Month: October 2016

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/saluting-a-new-kind-of-hero/2016/10/16/e75fbb26-8cd0-11e6-875e-2c1bfe943b66_story.html?utm_term=.017649bf6b1f

 

NY Times Article

The audience is primed for the op-ed with the Presidential campaign of Donald Trump. The author of the article, Charles M. Blow, makes it very clear just by the title of the article that Donald Trump is the worst thing to ever happen in America. Through the sequence of events from running for President to groping whichever women he desires, the author makes his opinion present with his comments and adjectives. The author’s objective is clear and concise in that he wants to denounce Trump for everything that revolved around him in the news. Charles tells of how Donald Trump came about and his presence in America as well as Trump’s rise through the Republican party. Charles writes about the Republican Party with great hatred and denounces all credibility of the Republican party to be taken seriously.

Quotes:

“He looks pathetic.

He is a ball of contradictions that together form a bully, a man who has built a menacing wall around the hollow of his self. He is brash to mask his fragility.”

“He has dispensed with all semblances of wanting to appear presidential and embraced what seems to be most natural to him: acting like a pig.”

Check in on progress of profile stories.

Discussion: Intro to op-ed/editorial feature writing

An op-ed is an opinion piece written by the reader of a newspaper, magazine, or other source, on a topic relevant to the publication’s audience. The term comes from “opposite editorial”—“the page of a newspaper facing the editorial page, typically devoted to personal comment and feature articles.”

An editorial “is an article that presents the newspaper’s opinion on an issue. It reflects the majority vote of the editorial board, the governing body of the newspaper made up of editors and business managers. It is usually unsigned. Much in the same manner of a lawyer, editorial writers build on an argument and try to persuade readers to think the same way they do. Editorials are meant to influence public opinion, promote critical thinking, and sometimes cause people to take action on an issue. In essence, an editorial is an opinionated news story.”

Consider your audience: Who are they? Are they readers of a small-town newspaper, a national newspaper, or mostly millenial readers of online news sources?

What do they already know about the issue, and what do you need to tell them?

Why is your issue important?  What action would you like your readers (or Congress, or City Council, or the dean, or…) to take?

Why should readers trust your opinion? That is, why should they find your particular perspective, expertise, or experience worth thinking about?

Have an opinion. Take a stance.

Make your point early on. The very first sentence should give readers a sense of what your topic will be. How will that sentence grab your readers’ attention? How will the first paragraph make readers stay with you to the end?

Acknowledge—but be respectful of—opposing viewpoints. By acknowledging them, you can also pre-but them.

Reading:

Hillary Clinton says Bill won’t be picking out the White House china. He should.

Editorial: Gaga Concert is Too Hot For Indonesia

In-class assignment: Look for an editorial on a topic that interests you. Write a few sentences on the blog about whether it was effective and/or how it could have been better, and why.

The Undecided Voter

On September 26^th, 2016, Ray Liang sits on his couch in disgust of what he’s seeing in the first 2016 Presidential Debate between Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump on his 48-inch Vizio television. A cool breeze fills the room on a windy night, Liang takes the final sip of his Corona as he listens to Trump, the Republican nomination for President speak. Trump finishes his remarks about his immigration policies if he were to be elected and Liang throws his remote in anger at the floor dissembling the remote into two pieces.

“To have to choose between one of these candidates right now, we might as well blindfold ourselves at the voting booth and hope for the best, said Liang.”

Liang, a 27-year old graduate student in Mount Sinai and eldest child of two immigrant parents, never found a need to tune into the election. In Liang’s pursuit for a PhD in biomedical research, politics were rarely in any of his studies. Although Liang registered to vote when he was 18, he never made it a goal to go to the voting booths and select a candidate. Throughout the years of 18-27, Liang identified himself as an undecided voter. He never truly agreed with the ideals of the Republicans but was never satisfied with the accomplishments of the Democrats to give them his vote.

According to the June CNBC All-America Economic Survey, a large chunk of the voting public remains undecided. The poll of 801 registered voters conducted June 11-14 shows Clinton with a 40 percent to 35 percent lead, but the poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. Pollsters for CNBC say the survey shows a tight race with 25 percent undecided, including 14 percent who right now choose “neither” candidate.

Liang’s uncertainty in voting for Clinton, the Democratic Party Nomination or Trump reflects a growing population of undecided voters. Some voters choose to not vote as a sign of social movement while others can’t distinguish which candidate would be their ideal candidate even though voters must identify as either a Democratic or Republican.

 

While Liang reflects a student pursuing a PhD, Carina Santana, a 20-year old undergraduate Baruch College student, remains in the category of the undecided voter. Santana comes with a Mexican immigrant background and national identity. Therefore, the immigration policies of Trump disgust Santana.

 

“To take away someone’s rights, their way of living here for the past couple of year is just inhumane, said Santana.” “My parents came into this country as immigrants pursuing the “American Dream” of a nice house, car and a beautiful/handsome significant other. Now all of that hangs in the balance, I wonder who will stand up and call Trump out on everything that he’s saying and getting away with.”

 

Liang and Santana share a common trait. Due to their parent’s backgrounds coming from an immigrant standpoint, the lenience in immigration policies have centered that of pardoning immigrants for overstaying their visas. The uncertainty in their cast of votes renders the nation that stands for democracy and freedom in uncertainty.

 

“It seems almost as if we’re too biased but in all reality, everyone has got to realize that if Trump were to actually be President of the United States, we might not get a chance to leave on our own free will, said Liang.” “Trump has indicated time after time that he would force immigrants as well as the second generations of children and babies that were born in the U.S. from immigrants out of their homes. Meanwhile Clinton isn’t building a strong case either with her sneakiness of her e-mails.”

 

Both Presidential candidates Clinton and Trump have faced scandalous circumstances surrounding their campaign. Trump refuses to reveal his tax forms and was recently exposed on sexually assaulting women on a daily basis while Clinton’s health concerns grow along with the pressure from the Trump campaign to unveil the secrets behind her e-mails of which were rumored to have confidential information detailing a military operation.

 

With the Second Presidential Debate, the Town Hall of undecided voters asks the presidential candidates their questions. The moment where a man with a red sweater named Ken Bone stood up to ask a question, the Internet started trending with the name of Ken Bone in social media. The excitement in the Presidential Debate escalated. Suddenly, the undecided voters had a leader/figurehead to look to for guidance.

 

With an insurmountable amount of fame and publicity came a consequence, the niceness and leadership of Ken Bone soon turned to dust as the internet that once made him extremely famous was the source that exposed Ken Bone’s true opinions in matters such as Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman. The undecided voters remain conflicted.

 

In an interview with CNN, Cook Political Report national editor Amy Walter answered the mystery of undecided voters: “Walter said for the first time that she can remember, she’s having trouble trusting the data that’s coming from the campaign trail, and that undecided voters are struggling to choose between the lesser of two evils.” “What I hear from these groups, is just this idea of like ‘You know, I don’t know if I trust Hillary Clinton,'” she said. “One woman said, ‘I don’t trust Hillary Clinton on terrorism’ — to sort of get to your point of instability in the world — ‘but Donald Trump is going to get us into World War III.’ So, that’s why people are like ‘I’d rather cut my arm off than have this election, because that’s what you’re making me choose from.”

 

With the third and final Presidential Debate, undecided voters hope to see a shift in the styles of both Clinton and Trump to justify a clear decision to the voters on who to vote for in November.

 

“At one side, Trump will give us the next Hunger Games, said Liang. “Clinton isn’t trustworthy so I might as well start planning my move to Canada.”

 

 

Jana Kramer’s Current Husband Apologizes for ‘Behavior’ As She Accuses Him of Cheating

 

This article explains how Jana Kramer accuses her husband of cheating. The angle of the article is to show the innoncence of Kramer and how she keeps winding up in bad relationships. Pointing out that her former husband was “horrifically abusive”. The quotes from Kramer show that she just wants to be loved and to have a happy family. This adds to her angle of being the victim of the failed relationships.

 

 

I always enjoy profiles on music artists because the music artists themselves already give so much of who they are in their albums, so if a writer can give more knowledge to the reader than the artist themselves, I think it is worth the read. “A Young Biracial Rapper From DC Is the Next Big Thing” is the title of an informative profile sharing the rapper Logic’s story from childhood to his recent rise to stardom.

To summarize, Logic is a biracial rapper that looks white. He has a troubled background involving gangs, drugs and racism, however, he does not glorify those topics in his music. Instead, Logic has been implementing Sci-Fi themes in his hip hop album concepts, has described himself as the nerd of hip hop, likes to play the Rubik’s Cube while rapping and of course, loves the art of rapping. I feel like the profile does a good job of blending Logic’s troubling and tough past that is similar to a lot of rappers, with his newfound fame and persona that some hip hop fans find hard to connect with.

A Young Biracial Rapper From DC Is the Next Big Thing

This profile piece I read is about Jorge Ramos. Ramos is a reporter for Univision. At the time 2015, he was kicked out of a Trump press conference after asking serious questions about immigration to trump. Many believe that he is the voice for immigrants, but others believe the action he did was not professional.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/10/05/the-man-who-wouldnt-sit-down

The profile piece I read was about Mike Allen, one of the main reporters at Politico. Despite that this piece is a few years old at this point, it’s from 2010, it’s still relevant to how journalism works today. The story is reflective of the man being profiled, an interesting mix of Washington politics, the crazed 24 hour news cycle, and the approach newer organizations have to covering stories. The article starts by talking about an email blast put out by Allen every morning called the Playbook. The Playbook is reflective of Allen’s own almost spastic genius, covering everything important that day while also slipping in mentions of people’s birthdays and the like.

The piece uses Allen’s work as it’s drive, with both the story being told and how it’s framed. It to is slightly off kilter much like Allen appears to be, but that adds to the story being told. The story is a long one and was originally in The New York Times Magazine.

In this profile article “Finding His Place, Reluctantly, in the Tribe of Judaism”, Steve Erlanger writes about Philippe Sands, a Jewish lawyer whose history he did not fully understand because his parents always avoided the subject. This lack of knowledge always gave him a sense of insecurity. He then began to do his research about the horrible history of his ancestors and the many ways in which they were suppressed.

The angle of the story was to understand the importance of an individual’s personal identity, separated from the association others give us with a larger group.

In terms of the way the profile article was written, I believe the author was very effective giving us a brief summary of Sand’s life. Erlanger not only described who his parents and grandparents were but, he also connected it to the angle of the story. He also gave us a few details about his personal life. In several occasions the author quoted Sands and described his physical reactions as Sands spoke. This gave the profile article a more intimate feel and more color.