The Diminished role of Blogs in News Framing?

Recently we have read a journal article by Henry Farrell and Daniel W. Drezner tilted, “The Power and Politics of Blogs”. The findings in this article suggest that elite bloggers influence news framing by becoming a focal point of reference to the main stream media. Although what we did not discuss in class is the findings in this entry are not conclusive, they are only a beginning of future research in the photosphere.

“However, even if the blogosphere can influence the body politic, the extent of that influence remains open to question.”

This is what I was worried about the entire class period. The discussion we had seemed to lead us to assume that the influence from blogs was there when really the evidence can do no more than suggest an influence.

What I was most concerned about was the small amount of actual references the main stream media made towards blogs “between September 2003 and January 2004” when there survey took place. What the data showed was that in the span of 5 months the major blogs mentioned were mentioned very few time s one which was mentioned 78 times but this one was truly an out liner for the rest ranged from 1-16 mentions. My point is that these are the top read blogs yet they are mentioned very few times within the span of five months. Although I could not find data on the most highly referenced source for political information of the mainstream media, it does seem rather miniscule that the media would only reference the top read blog with an outlier at 78 mentions in 5 months in the presents of a 24 hour news cycle.

Another concern I had with this article is the wording that a certain survey finding had:

“Of those who used blogs, 55% reported that they use them to support the work that they
do in writing news.”

My problem is with the word “support”, it leads me to question whether the blog was really influential news framing, or the journalist had already developed a frame for the news and used the blog solely for support; in which case the role of the blog in news framing is diminished.

Santorum Drops Out

Rick Santorum dropped out of his presidential campaign today. He did not give specifics as to why he decided to drop out, but it is most likely due to Romeny's dominance in across the nation. Santorum stated that he will still give any aid to the Republican Party that he can, of course that mean backing Romney when he wins the candidacy.

The issue of money is brought up in this article, which suggests that Santorum has far less money than Romney. Money has become a huge player in presidential elections, maybe too much of a player. The Super PAC, Restore our Future, has backed Romney by putting millions and millions of dollars toward campaign adds that targeted Santorum. The amount of money that is being put into these campaigns is unbelievable. This leads to the question; is the best candidate being chosen by the country or are the supporting factors behind the candidate putting millions behind that candidate in order for that person to win? Most likely the candidate with the most money or the most financial backing will win the elections or campaigns. But if there are two candidates with about the same amount of financial backing, I think that the country would pick the best candidate because they are seeing more of both sides instead of seeing a majority a single sides propaganda.

The question of financial backing is a tricky question, because the more money behind a candidate, the more good publicity they will get, and the more bad publicity their opponents will be get. But if a candidate has a major financial backing from several sources, does that mean that they are the best candidate? Is it fair to say the people and companies supporting the candidate have a lot of money for a reason; they are successful and educated. But, of course, this brings up another issue of the elites running the country. Is that such a bad thing? Maybe the educated and elites should run the country because they are the most educated and knowledgeable. I don't know, it seems to be a issue that will never be completely answered.


http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/10/santorum-to-suspend-presidential-campaign/?hp

We Need Blood

Chapter 27 of Doris A. Graber’s book “Media Power In Politics”  discusses Sean Aday’s article “The Real War Will Never Get On Television: An Analysis Of Casualty Imagery”. Aday’s article concerns a simple dilemma, the media will never portray war as it truly is: an “awful” endeavor. The concern is with the medias’ refusal to depict the gruesome carnage that is the result of war. What I want to focus on during the remainder of this article is addressing a claim found in Aday’s article by Walt Whiteman, “The real war will never get in the books.” A question that arouse to me after reviewing this article is: Should the media reveal the graphic nature of war, for the purposes of reporting the full implications of war as observed by the reporters? What I have determined to be my response to this question is: Yes, the media should in fact expose the graphic nature of war so as to adequately inform the public of what the “real war” is like. I believe that that the exposure to this graphic content a necessary to fulfilling the media’s role in a democracy of informing the public of what the “real war” is; so that we may understand the full implications of war in the future consideration in military involvement. If we exposed to war as it really is we may better understand what war is and may aid us in refraining from military action unless determined to be absolutely necessary. It is therefore that I have determined that this graphic content as absolutely essential information in the evaluation of whether or not military action is appropriate. Seeing that this information is essential to the objectivity of war coverage the media does have an obligation to expose us to the graphic nature of war, under its role of informing the public as a media serving a democracy. What implication’s this graphic content would have can range from: Increasing support for a war by displaying the state of the afflicted, to; lessening the support for war as a protection for all of humanity.

I am pro-ProPublica

"ProPublica is an independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest. Our work focuses exclusively on truly important stories, stories with “moral force.” We do this by producing journalism that shines a light on exploitation of the weak by the strong and on the failures of those with power to vindicate the trust placed in them."

This is how the ProPublica website describes itself, and it really is a great media source.  That is, if you're into that whole "social responsibility" thing.  I read an article the other day on their site that had to do with new federal rules for natural gas companies to disclose information about the chemicals they use for hydraulic-fracturing.  The article laid out the Bureau of Land Management's draft of proposed rules regarding fracking, and went in to detail as to how certain loopholes may be used to go around these rules.  While the article was informative and the issue responsibly addressed, what impressed me most was one of the comments underneath.  In class, we talked about how the comments section can be a very informative collection of diverse opinions.  Many different types of comments had to do with the content of the article of course, but there was one comment that caught my eye.  'John' commented not only on what the article had to say, but also on the quality of the article itself.  He noted that the article formed one side of the argument pretty informally.  I would say that given past articles about fracking, we can let this detail slide.  But it really said something about the quality of discussion on this site.  The readers are concerned about the state of journalism itself, and want to hold ProPublica to the high standards they expect.  It's worth looking at this article, and I recommend looking around at different articles.  Many of them are boring and simply lay out facts for the good of the public, which is something that our media could use a bit more of.

http://www.propublica.org/article/federal-rules-to-disclose-fracking-chemicals-could-come-with-exceptions