The
Fox News article strongly defends the the Republican Party’s position stated in the headline. By using scare quotes around the word “deal”,
it immediately invalidates Democrat’s attempts to negotiate with them. The
article then goes on to quote exclusively Republican members of congress and
ends with the quote "People
all over this country are losing the health care insurance they wanted and they
liked," (Fox News) from Rep Ted Cruz. Ending with this quote leaves readers
with the final impression that the Republicans are fighting against the
Affordable Care Act because it is in their interest to do so. The article is
comprised of quotes from Republican representatives with some basic
explanations of them from the journalist. On the other hand, the Huffington
Post’s headline does not point to a specific political party by simply saying
that the shut down is “stuck” on an issue. However, the article focuses on the
actions the Democrat Party has taken in rejecting a recent Republican proposal,
and quotes Democrat and Independent representatives on the issue. They discuss
the downfalls of the proposal, and their strategies in attempting to get their
desired legislation passed. Similarly to Fox News, the article quoted all
Democrats, with the exception of one Independent, thus creating a strong liberal
bias.
Neither article was balanced or gave
a full perspective of the government shutdown. They were both party- driven and
were written to defend the positions of each major political party. I think
there is a lot of contextual information missing about the various proposals
and each party’s reaction to them. Furthermore, I think that each article could
benefit from quotes that explain the other party’s politics so that the reader
can have a better perspective on the issue as a whole, rather than the
perspectives generated by a singular party.
-Sita Goetschius
-Sita Goetschius
The use scare quotes is very well identified, as is the disparaging intent. The articles certainly are each very biased to examining one party's perspective, but beyond that what is interesting is that to the extent that the Fox article offers balance it is BETWEEN the moderate wing of the Republican Party and the Tea Party faction on the right - so even in the sympathetic media they are framed as damaged by a split. The HuffPost gives a more deliberative-sounding account of Democrat discussion on negotiating tactics, and frames their position as a 'stand', which sounds principled, rather than the Fox framing of the Tea Party 'fight', which sounds more aggressive.
ReplyDelete