Fox News has a reputation that I will not start to delve into, but for this assignment I figured I would step out of my normal news circuit, CNN and the New York Times, and critique the infamous Fox News and see exactly what all the fuss is about. I choose this particular article because the headline 'Blame Bush' Strategy Wears Thin as Obama Enters Second Year’,caught my eye and my interest. I like reading about politics so I figured why not.
First I must give kudos to the headline because upon first glance it causes one of two reactions; either you are instantly enraged by it because you support President Obama and you believe he is not making an excuse or you feel proud that Fox News is calling for real action instead of allowing this excuse to suffice. Either way it doesn’t really matter what you believe as long as the headline roped you in. Frankly, opinions change from news outlet to news outlet, what seems to matter most is the audience, and the headline is the first device a journalist can employ to catch one. It’s not the most glittery or provocative headline but I think it accomplishes what it needs too.
Now with all that said, I do think the article was a bit bias against President Obama. The article quotes two Republicans, and both make strong statements against the President. The article quotes former Rep. Tom Davis former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, who goes on the say "What you have the last two cycles is the angry voters, the ones most motivated to turn out, were Democrats, who did not like Bush. They didn't like his policies ... You saw it, what we call the surge voters, Bush is gone now -- they're all asleep." This quote implies a lot, first it implies that President Obama was just elected because people didn’t like Bush, which to some degree is true but I don’t think it would be fair to say this as an all encompassing statement. President Obama was elected because the people supported him not because we hated bush. This, in turn, connects to the theme of this article itself. Fox News is trying to criticize President Obama for blaming his problems on former president bush but they are similarly blaming his election on the former President as well. The connection may not be a direct one but I just found it interesting that Fox News would criticize President Obama for blaming bush when they themselves blamed Bush for President Obama’s election. It seems a little hypocritical that they condemn the “blame Bush” excuse and then they themselves use a quote as evidence but it implies that they are blaming bush as well.
I thought the flow of the article was consistent and the whole story meshed together quite well. There is definitely a sense of voice but I found it to be somewhat bogged down at times, like you felt what the author was trying to convey but at times it just felt like empty words strung together to form a sentence. I guess my problem is that this piece is not based in fact but more opinion based. All in all the article is interesting to read, even though it feels somewhat unbalanced in regards to accuracy and opinion.
Full Article Found at.....
(http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/01/25/obama-administration-blaming-bush-president-enters-second-year/)
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The real test here, I think, is to look back at Fox's coverage during George W. Bush's presidency, and see how critical they were of him. It does seem that Fox news personnel have been much more critical of Obama than they were of Bush. Does the article quote any Democrats?
ReplyDeleteGood post, Anthony. Be sure to proofread carefully, though. You have a number of run-on sentences.