Donald Trump and Times Magazine

This week's blog is going to be able the alleged news bias and the misinformation our "Madam President" has tweeted about in the last week or so about how he turned down the whole TIME magazine's title of "Person of the Year" and ultimately how the people themselves take to the internet and troll the living hell out of this over grown man child and probably why we see the net neutrality situation occurring. I won't go into huge detail on each and every part of this because it will only be speculative due to the time crunching that will occur as we have finals coming up (btw best of luck for my peers and such. It's been a blast to have shared this experience and this year with y'all.)

So, this week I pulled my information from Politico yet again! I have really grown to love the fact that one story is backed by at least 3 articles having different views on said story. This was the exact premise of my blog in the first place so it has been good to be able to stream line by blog posts. 

The story has to do with Trump stating that he had to turn down the person of the year cover and all from TIMES magazine to which TIMES shot back stating that they had never offered this spot to the president. That could be simple because there are actually people out there in the world who deserve this position more than this man child (my words). More to the fact is that twitter blew up with people basically trolling the president in various ways (please click the link to see more information about this). As you are probably all aware if you have me on twitter, I have made it a point to leave comments on his statements as I find him to be the least credible individual on the planet and as much as I might not like CNN and their ways of presenting their stories there is still some shred of truth to their blog like story telling posts.The fact is, our news stations are corporate ran and as a result their sentimentalization of simple stories has grown quite large. 

This brings me to the fact that Net Neutrality is under fire currently and I personally think these situations are prime examples why that might be the case. There is a lot of internet traffic occurring which is good but I feel as though the pull of NN might be a way to which individuals are limited to their ability to seek out actual news and not the propagated stories to which our news sources allow us to believe. 

If you are not familiar with this then I IMPLORE YOU TO RESEARCH AND PLEASE LOOK INTO SIGNING THIS PETITION TO REJECT THE REPEAL OF NN BY THE FCC

here is the link 

I will leave this short and sweet and say this year has been one hell of a ride and I wish the best for you and yours. Happy Holidays and have a wonderful and safe New Years! 

Thank you!

New Tax Bill Gets Past the House!

So today the proposed tax bill made its way through the House of Representatives by a 22 vote margin. This is kind of huge due to the fact that a tax bill has not been passed like this in a while. Not a single democrat voted in favor for the bill and about a dozen Republicans voted against the bill but never the less it still went through. The thing is these bills often include more substance than just the issue of tax as we have seen time and time again when a huge bill makes its way through the house. The reality is that this bill if it makes its way further through the law making process will see itself change into something much different than what it currently is. For instance, the bill currently has within its content a repeal of the Affordable Care Act. This is huge because the president CANNOT line item veto the bill once it makes its way to his desk so if Trump really wants the bill to go through he will sign it without ever really looking into the fine print.  This bill is supposed to redistribute the tax burden on those states like New York and California who's personal state and sales tax are high and low tax states basically have to supplement the difference in taxes to those states. Personally, I'm broke as can be so no amount of tax change alters my life of roman noodles and $0.99 sandwiches.


As always, I have used Allsides (Politico) as my means of information because I like the approach of the website. The blog speaks on the subject and provides three separate stories from the LEFT, RIGHT, and CENTER. Please skim through them and consider each of their approaches and what information that they choose to provide. Make up your own conclusion on the subject and go from there.

Have a wonderful day and comment below if you feel so. :)

Politico - The Subtleties of Media Bias

This weeks post is going to recap on much of what we have learned in class about the media and its ultimate and unavoidable bias which comes with it. The article is found in their "Perspective Blog" section and is titled The Subtleties of Media Bias. I find this article extremely important because it speaks on the very point to which my blog is set up! I've spoken on this subject as well we have learned much of this in our readings. Media outlets are inherently bias and we often end up leaning toward the media to which cradles our ideas and political identify without ever really looking toward the other side of the fence for a better understanding of the information. I myself have found that finding the most unbias, neutral information within the media is more important. This blog states that doing so isn't always the best thing but that we should also willingly read information which comes from all sides of the spectrum. So what we read ultimately has a bias to it whether we realize it or not and this can be witnessed through what and how information is delivered to its consumers.


Types of Bias

1.) Bias by Omission.
2.) Bias by selection of sources.
3.) Bias by placement
4.) Bias by labeling
5.) Bias by spin

Each one of these forms of bias can be seen and understood once one admits to the fact that there is bias in all forms of information. By doing this one can read an article by FOX news and say, "hey they left out ____" or watch CNN and ask, "hey, this person really an "expert?" or "Why is President Trump's tweet more important than the issue in Flint?" Surely there are more important things to discuss than Don Jr's new tie he wore to an interview...



This blog goes on to speak on gate keeping bias to which conservative outlets tend to speak on illegal immigrants and the crimes in which they commit while liberal outlets speak on white terrorist occurrences which have been more frequent. In this, though both may be occurring both sources choose to speak on these subjects exclusively and because of this the fact is distorted and often made to seem more frequent than in reality. This is not to say the act should be taken any less than it is.

In addition, because of the ownership of the media outlet the advertising and corporate bias ultimately shapes the content and delivery of the information. Lastly, this blog speaks on tonal and concision bias which occur through the media. Tonal bias ultimately deals with the delivery of a story to which can be drastically different based on who you get the information from. This is something that I spoke on in one of my first blogs where RT (Russian Television) spoke on German-American relations if we were to go to war with North Korea. You did not hear about this in American media what so ever. Concision bias deals with the fact that information is compressed to the point where the entire subject matter cannot be discussed to a full understanding and because of this really important information is broken down into Powerpoint - bullet points of information to give a general overview of a story which often times makes something that is extremely important seem much less so.

Please take the time to read the blog from Politico and tell me what you think of this blog below. Since this has probably been one of the most busy looking blog I've posted lately I figure I'd wrap the blog up with some funny political cartoons. :) Goodnight

Russian manipulation of Facebook and Election

Hello again blog people! Here is another week where I'm going to bring you something from Politico. I know probably by this point you are noticing that my content is starting to get predictable in terms of where I'm getting my information. I have to admit I have been extremely busy and I haven't had the time to really look into a bunch of different sources to which I could pull from this particular website. I find this to be much more convenient. Never the less! I found this article I really like which speaks on the election (I'm sure we're all tired of hearing about it) and how the original investors of Facebook were actually Russian investors. We can all agree that Facebook has played a large part in how we all get our politically driven news sources and MEMES. So, in theory it could be safe to say that the investors to which helped fund Facebook in the beginning might control the content in which it produces and allows so in this idea it's accurate in saying how the speculations of "Russian involvement" could be plausible - however you might view it. Personally, I think it's iffy at best!




The story here goes on to say that Silicon Valley managed to get an investment from a Russian bank. This guy by the name of Yuri Milner invested around $850k of her own money into a company Donald Trump's step son Jared Kushner partially owns.

Apparently the bank is called VTB and was eventually sanctioned and is currently being investigated by the U.S. for its potential involvement in the 2016 election. As a general over statement it seems like there was investment in this company prior to it becoming public and in addition over time these folks grew in wealth and managed to pull some really big profits. There was a lot of people who refused to speak on the situation (I would assume because to them it's speculative) yet it seems really odd with all of this going on but in the same situation....I feel like it's possible that Silicon Valley is just a hot bed for investing toward technology and it could be a coincidence that the person who happen to invest in this company was Russian...or maybe not. I guess we will see as time goes by.

Weighing Immigration Status in The States

Hello everyone for our 11th week in the class (I think) hope you are all doing well with everything going on in the world. I am here once again with information to consider and hopefully offer something in terms of perspective on an issue which seems very important to many Americans - immigration policy and the over all impact to which these individuals have on our country and society as a whole. So, I'm not going to state my opinion on the matter because I like to think I see the big picture and understand why folks come over and I won't debate the legality of it because I mean let's face it...we've all run a red light or stop sign before knowingly. We've all jay-walked but it just seems like a better option than walking all the way to the cross walk so I won't go into all that.

So there are many issues in which people like to associate illegal immigration with such as crime and taking advantage of tax payers money where as others who defend it often say that these individuals take the jobs too low in wage or just undesirable for Americas to have. In addition to this (I'm personally stating this) I think the tax issue of undocumented workers is tricky because what is not paid to the state or federal income tax is most definitely being done so through sales tax. That's all I'll say on that.

I was looking for a number of pictures but some of which popped up made me feel uncomfortable to post up and I figure if that is the case then I don't want to be misunderstood as "this or that". Ultimately though what it understood whether you look at the immigration of those coming from economic crisis, religious persecution, war, etc.  Folks are coming to this country to start over and have a better life than they did before and that's all one can really ask for. Now, I know a lot of you will argue "well then they need to become citizens or what have you" but honestly how many of you actually know the process to which it takes to become a citizen or even to become a permanent resident for that matter? Never the less, here are two pretty cool websites which speak on the Pros and Cons of illegal immigration from ProCon.Org through AllSides (Politico) and an open debate on the subject brought you to by Debate.Org. I figure as an added bonus, if you are interested on steps to which it takes to get your Green Card or Citizenship HERE you are. There is a link box to the rightin this page that will bring you to everything. 

Also this site gives information on the cost to which it takes to become a citizen 


Green Card Costs <----Here. 

^^^^^^^ Can I just take a moment and ask why in the hell is her name "Test 5 Specimen?!" that's really sketchy to me.  This was pulled from the Immigration Direct website too.

Personally, I'd be screwed because I don't have that kind of money and time just lying around as I have bills to pay. I'm sure everyone else does too.

Anyway, there are a lot of steps to which one has to take just to be qualified to get the card or citizenship so I feel like it's a catch 22.

"Oh, how things have changed"

How is everyone this wonderful Sunday? I normally try and keep up with the class subject in terms of these blogs to keep the pace with the class and to better idea as to where you can find this weeks blog entry. In any case, I figured to kind of go with the original concept of the blog itself where I look at one story or an idea and show how different media sources write about the story to give you a better understanding of bias and the spin to which journalists use to shape an idea within their story.

In this weeks blog entry I figured that since I had so much to go off of I would pick a story...or speech which I actually really enjoyed which I didn't think I would. SO! A few years back (if anyone in the class is old enough to really remember him while he was in office) we had a man, a republican by the name George W. Bush or "Dubya" to which a lot of folks after a while felt like he wasn't the brightest bulb in the pack but lately with all the memes of him looking longingly at Michelle Obama (which personal I absolutely love and find hilarious) you kind of grow to miss the ol' idiot. Anyway, the man and his swagger gave a pretty damn good speech on where America needs to be and tried to remind us of what America stands for. 

This week and most likely the remainder of the class I will be pulling from politico because it gives the exact example as to what I was hoping to provide within my blogs. In this link below I will present the main story of   George W. Bush's speech which will open a link and provide an overview of his speech and then three sources to which leans to the left, right, and center but not on any one extreme but immediately even before reading any of the links you can see in the title itself how it may shape the way in which you go into the article right of the rip.


This video below is a speech he gave some years back and honestly it shows my age because I grew up at the end of my years in high school and then some after with him on television and through out the year 2000's. It's weird as I grow older how my feelings toward this man change with the more I know. 

But without any "dilly dally" here is the speech in which George W. Bush gave which I find to be just absolutely wonderful. I love to see old presidents get back up and speak. It kind of gives light as to what captivated the American people into voting for them in the first place without all the political influence involved to shape them and without the stress of political backlash.


Lastly, for those who still think George W. Bush in some way doesn't deserve a special place in American history... maybe these sweet...sweet moves will convince you otherwise. 


EDIT: I figure if everyone loves Michelle Obama and she's cool with o' Dubya then maybe he's alright hahah

Muckraking and the governement

Hello there! So for this weeks blog post I'm going over activist journalism and muckraking. In other words, when a journalist or media source uses a story to directly or indirectly influence people on a situation and as a result (sometimes) policy is set forth to correct the situation. More often than not these policies fail to be presented because it's not an issue to the public officials or that the people themselves are not aware. The American attention span on some issues are short term and because of that many of those in office to not find it worth while to actually go ahead and correct the issue itself or even to a point it's like opening up a can of worms and will be more trouble than it is worth that is...unless it provides upward movement for the individual's career who might implement the policy.


With the inequality becoming ever more of an issue as time goes by it would seem that there is a great need for activism journalism and muckraking to come back into prominence. Yes, I truly understand that it is of the utmost importance for a journalist to be objective but in these cases I find that it is more important for those who tell the story of the down trot to take a side clearly and firmly.

This article done by the Huffpost speaks upon the ever growing issue of homelessness which seems to be increasing as time goes by.  As the numbers stated in this article claim 22,000 homeless children in New York is an amazing number of homeless I fear that this number is probably conservative at best and the numbers are much higher. Still, this only touches on the homeless children and not the adults which I can assume is equal if not higher than that of this number shown. For a country which speaks on the importance and duty we have to this countries children - the fact that there are this many in New York ALONE is a scary truth that this country does not in fact give a damn about homeless and especially as it claims to follow Christian morals and principles. Would you know say that this is a corner stone to the religion?


Flint Michigan's water situation is a perfect example as to why muckraking needs to come back into the playing field ASAP! The fact is this issue has been going on for years now and more often than not unless you're near those who are dealing with this you only really ever hear about it in random situations that is ...if you're not one to seek out information about these sort of problems. It seems that there are no officials really being held accountable for this and there seems to be very little going on in the way to improve it either. You'll hear about those artists and athletes who are donating money to the problem but let's be honest, most of that money doesn't go completely to the problem to which the money is donated.



I think this cartoon of the situation is actually pretty spot on. It is brought to you by an article which was written by The Mercury News. That's mercury...both on the page and in the water ;) and honestly I could go into so many more issues here in terms of public issues which need to be brought to the attention of those in power but more importantly there needs to be a DEMAND for action and not simply words. If they are unable to do anything about it then we as citizens need to hold them accountable until someone does something about it!

I will leave this blog post short and sweet for the sake of time but I wanted to leave this last picture up so you get what kind of issue this is...and really think about it, would you drink this water?!