Hillary, Hillary, Hillary

I wanted to write something about the republican side of the 2008 Presidential Election... but honestly, all I keep hearing about on tv is Hillary Clinton.
Yesterday, she hit up FIVE Sunday morning talk shows-- defending her proposed health plan and talking about pulling the troops out of Iraq as soon as she becomes President.
Many people get defensive when they talk to her and don't think she'll be able to do any of it. But i give her props for actually making the initiative and speaking up, and getting on talk shows. People need to see that- they need to hear what she has to say in order to make and educated decision when it comes time for elections.
Bad press for her... maybe? Put is bad press every really a BAD thing?

O'bits.

“An obituary is a news story,” says our book. “Too many obituaries read as if they were written by a computer-program—efficient but lifeless.”
I completely agree with both of those statements. Coming from personal experience, when I read my grandmother’s obituary in the paper I was a little disturbed by it. My grandmother was very well-known and loved in her community and the obituary only had small general statements about her. It did not include any achievements, or memberships, or community service… nothing of what my grandmother was about was included in there.
I feel obituaries need to be full of life. That they need to tell what the person was all about. And I think it is the reporter’s job to find these characteristics and do a fair amount of research to get an accurate account of the lost-life.
The book says that most obituaries or “stories” are not written well because most of the time the reporter is afraid to do the reporting. I do believe this is true, although I don’t know why. I know it is a tough time for the family, but if a report approached me and asked me about my grandmother, I would have been more than happy to brag about all of her accomplishments and her life.
I think reporters need to feel empathy/sympathy in that situation, but also remember that they are still a reporter and need to get the news out in the most accurate way.

Don't Knock It.

Hillary is at it again. Thirteen years after her first attempt at improving our nation’s health care, Clinton is offering some new ideas oh how to get every American assistance.

It really irritates me how people are already criticizing her and the plan. I’m a firm believer in the saying “Don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it.” So I tell the critics to shut up because something needs to be done about health care in America.

…. More to come on this story…

Serendipity

Serendipity. The effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely.

I’m not talking about the movie; rather I’m talking about Poynter Online’s, E-Media Tidbits. Echo didn’t expect to have such a response to their site and I think that it’s truly amazing that they did. I believe that the way the public reacted to the forum shows how the world of journalism is changing.

It’s not just simply about print anymore; it’s about change and making good things better- even if it was discovered accidentally!

In reference to the timeline story:
I believe that if it makes it easier for the reader to understand, use it. Maybe it’s a matter or preference (I’m more of a visual person,) so looking at a timeline- or something of that sort- while I’m reading the story helps me to better understand what the writing is saying.

But at the same time, if you chose to use this multimedia function, don’t make it too complicated! And as the story says, “You must avoid "mystery meat" navigation -- that is, a timeline that doesn't give them anything but the time information.”

Moyers & Interviewing

Since freshman year, I’ve been learning the art of interviewing (and I say art because it really is an art). Even though I’ve been interviewing people for years now, it really is nice to refresh my memory. Knowing how to approach the interview and actually preparing for it, I believe is the most crucial part. If you prepare for something you’ll be ready for anything I always say.
In one of my interviewing classes last week we watched Bill Moyers interview Jon Stewart from the Daily Show and in the entire 30 minute interview you knew that Moyers had done intense preparation for it. Moyers even said that it takes him months to prepare for interviews like that.
And I think that is something to strive for with up and coming journalists. Prepare the best you can, take your time with it and if you’re going to do it, do it right. Moyers is a great interviewer and I think we can all learn something from him.

The O's Have It

Just the other day in one of my classes the professor had us write down the name of someone who we would want to be for a day. To no surprise, Oprah Winfrey was the most popular name that came up. I suppose that is why Forbes gave Oprah the number one spot on their list of Most Influential Celebrities. Being so, does that mean that if Oprah were to endorse something it would sell? Absolutely. Each month she gets millions of people to go out and read a book from her book list. On top of that she has over 49 million people tune into her show each week.
The reason I’m talking about Oprah is because just recently she has endorsed Senator Barack Obama in the 2008 Presidental Election. Good for Obama, bad for the other candidates. Although she is for Obama Oprah states that she still has a great respect for Hillary Clinton and the other candidates, stating: “I have great respect for Hillary Clinton. I think I’ve said this before and it’s true: Because I am for Barack does not mean I am against Hillary or anybody else."
She may not be against anyone else, but with her back behind Obama and with her being the most influential person in America, I’d say that Obama has a pretty good shot at becoming the next U.S. President.

Road Trip with Hillary

While listening to Good Morning America the other morning as I was getting ready, I overheard Diane Sawyer tell America that in a recent GMA poll, 48 percent of Americans said they'd rather have Hillary Clinton as their traveling companion on a drive across country, versus 39 percent who'd want Rudy Giuliani along for the ride (she also beat out all her Democratic competitors.)The GMA poll voters also said that they’d rather Clinton over Giuliani as a business partner. Although neither of these poll results signify voter preference, serving as a business partner does seem to correspond to serving as the next president in my eyes. Maybe it’s just because Clinton has more of a “celebrity” status. I don’t know the answer, but we will find out soon enough.

Network TV and Katie Couric

“Network TV” was the first chapter that grabbed my attention in The State of the News Media. Not that I’m not interested in the other forms of media, but I get most of my news from network television; so I felt the need to pay special attention to the section. The first sentence in the introduction states that it was a year that people where waiting for, and it truly was. The part that really caught my attention in the reading was the question of whether or not the older audience would adapt to the new faces and changes that network television was bringing about. This is interesting because I’ve seen numerous reports throughout the year about the CBS Evening News and their falling ratings. In a way I found the ratings sad, because I wanted the first solo female night anchor, Katie Couric, to do well, and I truly thought she would. But as she said in an interview recently, she didn’t think the world was ready for that kind of change. Personally, I think change is a good thing and I don’t really understand why the rest of the world is against it. But it’s not just Couric’s fault, because the reading also stated that every media sector, except for two, has stopped growing. Could it be that people have become generally uninterested in the world around us? I can’t see how this could be, but it makes you wonder what really is going on.