I wasn't intending for this topic to take three parts to get to, but hopefully you guys are seeing what I see. This will be the final part of dealing with the Iran deal, and we will be taking a look at the last article. The last article comes from CNN. CNN, for those you aren't aware, is also said to lean to the left. I have tackled some of their articles before and pointed out that sometimes they do. Here is the link to the third and final article. http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/24/world/meast/iran-nuclear-deal/index.html?hpt=po_c1
'3-decade gridlock broken: The nuclear deal with Iran in Geneva'. Now this seems like a proper headline. It does the job of letting us know that it is a big deal by saying its been an issue for thirty years. It tells us there is a deal. Thats it, and all it should do. Its not exactly an attention grabbing headline, but that isn't what I want. This isn't TMZ.
"The diplomatic gridlock between Iran and the West seemed immovable for decades. But on Sunday, diplomats made history when Iran and six world powers came together on an agreement over Iran's nuclear program. The deal dials back Iran's ability to work toward a nuclear weapon and at the same time loosens the choke hold of international sanctions on Iran's economy."
The opening couple paragraphs really let us know why this is important and does it without jumping to the 'skepticism' that our Congress has over it. So far, I'm digging it. "Iran has stumbled from one economic crisis to the next under the sanctions, and unemployment currently runs over 24%." Yes! I knew I saw that statistic somewhere. If you are confused, refer back to Part II where I talk about how the Iranian people are suffering because of the sanctions. It does refer to the criticism that the deal has received, but in a much better way I feel.
"Obama's Republican opponents in Washington scorned the deal, and key ally Israel frowned upon it. Both say it will have the opposite effect, advancing Iran's alleged quest for a bomb. "This agreement shows other rogue states that wish to go nuclear that you can obfuscate, cheat, and lie for a decade, and eventually the United States will tire and drop key demands," said freshman Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida."
While they use a quote, I don't feel like its the best quote they could have used to present their argument in a good light. It seems kind of overly dramatic (surprise).
Overall, CNN's article is what I was looking for when I wanted to learn about what the deal was. It presented the information in less bias than both MSNBC and Fox. They did a great job explaining the deal and the history and what it means. It lets us know who the key players were (John Kerry, Rouhani). Now that you all have seen all three articles about the same subject, which one did you feel appealed to what you look for more?
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Is the Iran Nuke Deal a Deal With the Devil? (Part II)
Hopefully you are coming here after reading the first post. I didn't want to have it go on too long, so I thought it would be better to break it up into a separate post. Okay, so we saw Fox News' take on the article and I proposed the question to you guys and hopefully you responded to it. Your responses are due tomorrow, so get on it!
Now, let us get back to checking this next article. Next up is MSNBC. I usually don't check out MSNBC so I can say that my knowledge of them are their reporting is limited. I do know they tend to lean to the left, so this will give me an opportunity to see. Here is their article. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/critics-blast-iran-deal-us-defeat.
'Critics blast Iran deal as US 'defeat'. Now, ain't them some fightin' words? I think mentioning the words 'US' and 'Defeat' in the same sentence is bound to get under the skin of some people. Its not a phrase Americans usually hear, or like to hear. Think back to reports of America 'losing' the Vietnam War. It is certainly a much stronger and biased headline than Fox News, and I'm surprised already.
"Republicans and even some hawkish Democrats greeted the Iran nuclear accord with skepticism Sunday, in a challenge to President Obama as he tries to bring about a peaceful, negotiated end to decades of hostilities"
There is that word again. Skepticism. What is this, that Conan segment where they show that many of the same news stations use the same script https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFsDnn9FjOQ? I don't know, as a reader, the word skepticism is a unusual word that I don't think is used unless they had a reason.
Our very own Saxby Chambliss is quoted as well. "Sen. Saxby Chambliss, the Georgia Republican, expressed regrets about the easing what he said were stern and effective sanctions: “We’ve got all the leverage in the negotiations, and we’ve let them out of the trap,” he said during ABC’s This Week."
Now, I'm not very happy about the use of the word "trap". The Iranian people are suffering from the sanctions because of their government. I don't have a source for this, but one of the articles might have mentioned they have a unemployment rate of like 24% or something crazy like that. We flip out when it got to be like 10% here in America. A normal unemployment rate is what, 3-4% for a healthy economy? I don't think our elected officials should be looking at this situation like its a game or a 'trap'. It is people's lives we are talking about. We put everything else but humanity first it seems like. What are your thoughts on this article?
Now, let us get back to checking this next article. Next up is MSNBC. I usually don't check out MSNBC so I can say that my knowledge of them are their reporting is limited. I do know they tend to lean to the left, so this will give me an opportunity to see. Here is their article. http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/critics-blast-iran-deal-us-defeat.
'Critics blast Iran deal as US 'defeat'. Now, ain't them some fightin' words? I think mentioning the words 'US' and 'Defeat' in the same sentence is bound to get under the skin of some people. Its not a phrase Americans usually hear, or like to hear. Think back to reports of America 'losing' the Vietnam War. It is certainly a much stronger and biased headline than Fox News, and I'm surprised already.
"Republicans and even some hawkish Democrats greeted the Iran nuclear accord with skepticism Sunday, in a challenge to President Obama as he tries to bring about a peaceful, negotiated end to decades of hostilities"
There is that word again. Skepticism. What is this, that Conan segment where they show that many of the same news stations use the same script https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFsDnn9FjOQ? I don't know, as a reader, the word skepticism is a unusual word that I don't think is used unless they had a reason.
Our very own Saxby Chambliss is quoted as well. "Sen. Saxby Chambliss, the Georgia Republican, expressed regrets about the easing what he said were stern and effective sanctions: “We’ve got all the leverage in the negotiations, and we’ve let them out of the trap,” he said during ABC’s This Week."
Now, I'm not very happy about the use of the word "trap". The Iranian people are suffering from the sanctions because of their government. I don't have a source for this, but one of the articles might have mentioned they have a unemployment rate of like 24% or something crazy like that. We flip out when it got to be like 10% here in America. A normal unemployment rate is what, 3-4% for a healthy economy? I don't think our elected officials should be looking at this situation like its a game or a 'trap'. It is people's lives we are talking about. We put everything else but humanity first it seems like. What are your thoughts on this article?
Is the Iran Nuke Deal a Deal With the Devil?
It gets hard coming up with titles for these blog posts. I hope you guys know I have to sit here and try to think of something clever. Anyway, let us get back on topic. News has come out recently about a deal with Iran and their nuclear program. I only heard the bare bones version of the story before this blog, so I decided to read up on it and get an idea of what is going on. This blog post is going to focus on comparing three different media sources reporting of this story and see the issues with them. I thought about finding a smaller news site to use, but those can be very hit or miss as far their reporting goes. With a story like this, I really wanted to use three of the biggest media sites because that is where a lot of people will be getting their information on.
Up first is Fox News. Here is the link for the story. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/11/24/capitol-hill-skepticism-over-iran-nuclear-deal-results-in-bipartisan-call-for/
"Capitol Hill skepticism over Iran nuclear deal results in bipartisan call for more sanctions". That is the headline for the article, for those of you who are skipping it. Now it seems some words in that headline are strategically placed. 'Skepticism' and 'bipartisan' seem kind of out of place to me. It seems like its worded that way to create doubt in readers minds that "Oh wow, Congress agrees about something, it must be bad". Maybe its just me.
The article doesn't spend a whole lot of time giving us viewpoints from Congress members who support the deal. It gives us a couple Hershey's Kisses, but overall it seems to be critical of the deal. An interesting point in the article was the end, with:
"“Amazing what WH will do to distract attention from O-care” tweeted Cornyn, referring to the White House and ObamaCare. His remark drew sharp rebuke from Obama 2008 presidential campaign manager David Ploufee. “No, a real distraction would be war. Like Iraq,” he tweeted in response."
Why even post that quote? To insinuate that the deal was made to detract from the criticism that the Affordable Care Act is receiving? Then to include someone's reply who worked with Obama who referenced the Iraq War. Fox News viewers tend to be more conservative, so is it an attempt to irk their base to seeing this negatively? What do you think? I'm going end this blog post and continue it in a separate one. Look out for Part II!
Up first is Fox News. Here is the link for the story. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/11/24/capitol-hill-skepticism-over-iran-nuclear-deal-results-in-bipartisan-call-for/
"Capitol Hill skepticism over Iran nuclear deal results in bipartisan call for more sanctions". That is the headline for the article, for those of you who are skipping it. Now it seems some words in that headline are strategically placed. 'Skepticism' and 'bipartisan' seem kind of out of place to me. It seems like its worded that way to create doubt in readers minds that "Oh wow, Congress agrees about something, it must be bad". Maybe its just me.
The article doesn't spend a whole lot of time giving us viewpoints from Congress members who support the deal. It gives us a couple Hershey's Kisses, but overall it seems to be critical of the deal. An interesting point in the article was the end, with:
"“Amazing what WH will do to distract attention from O-care” tweeted Cornyn, referring to the White House and ObamaCare. His remark drew sharp rebuke from Obama 2008 presidential campaign manager David Ploufee. “No, a real distraction would be war. Like Iraq,” he tweeted in response."
Why even post that quote? To insinuate that the deal was made to detract from the criticism that the Affordable Care Act is receiving? Then to include someone's reply who worked with Obama who referenced the Iraq War. Fox News viewers tend to be more conservative, so is it an attempt to irk their base to seeing this negatively? What do you think? I'm going end this blog post and continue it in a separate one. Look out for Part II!
Thursday, November 7, 2013
Obama's Good at Killing People...
I've been searching for a few days to find an article that I wanted to write a blog about. A lot of the most recent headlines have been about the Affordable Care Act, which I covered in my last blog post. I did see something though that caused me to do a double take before immediately clicking on it. Even if it was a misleading headline, it seemed like it would be appropriate to cover for this blog. But after looking at a couple articles, it seemed to be more accurate than I thought. Therefore we will look at the article and break it down in comparison to another source.
The first website I found it on was Business Insider. I'm not awfully familiar with them but I have heard of them before. Here is the article:
http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-said-hes-really-good-at-killing-people-2013-11
The headline is pretty standard, as it gives us the information with putting a spin on it. Unlike this one from Fox News http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/the-five/article/2013/11/05/nobel-prize-winning-president-really-good-killing-people. The headline is 'Nobel Prize Winning President "really good at killing people'. This one is obviously going for a more harsh tone. While the Business Insider article mentions him being a Nobel Prize Winning President, it doesn't use that in the headline.
Essentially the article is talking about how President Obama said that he is "really good at killing people" in reference to drone strikes. The article lists some statistics about drone strikes and that Obama's administration has done more Drone Strikes than Bush's did. Now, the article isn't very subjective in its nature. It provides information, but at the same time it doesn't just stay informative.
Look here "Furthermore, the disturbing trend of the “double tap” — bombing the same place in quick succession and often hitting first responders — has become common practice." While I would agree with the author's opinion, using the words "disturbing" lets you know the author's feelings about it.
To save time, I won't really have the space to mention much about this article. But to see a more subjective look at this topic, see the article over at The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/03/obama-drones-double-down_n_4208815.html. It does a pretty good job at presenting facts, quotes, and information without it letting you know what opinion the author has.
The first website I found it on was Business Insider. I'm not awfully familiar with them but I have heard of them before. Here is the article:
http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-said-hes-really-good-at-killing-people-2013-11
The headline is pretty standard, as it gives us the information with putting a spin on it. Unlike this one from Fox News http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/the-five/article/2013/11/05/nobel-prize-winning-president-really-good-killing-people. The headline is 'Nobel Prize Winning President "really good at killing people'. This one is obviously going for a more harsh tone. While the Business Insider article mentions him being a Nobel Prize Winning President, it doesn't use that in the headline.
Essentially the article is talking about how President Obama said that he is "really good at killing people" in reference to drone strikes. The article lists some statistics about drone strikes and that Obama's administration has done more Drone Strikes than Bush's did. Now, the article isn't very subjective in its nature. It provides information, but at the same time it doesn't just stay informative.
Look here "Furthermore, the disturbing trend of the “double tap” — bombing the same place in quick succession and often hitting first responders — has become common practice." While I would agree with the author's opinion, using the words "disturbing" lets you know the author's feelings about it.
To save time, I won't really have the space to mention much about this article. But to see a more subjective look at this topic, see the article over at The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/03/obama-drones-double-down_n_4208815.html. It does a pretty good job at presenting facts, quotes, and information without it letting you know what opinion the author has.
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