NMalec

A commemoration of a Minnesota boy who died in the Iraq War.

The Pioneer Press gives a clearer picture of who this boy was. He was very patriotic towards America. Although he lived in the Netherlands after he was 12, he only spoke English with his friends and family and never Dutch. The description of events leading up to his death are also very vivid. For instance, 3 of his friends died in battle and then he began having nightmares.
I think that the Star Tribune article only gives a superficial account of the things that were mentioned in the Pioneer Press article.
One problem is the angle they take, which is that he wanted to come back and start his life. But in the Pioneer Press he is pictured as a patriotic young man that lived for his country. Both might be true, but judging by what I the detailed accounts by relatives he first and foremost wanted to work for his country (the US) in the army. In the Star Tribune they didn't mention that he had always dreamed of becoming a US soldier until half way through the story. But in the Pioneer Press they mentioned this very important detail in the second graph.

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A new Minnesotan income tax rate will be voted for on Saturday. It would be the highest income tax in the nation, but the tax is only directed at the wealthiest segment of the population, and only includes 60,000 people.

The Pioneer Press's lede describes the income tax proposal in terms of the nation and who it effects, by saying that it will be the highest income tax rate in the nation and will effect the wealthy. The Star Tribune describes it in terms of what the money will go for, which is education and tax relief.
The Pioneer Press makes a judgement on the second to last paragraph that says that, "The measure, and a similar new 9 percent rate the House wants to levy on couples with $400,000 or more in annual income, would face a near certain veto from Gov. Tim Pawlenty. "
Although this is probably true it should be attributed, but isn't.
The Star Tribune, for instance, says, "Gov. Tim Pawlenty has said he will veto any bill with an income tax increase."

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Ethiopia broka a truce fire with one of Somalia's dominant tribes killing 11 people and causing large numbers of people to flee. Ethiopia broke the truce to secure that another Islamist country would not rise up.

This story seems to be written well by both Reuters and Guardian Unlimited, but the Guardian gave us more desctiption of why they broke the truce and they also said that Ethiopia feels they have basically accomplished there mission. The Ethiopian government wanted to keep another Islamist country from rising up, because Ethiopia is primarily a Christian country. The Reuters story was written a day later, so it is possible that they felt that that informaiton was old news and didn't include it.
Obviously the challenge for this article is getting accurate information. It is a very chaotic situation and hard to get accurate numbers of deaths or people fleeing. In the Guardian it was written that a telephone call from a woman in Mogadishu to the Associated Press was cracking. This also lets the reader that the phone call may not be exactly correct. In addition it is most likely a translated message.

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Gas prices went up about 6 cents per gallon, but that increase is smaller than usual increases. And prices may be going down soon.

CNN reports that gas has risen 6 cents per gallon and compares this increase to the prior two weeks, which saw an increase of 20 cents per gallon. Reuters UK gives a more broad look by saying that it costs 11 cents more per gallon to fill up your tank than last year, but 42 cents less than the record high price of last year. My question though is what the 11 cents is referring to, is it the average total, or what? That could tell us a lot, because fluctuations in the price of gas can be very fickle.
Another thing was the number of gas stations surveyed by the "Lundberg survey" was reported as 5,000 stations in CNN and 7,000 by the UK. Which is correct? I don't know, but that is a pretty big discrepancy.
I liked that both papers reported the two lowest and highest prices of gas along with the average price.
And CNN also reported gas averages in a few large cities from America to give us a general view. The places chosen are all seem pretty far spread apart except for maybe Philadelphia and Hartford.

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The second round of voting happened in Mauritania last week, this is the first democratic election since their 1960 independence from France.

I think the lede in Voice of America is very descriptive and jam packed with all the background and information of what is happening. The BBC starts with a description of the election itself, how many came to vote, and who is running, the article describes the background throughout, but mostly at the end.
The VOA really shows what is happening, they describe the different views of people. That most people seem happy about the voting process and most criticism has died down and people are optimistic the junta will hand over power to the elected person.
The BBC mostly focuses on the slavery issue, which is not mentioned in VOA, but seems like a very important issue for the region.

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2 more children die of the flu, and some are saying this is a wake-up call to parents who didn't get their children flu shots.

The lede for the Star Tribune reads, "As an unusually LETHAL flu season winds down" and the third graph of the Pioneer Press says "The number of child deaths has troubled state health officials, who otherwise have reported a fairly TYPICAL flu season."
The two sentences contradict each other, one says the season was typical and the other says it is lethal.
I think the Pioneer Press has reported this well, it tries to bring up questions to why a typical flu season would produce so many deaths. But I think the Star Tribune does a better job of encouraging parents to give their kids flu shots.

Posted by Nicholas Malec at 7:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A law that was passed in 1994 that obligated physicians to make public drug company payments to them. The public data was looked at by the journal of American Medical association and they found that these payments were huge and are probably higher, because they weren't all recorded due to neglect.

Their were many numbers in these articles. In the Pioneer Press they reported that "there were 6,946 payments to doctors totaling nearly $31 million," which was nice because it gave a broad overview of the numbers. They also separated payments into what the physicians were payed for, whether it be speaking or education, and into how much the top three drug companies payed.
The Star Tribune decided to just use the total amount of money given to physicians in 2005, which I felt was kind of limiting.
One major problem was the way the numbers from JAMA were reported. The Star Tribune gave a very vivid description by expressing the range from $100 to $1 million, while the Pioneer Press just said doctor's recieved over $100 without expressing the full range. I felt this didn't capture the seriousness of the payments.
On the other hand that 1 million dollar payment could have been an outlier, but even if it was in the Star Tribune report we can see at least three examples of doctor's being payed in five digit numbers.

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A small town in Pennsilvania is trying to pass a law that penalizes people who rent to, or hire illegal immigrants. The ACLU is suing them.

I think the article in the Herald Tribune would be hard to write because there are many judicial decisions that need to be organize and expressed coherently in the column. The writer organizes the decisions in the order of which trumps the next. So the later one makes the former inconsequential.
The lede is also very good. It paints a picture of a backwards small town, without really saying that it is backwards. It says,"During a nine-day trial, U.S. District Judge James Munley learned a lot about Hazleton, a working-class former coal town that few outside Pennsylvania had heard of until the mayor declared a crackdown on illegal immigrants."

The Washington Times elaborates on a piece of the article that I was curious about. It discusses whether crime really has increased in that city because of immigrants.

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Bush went to Columbia on part of his tour in South America. This was the most dangerous country on the trip.

The NY Times begins with a descriptive lead that uses the message that is printed on his Air Force One screen to describe the dangerousness of Columbia. The nutgraph appears in the third paragraph.
The LA Times explains the story right away, but uses numbers of security officers, restrictions and precautions to describe the dangerousness of the trip.
I think it is quite appropriate to focus on the tension of the Columbian trip because his purpose of going was to talk more about Plan Columbia, which apparently is used to stop terrorist actions and other violence in Columbia.

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Mauritania had its first free election in over 40 years this week. A military coup took hold of the coutry in 2005, but barred their members from running for office. However, they did set the stage for this weeks elections.

The BBC;s article is very clearly written, it has a clear order from important to least important information then with background on the military coup and problems that face the country due to racial tensions.
The Guardian article is much shorter and so doesn't get into as many specifics, but despite this, it does manage to summarize the situation well.

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An investigation found that the FBI has been over using the power it was given after sept. 11th.

I think it is important to make it clear that the FBI did not misuse their power intentionally, and for now, the misuse of power are seen as negligence. Both the Star Tribune and Pioneer Press did do this.
Both articles also explains clearly what the FBI did wrong and tells us the oints-of-view of congress and civil liberterians. However, they basically use the same sources in a different order on the page, so it is possible we miss out on some other points-of-view.

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Discussion about the new tuition reciprocity arrangement between Wisconsin and Minnesota will be put off until Fall 2008.

The Star Tribune and Pioneer Press basically talk about the same story. Tuition rates for Minnesota schools are lower for Wisconsin students than they are for Minnesotan students and talks to change this are being postponed. But the Star Tribune takes it from the angle of Robert Bruininks. They talk about his feelings on the agreement that he brought up in 2004 and how he is starting to become impatient with its delays.
The Pioneer Press takes the angle of the student and assures us that students that plan to "cross the border" will not be affected for another year and therefore save some money. I'm confused how Minnesotans save money in this deal, but anyhow that is what they wrote.

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Pawlenty went to the Middle East to thank the troops for there hard work. However, cynics say the trips are politically motivated, although many also disagree with this.

The Star Tribune tells the story of a Governor visiting his troops to encourage and thank them. At the bottom of the article we can find a paragraph that questions his reasons for going, saying that he wishes to raise his political prowess, but it is quickly rejected as a faulty assumption.
Meanwhile, this tiny conflict is expanded into an entire article in the Associated Press. But even that article concludes that the assumption is probably faulty, saying that other senators could go more often too.
The lead in the AP article is intriquing, but with a hint of sensationalism. It is intriquing because it shows right away that Pawelenty's three visits to Iraq is different from other governors, but then it makes it seem like that is a bad thing. I think they just want to spin it this way to make the story more interesting. Though it is worth mentioning it isn't worth writing the whole article around.

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The world is suspicious about China's intent in raising its military budget by nearly 18%. US is asking for greater transparency in discussion with China.

Somebody's numbers are wrong in the lede. The NY Times says that the increase is the largest in 5 years and the Guardian says that it is the largest in ten years. But, this is a rather trivial statement given the issues addressed.
Articles like these must be sure not to over sensationalize, while still reporting the possible problems that could occur. I think these articles do that well. They show that the Asian region, but gives reasons why they are suspicious. John Negroponte also gives a very valid reason why the US feels unsure about the deicision. He says "It's not so much the budget and the increases as much as it is understanding those questions better through dialogue and transparency."
I like how the Guardian tries to keep a more global perspective. This can be seen in the lede where it says "INTERNATIONAL concerns about China's growing military power and a spiralling GLOBAL arms race"
This is compared to the Times "an increase that quickly prompted the UNITED STATES to renew its calls for more transparency from the Chinese military"

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Shinzo Abe, Japan's prime minister, denounced claims that Japan was took in sexual slaves from Korea and other countries during WWII.

This is a topic that needs a lot of background, since it is based on history. People need to know that there has been a denial of this issue by many Japanese for a long period of time, much like the Holocaust denial by some Germans and others. I think both the BBC article and Britain's Telegraph article did this well, because they both gave accurate background and at least implied that there has been a debate by mentioning that there was not even an apology until 1993 and the compensation that was given to the "comfort women" was from donations and not by the government.

Posted by Nicholas Malec at 11:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Bush is lobbying congress to renew his No Child Left Behind law. He visited Silver Street Elementery School to talk about it.

The Washingtonpost article gives the larger picture of why Bush is talking about the No Child Left Behind law and what he said about it at an elementary school.
But the NWI article talks about the view of the elementary school's community towards having the president there. At first the article is a little too much to swallow and it seems like it is a bit bias and maybe even generalizes the community, because everyone is depicted as patriotic and with red white and blue apparel. But then they have a quote from a local who said,
"Regardless of your political affiliation, or what you think of the war, it's still the leader of our nation," said Wells, who did not vote for Bush. "I'm 45 and I've never seen anything like that in my life."
And this makes it more balanced, since it shows that the act of honoring the president was more out of a universal human characteristic of respect and propriety and not about absolute loyalty to his political ideologies.

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