th President of the United States of America.
Trudeau was as close as you could be, the reporter had his story, America had their president, and all the crowd could manage to cheer was, “Yes, we DID!"
Monday, November 24, 2008
In Class Questions
My attitude in the beginning of the class towards the media coverage of government was a little nicer than it is now. I always thought that the mainstream media offered up a lot of good information and it was very entertaining in its presentation. I originally thought this was a good thing, however, now that I’ve taken this course, I see it much more as a way of television and the corporate, money-driven powers-that-be to feed information to the public in a way that is hard to dissect and fact-check in any sort of an easy manner.
I am mainly coming down harsh on cable television. TV news such as PBS, the BBC, and CSPAN are great examples of news stations that offer objective material without all the glittery embellishments needed to bring in ratings and dilute the real points.
I’ve learnt from this course to always research your sources. It’s not enough to just read about a particular subject, you have to understand where and who the material on the subject is coming from. Once you understand the sources and the medium in which the reporting is being delivered, you can make much better sense out of what you’re reading.
I don’t know what I would have liked to learn that I didn’t. That’s a tough question considering if I knew what it was, I probably wouldn’t need to learn it. Maybe it would have been nice to look at the way journalists covered the 2000 and 2004 elections. Hindsight is always 20/20 and you have to learn from your mistakes. I think the media has been trying a lot harder this election to look at both sides considering the crappy job they did during the middle of the Bush Administration and it would have given us an interesting insight had we looked into some of the journalism of our recent past.
I am mainly coming down harsh on cable television. TV news such as PBS, the BBC, and CSPAN are great examples of news stations that offer objective material without all the glittery embellishments needed to bring in ratings and dilute the real points.
I’ve learnt from this course to always research your sources. It’s not enough to just read about a particular subject, you have to understand where and who the material on the subject is coming from. Once you understand the sources and the medium in which the reporting is being delivered, you can make much better sense out of what you’re reading.
I don’t know what I would have liked to learn that I didn’t. That’s a tough question considering if I knew what it was, I probably wouldn’t need to learn it. Maybe it would have been nice to look at the way journalists covered the 2000 and 2004 elections. Hindsight is always 20/20 and you have to learn from your mistakes. I think the media has been trying a lot harder this election to look at both sides considering the crappy job they did during the middle of the Bush Administration and it would have given us an interesting insight had we looked into some of the journalism of our recent past.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
New Salem, Illinois Times, Doc, and My Valued Opinion
The day of class after we read your recently published Illinois Times article I got into a discussion about the piece with another teacher. He read your article and was very impressed. The discussion and article led him into a venting session about how important New Salem is and how insane all of these funding cuts are. You've done well Doc, you've done well!
The Wisdom of Cabinets...
Last night on The Daily Show with John Stewart there was a segment in which a picture of Barack Obama's potential cabinet was displayed... It was displayed in the context of discussing Obama's goal of having a diverse cabinet that incorporates both sides of the isle.
With the inclusion of Seth Rogen, Osama bin Laden, Sarah Palin, and Dennis Kucinich, Obama's "Team of Rivals" is hysterical!! Have any papers done a cartoon on this one yet?? It'd be great!
Anyways here's the link to the video... http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videold=210854&title=Obama's-Team-of-Rivals
With the inclusion of Seth Rogen, Osama bin Laden, Sarah Palin, and Dennis Kucinich, Obama's "Team of Rivals" is hysterical!! Have any papers done a cartoon on this one yet?? It'd be great!
Anyways here's the link to the video... http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videold=210854&title=Obama's-Team-of-Rivals
Accurate Reporting?? About Science??
In today's class I brought up the story that broke today about a woman in Spain receiving a transplant for part of her throat... the crazy part is that her transplant came from her own stem cells, and doctors have "grown" a new trachia for her out of a dead person's throat and the living woman's cells.
Doc was so kind as to challenge the article and pose a skeptic's attitude towards scientific articles in general. Though I see his/your point, every article I have found on this story seems pretty legit. Granted, and as Doc pointed out, this article worked very hard to establish its credibility.
There was also an article several months back about a thumb that doctors/scientists grew back on a man. In this story cells from a pig's bladder were used. The thumb, which had been accidentally cut off, was grown back, finger prints and all.
This story was also very interesting and, clearly, had a lot to do with science and the medical field, however, it too was also reported on in a very clear, factual, credibly-backed up sort of way.
So in my opinion, stories we read about in the main stream media relating to scientific and medical breakthroughs are pretty factual. The reporter may not be the expert on such a subject, but he is an expert at reporting, and therefore can probably report what the Doc's and Science wizzes tell him.
So I may, in a way disagree with you, Doc, but you have a great point in saying that when it comes to Science and the medical fields, always make sure the reporter is building proper credibility before letting him lead you over the edge of the cliff.
Doc was so kind as to challenge the article and pose a skeptic's attitude towards scientific articles in general. Though I see his/your point, every article I have found on this story seems pretty legit. Granted, and as Doc pointed out, this article worked very hard to establish its credibility.
There was also an article several months back about a thumb that doctors/scientists grew back on a man. In this story cells from a pig's bladder were used. The thumb, which had been accidentally cut off, was grown back, finger prints and all.
This story was also very interesting and, clearly, had a lot to do with science and the medical field, however, it too was also reported on in a very clear, factual, credibly-backed up sort of way.
So in my opinion, stories we read about in the main stream media relating to scientific and medical breakthroughs are pretty factual. The reporter may not be the expert on such a subject, but he is an expert at reporting, and therefore can probably report what the Doc's and Science wizzes tell him.
So I may, in a way disagree with you, Doc, but you have a great point in saying that when it comes to Science and the medical fields, always make sure the reporter is building proper credibility before letting him lead you over the edge of the cliff.
HOW 2
The following is a list I've compiled of useful tools (in no particular order) to get an article published... No, I'm not just being really nice, Doc's making me do this...
1. Write an article that has rarely or never been written about.
2. Find a new angle.
3. Don't write anything that has been covered by the publication in the last three years.
4. Read at least the last 6 issues of the publication in order to get a feel for their style and focus.
5. Write about what you know.
6. Stick to the writer's guidelines provided by the publication.
7. Write a query letter.
8. Keep trying.
9. Write a great title.
10. TRIPLE check the article when editing BEFORE sending out.
11. Keep a record of which articles you've written, who you've sent them to, and when you sent them.
12. Learn to live with rejection.
http://www.essortment.com/all/howtogetanar_rsxa.htm
http://searchwarp.com/swa214378.htm
http://e-articles.info/e/a/title/How-To-Get-My-Article-Published/
http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.0010057
1. Write an article that has rarely or never been written about.
2. Find a new angle.
3. Don't write anything that has been covered by the publication in the last three years.
4. Read at least the last 6 issues of the publication in order to get a feel for their style and focus.
5. Write about what you know.
6. Stick to the writer's guidelines provided by the publication.
7. Write a query letter.
8. Keep trying.
9. Write a great title.
10. TRIPLE check the article when editing BEFORE sending out.
11. Keep a record of which articles you've written, who you've sent them to, and when you sent them.
12. Learn to live with rejection.
http://www.essortment.com/all/howtogetanar_rsxa.htm
http://searchwarp.com/swa214378.htm
http://e-articles.info/e/a/title/How-To-Get-My-Article-Published/
http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.0010057
Monday, November 3, 2008
What a Stud, Studs!
After reading the articles posted to the class blog I can only be sad that I had not known who Studs Turkel was sooner. From what every single article said, he seems to have been an iconic figure of our time. He was fortunate enough to live for nearly an entire century, something that most would do anything for. It seems that he found a good balance in between being extremely liberal, but also still being able to connect with people holding an array of philisphical views. His story is one of incredible determination. A victim of the "red scare", he kept on going... just in a little bit of a different route. I think this is a good lesson for journalists. Journalists are in a cut-throat environment, they're a dime a dozen; therefore it is ever so important for a journalists to be determined. Determination and optimism, like Studs had, is a vital necessity to today's reporter, interviewer, journalist, and anchor. His situation also goes to show that you have so much life ahead of you at any point. His book-writing career took off in his fifties... most people start planning for retirement, Studs was starting his next venture. It's this kind of love of life and really valuing one's own work that people in all professions, not just journalism, need to adopt. Studs clearly loved people and loved his career. This is, above all, the key to success. And this is a key that Studs found early in life...
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Palin's Moose Poooop
This article carries a voice that I can certainly appreciate! I love the narrative it uses and the way it perfectly portrays Palin's "crappy" campaigning... This article sure hit home. I can't even count how many times I have been watching her and when I start negating something she's saying, she is three steps ahead of me with her crazy talk. Thank God for DVR, because without it I sure wouldn't be able to dissect her interviews nearly as easily. I only wish that these techniques provided the same satisfaction that a moose nugget jelly bean does... those taste good, but her stories are headaches waiting to happen. This piece pinned her on the head, and I love it. Kudos to the writing style, tone, and voice.
Friday, October 31, 2008
My Keen Observations...
...are as follows:
1) I find it SCARRRRY and completely appropriate for halloween that Palin is still on the McCain ticket... haha
1) Okay, really, here's the first thing I noticed in this article, IT WAS SHORT!!!, but more so than that, since I doubt that really counts as something I noticed, I thought that it was funny how to be good at journalism, it's really just about getting lucky. That reporter was in the right place at the right time, AAAND that's about what it amounted to.
2) I found it incredible that he was almost entirely alone in Alaska until that Monday... are journalists absolutely dense?? It seems so obvious, yet he was the only one jumping on it... incredible.
3) I thought that it was interesting how he commented on her always being ready to jump on "the next thing"... it's a very accurate respresentation of her from what I've seen so far. People are always talking about how she's looking to 2012. Now that may just be pure speculated bull sh!t, but I have a feeling there's some substance there. She calls it being a maverick... I call it A.D.H.D.
1) I find it SCARRRRY and completely appropriate for halloween that Palin is still on the McCain ticket... haha
1) Okay, really, here's the first thing I noticed in this article, IT WAS SHORT!!!, but more so than that, since I doubt that really counts as something I noticed, I thought that it was funny how to be good at journalism, it's really just about getting lucky. That reporter was in the right place at the right time, AAAND that's about what it amounted to.
2) I found it incredible that he was almost entirely alone in Alaska until that Monday... are journalists absolutely dense?? It seems so obvious, yet he was the only one jumping on it... incredible.
3) I thought that it was interesting how he commented on her always being ready to jump on "the next thing"... it's a very accurate respresentation of her from what I've seen so far. People are always talking about how she's looking to 2012. Now that may just be pure speculated bull sh!t, but I have a feeling there's some substance there. She calls it being a maverick... I call it A.D.H.D.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Bold Strategy Supreme Court...
A piece on cnn.com told the story of Troy Davis. Troy is a black man in Georgia who was convicted of killing a police officer and given the death penalty... the Supreme Court has rejected his appeal. Soon he will die. Think he deserves it? Well, there was no physical proof tying him to the killing, the murder weapon was never found, Troy has ALWAYS declared his innocence, seven of the nine witnesses have since recanted their testimonies against him stating they felt pressure from superiors and other police officers to testify against him, and the primary alternative suspect happens to be a police officer who testified against Troy ... interesting, eh? I thought so to. Amnesty International, among others including myself, are pissed. This is rediculous. This is living (soon to be dead) proof that the justice system has its biases. A black man in the South, condemned to death despite a mountain of more than reasonable doubt... Coincidence? That's about as doubtful as Troy being the cop killer.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Poll of Polls?
I love how the polls all come up with so many different results. They're supposed to be reliable, statistical, and provide insight into the election... the insight I get, is that they're about as reliable as dollar store deodorant. Okay, so I'm not giving them much credit... I sure do like what they say about my main man! But here's one of my requests: Let's give Obama a few more points!! And I know how to do it!
We see poll after poll of Obama and McCain being compared to eachother, but I say, "What about the other guys??" What happened to including Nadar and Barr into the mix? Let's come up with a number of points that may, in fact, be added to Obama's numbers IF the cell phone people are counted. Just adding in Nadar and Barr we see at least 2 more points added to Obama's lead. What if we now add in the "cell phone voters"? The polls lean much to my preferences, however, I think Gallup can do better! Come on, Pew, I don't want any of this "14pt lead" stuff... lemme see a TWENTY!!!!!!
Here comes another Becky theory... Maybe the reason the Bradley Effect hasn't been seen in any of Obama's prior campaign races is for the very reasons I stated above? The lack of reporting in the polls that I have pointed out actually offsets the Bradley Effect that could/would/does take place.
A Wall Street Journal piece called "Are the Polls Accurate?" by Micheal Barone sparked my thinking along with the some of the polls listed on RealClearPolitics.com... This blog is not extremely well researched and/or cited, however, I think this idea is some good food for thought.
We see poll after poll of Obama and McCain being compared to eachother, but I say, "What about the other guys??" What happened to including Nadar and Barr into the mix? Let's come up with a number of points that may, in fact, be added to Obama's numbers IF the cell phone people are counted. Just adding in Nadar and Barr we see at least 2 more points added to Obama's lead. What if we now add in the "cell phone voters"? The polls lean much to my preferences, however, I think Gallup can do better! Come on, Pew, I don't want any of this "14pt lead" stuff... lemme see a TWENTY!!!!!!
Here comes another Becky theory... Maybe the reason the Bradley Effect hasn't been seen in any of Obama's prior campaign races is for the very reasons I stated above? The lack of reporting in the polls that I have pointed out actually offsets the Bradley Effect that could/would/does take place.
A Wall Street Journal piece called "Are the Polls Accurate?" by Micheal Barone sparked my thinking along with the some of the polls listed on RealClearPolitics.com... This blog is not extremely well researched and/or cited, however, I think this idea is some good food for thought.
Monday, October 13, 2008
The Rise of Socialism, Inc.less
Becky VanDyke
Advanced Journalism
Public Affairs Analysis
The Rise of Socialism, Inc.less
With the current chain of events that has taken place so far this month, The Fall of America, Inc. is a very timely article, full of insight from our past and into our present and future situation. This article, written by Francis Fukuyama, explores America’s capitalist ideals and influence on a world-wide scale. Most articles written over the past few weeks and months delve into great detail about our national financial crisis, local economic problems, and the candidate’s plans for the mix; but few articles have made the case that this article does. This article addresses the global nature of the problem at hand and the massive effect our meltdown in economics and foreign policy has had on the world’s view of America’s “brand”. The Republican brand has been discussed time and time again, yet America’s brand as a whole and the way the world now perceives it has rarely been a prominent topic of conversation. This article presents that very issue, an issue that should have been on the forefront of political discussions more often than it has been, and it presents it in a very clear, understandable manner.
First of all, this article’s headline is genius. It’s catchy, intelligent, funny, fitting, etc. The sub-title is a good insight to the rest of the article and sums up the thesis very directly. The wording in “a certain vision of capitalism has collapsed.” is a particularly good choice of words, the word “certain” helps explain the points he makes later that capitalism cannot be abolished all together, just the “certain” form it has been practiced in so far. This word, “certain”, ties into his pendulum references he later talks about when discussing the drastic changes that people tend to make when something isn’t working right.
I was reminded of my own writing style when I read the first paragraph. The events that have taken place over the last few weeks are listed by means of several fragmented sentences, a technique that I think is usually quite effective in an introduction. After the picture is painted of the current situation Fukuyama does an excellent job of citing his thesis point at the end of his lead and linking the previous fragments to the global perspective of the American “brand”. His introduction continues into the next two paragraphs, making the first three paragraphs to comprise a somewhat long but necessary introduction. The second and third paragraphs separately introduce the two areas that Fukuyama believes are the most affected areas of our “brand”, deregulation and democracy.
As the article continues, Fukuyama mixes stories of past issues in history such as European Socialism, more recent history of our own nation such as the Bush administration’s policies, and current events like the presidential election in order to give background, insight, and understanding to the situation we’ve come to find ourselves facing. The way he incorporates past, present, and future ideas with foreign and domestic matters is very effective in uncovering this multi-layered problem our nation is facing. History mixed with clear examples gives the reader a good understanding of the problem, the reason for the problem, and later, how the problem may be fixed.
Fukuyama also does a good job of not over using this year’s election throughout the piece. He doesn’t mention either of the candidates until the fifth paragraph and then only discusses them a few more times in the rest of the article. Though I am a political junkie, this technique is refreshing. The election is already going to be on the reader’s mind, and will be thought of through out the article without it actually being pushed in the readers face in every paragraph.
His article, for the most part, tries very hard to put forth a fair balance between the candidates when it does actually discuss them and also tries to be fair when it’s not discussing them. However fair the writer may be trying to be, the article still leans in Obama’s favor. The writer’s tone remains pretty fair, but the actual content is left-leaning and therefore, naturally seems to be more in support of Obama and Obama’s policies.
Aside from trying to be fair to the candidates, the article gives a very fair portrayal of opposing economic philosophies and unbiased views of different ideals. The article seems to be stating the downside of our past economic practices; and though some may say that it shows bias, I think it is simply stating the obvious. Just because the obvious is negative, doesn’t mean it isn’t fair.
One of Fukuyama’s writing techniques that stood out to me was his ability to effectively refer back to things previously stated in his article. Things such as Cheney’s statement of “deficits don’t matter” were stated and then later referred back to in order to make a point clearer and refresh the reader’s memory of past points and topics discussed. Sometimes it is helpful to the reader, as it was to me, to have a connection made apparent, a “brain break” as I like to call it.
The format of this article makes the connections easy for the reader to put together also. After the introduction, which is separated into three clear pieces, deregulation and democracy are discussed individually and at length. Once the reader has a clear understanding of the two problems America’s brand is facing, Fukuyama begins his conclusion with a change in tone, “if” paragraph, and solutions.
His tone changes at the fifth paragraph from the end. He starts talking about how America can and will recover. He proceeds to give what I like to call an “if” paragraph in which he has previously given the reader hope but then further explains that this positive and hopeful outcome can only come IF certain measures are taken and specific things are changed. He does this in the paragraph immediately following his tone change, beginning, “Still, another comeback rests on our ability to make some fundamental changes.” And finally he warns about problems to avoid and offers up solutions in the ending couple of paragraphs.
The actual conclusion does a great job of unifying the entire article which is key to making the whole piece work. Like the sub-title, the conclusion is able to sum up the main ideas of the article with just a few short sentences and, as I previously discussed, refers back to points previously addressed throughout the article. The conclusion is nothing innovative or risky as far as format; but it’s solid and unifying and considering the deep topics of the article it is also fitting.
The style of the article was straight forward and consistent, but the content of the article itself was very intelligent as well. Many profound points were made, cases presented, and ideas put forth. So not only was this a well written and laid out article, it was also full of valuable thought, ideas, insight, and conclusions.
Advanced Journalism
Public Affairs Analysis
The Rise of Socialism, Inc.less
With the current chain of events that has taken place so far this month, The Fall of America, Inc. is a very timely article, full of insight from our past and into our present and future situation. This article, written by Francis Fukuyama, explores America’s capitalist ideals and influence on a world-wide scale. Most articles written over the past few weeks and months delve into great detail about our national financial crisis, local economic problems, and the candidate’s plans for the mix; but few articles have made the case that this article does. This article addresses the global nature of the problem at hand and the massive effect our meltdown in economics and foreign policy has had on the world’s view of America’s “brand”. The Republican brand has been discussed time and time again, yet America’s brand as a whole and the way the world now perceives it has rarely been a prominent topic of conversation. This article presents that very issue, an issue that should have been on the forefront of political discussions more often than it has been, and it presents it in a very clear, understandable manner.
First of all, this article’s headline is genius. It’s catchy, intelligent, funny, fitting, etc. The sub-title is a good insight to the rest of the article and sums up the thesis very directly. The wording in “a certain vision of capitalism has collapsed.” is a particularly good choice of words, the word “certain” helps explain the points he makes later that capitalism cannot be abolished all together, just the “certain” form it has been practiced in so far. This word, “certain”, ties into his pendulum references he later talks about when discussing the drastic changes that people tend to make when something isn’t working right.
I was reminded of my own writing style when I read the first paragraph. The events that have taken place over the last few weeks are listed by means of several fragmented sentences, a technique that I think is usually quite effective in an introduction. After the picture is painted of the current situation Fukuyama does an excellent job of citing his thesis point at the end of his lead and linking the previous fragments to the global perspective of the American “brand”. His introduction continues into the next two paragraphs, making the first three paragraphs to comprise a somewhat long but necessary introduction. The second and third paragraphs separately introduce the two areas that Fukuyama believes are the most affected areas of our “brand”, deregulation and democracy.
As the article continues, Fukuyama mixes stories of past issues in history such as European Socialism, more recent history of our own nation such as the Bush administration’s policies, and current events like the presidential election in order to give background, insight, and understanding to the situation we’ve come to find ourselves facing. The way he incorporates past, present, and future ideas with foreign and domestic matters is very effective in uncovering this multi-layered problem our nation is facing. History mixed with clear examples gives the reader a good understanding of the problem, the reason for the problem, and later, how the problem may be fixed.
Fukuyama also does a good job of not over using this year’s election throughout the piece. He doesn’t mention either of the candidates until the fifth paragraph and then only discusses them a few more times in the rest of the article. Though I am a political junkie, this technique is refreshing. The election is already going to be on the reader’s mind, and will be thought of through out the article without it actually being pushed in the readers face in every paragraph.
His article, for the most part, tries very hard to put forth a fair balance between the candidates when it does actually discuss them and also tries to be fair when it’s not discussing them. However fair the writer may be trying to be, the article still leans in Obama’s favor. The writer’s tone remains pretty fair, but the actual content is left-leaning and therefore, naturally seems to be more in support of Obama and Obama’s policies.
Aside from trying to be fair to the candidates, the article gives a very fair portrayal of opposing economic philosophies and unbiased views of different ideals. The article seems to be stating the downside of our past economic practices; and though some may say that it shows bias, I think it is simply stating the obvious. Just because the obvious is negative, doesn’t mean it isn’t fair.
One of Fukuyama’s writing techniques that stood out to me was his ability to effectively refer back to things previously stated in his article. Things such as Cheney’s statement of “deficits don’t matter” were stated and then later referred back to in order to make a point clearer and refresh the reader’s memory of past points and topics discussed. Sometimes it is helpful to the reader, as it was to me, to have a connection made apparent, a “brain break” as I like to call it.
The format of this article makes the connections easy for the reader to put together also. After the introduction, which is separated into three clear pieces, deregulation and democracy are discussed individually and at length. Once the reader has a clear understanding of the two problems America’s brand is facing, Fukuyama begins his conclusion with a change in tone, “if” paragraph, and solutions.
His tone changes at the fifth paragraph from the end. He starts talking about how America can and will recover. He proceeds to give what I like to call an “if” paragraph in which he has previously given the reader hope but then further explains that this positive and hopeful outcome can only come IF certain measures are taken and specific things are changed. He does this in the paragraph immediately following his tone change, beginning, “Still, another comeback rests on our ability to make some fundamental changes.” And finally he warns about problems to avoid and offers up solutions in the ending couple of paragraphs.
The actual conclusion does a great job of unifying the entire article which is key to making the whole piece work. Like the sub-title, the conclusion is able to sum up the main ideas of the article with just a few short sentences and, as I previously discussed, refers back to points previously addressed throughout the article. The conclusion is nothing innovative or risky as far as format; but it’s solid and unifying and considering the deep topics of the article it is also fitting.
The style of the article was straight forward and consistent, but the content of the article itself was very intelligent as well. Many profound points were made, cases presented, and ideas put forth. So not only was this a well written and laid out article, it was also full of valuable thought, ideas, insight, and conclusions.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
As my undecided little sister would say... "What a fake ass bitch!"
I will fill this post with quotes from throughout the night which, I think, capture the essence of what has gone on the past couple of hours. What may not be captured is all of the pauses on the DVR to lend way to me or my sister's political bitching, the escape tricks of my kitty, or the bomb diggity food that was cooked prior to the debate. **All boxed wine, people, and principles are stated as realistic and are not altered to promote a certain belief, bias, or pattern.**
Quote 1: "All she [Sarah Palin] is, is a cute little one-liner"
Quote 2: "He [Biden] just gave her a look like he was going to jump her throat."
Quote 3: "I just stopped watching. She was annoying to look at."
Quote 4: "No, I really don't like her [Palin] at all! He's dominating! She's just ughhh..."
Quote 5: "Can you even imagine if something, dear God, did happen and she was our president?
Answer: "end of the world"
Quote 6: I'm going to need another box of wine to get throught this thing... yes, that's
right... BOX!!!
The debate was filled, as predicted, with her glittering generalities, her coy responses, and her "joe-six-pack" rhetoric. But if a six-pack is what's getting into our oval office, I'd like to nominate myself, because though it didn't take a six-pack for me to sit through this debate, it sure did take the equivalent in wine...
Biden showed knowledge, Palin showed excellent "anchor" skills. I'm sorry, but I'd rather have knowledge than a pandering puttsing puppet (there's my signature alliteration) as my vice-president.
Obamba/Biden 'O8... I'll bitch more in class ;)
Quote 1: "All she [Sarah Palin] is, is a cute little one-liner"
Quote 2: "He [Biden] just gave her a look like he was going to jump her throat."
Quote 3: "I just stopped watching. She was annoying to look at."
Quote 4: "No, I really don't like her [Palin] at all! He's dominating! She's just ughhh..."
Quote 5: "Can you even imagine if something, dear God, did happen and she was our president?
Answer: "end of the world"
Quote 6: I'm going to need another box of wine to get throught this thing... yes, that's
right... BOX!!!
The debate was filled, as predicted, with her glittering generalities, her coy responses, and her "joe-six-pack" rhetoric. But if a six-pack is what's getting into our oval office, I'd like to nominate myself, because though it didn't take a six-pack for me to sit through this debate, it sure did take the equivalent in wine...
Biden showed knowledge, Palin showed excellent "anchor" skills. I'm sorry, but I'd rather have knowledge than a pandering puttsing puppet (there's my signature alliteration) as my vice-president.
Obamba/Biden 'O8... I'll bitch more in class ;)
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