Pulled Quotes

  I like Laura Kurtzman’s lede in her Associated Press story found in today’s USA Today, because it uses Bill Clinton’s words to express the legitimate view that Hillary’s ongoing battle for the democratic nomination will not hurt the outcome of the election, while at the same time letting you know that that is what he believes.   Another effective element of the story is her skilled use partial and full-sentence quotations. The author utilizes partial quotes where they fit the bill, such as in the first paragraph:  ”chill out” is language that, since it was used by the former president, is relevant to quote, while the rest of the paragraph logically uses paraphrasing to effectively lead into the story.  Meanwhile, full-sentence quotes from relevant sources dot the story strategically and sparsely.  

Here are some suggestions for the Associated Press author who wrote today’s story in USA Today covering the debate over Hillary Clinton’s continued campaigning for the democratic presidential nomination.   1) The lead, and, accordingly, perhaps even the title, should be changed to emphasize the fact that there is much debate over Hillary Clinton’s refusal to hand over the democratic nomination to Obama, instead of the fact that Obama has encouraged her to continue her fight.  This is because the entire story, save for the second and third paragraph, concentrate on the controversy–not Obama’s view of it.  Besides that Obama’s comments on the subject were brief, more devastating to the newsworthiness of them is that it would obviously be potentially negative for the candidate to publicly state that she should give up.  Further discrediting his apparent approval of Clinton’s effort, Obama is said to have urged a California superdelegate to hurry up and make up his mind for the good of the party in another Associated Press-written story in today’s USA Today.    2)  Obama’s comments on the U.S. job market in paragraph 10 appear too abruptly.  This could be fixed rather simply by preceding this paragraph with paragraph 13, including some transitory language, and, in effect, creating a nut graf for the new topic that dominates the rest of the story–campaign issues/random comments from political figures.    3)  The last four paragraphs should be pasted before said nut graf, as they are more relevant to the story’s initial topic than the information that begins at the current paragraph 10.   

I thought it would be appropriate this week to talk about a sports story since I have just completed one. This article from USAToday.com  describes the Chicago Cubs baseball game on March 30. The article is written much like any other sports coverage one but focuses a heavy deal on the fact that this is the Cub’s 100th year since winning a World Series because this is the most newsworthy.

The article follows the inverted pyramid rule quite nicely. The most important and most current information is in the first two paragraphs. Then as the article progresses there is a great deal of background of the “curse” that is supposedly haunting the Chicago Cubs. I thought the reporter did a good investigative job uncovering all of the theories that fans possess. He, the reporter, also provides a great deal of quotes from fans and from a Chicago Cub’s historian/expert. These quotes gave a lot of good information and authenticity to the piece.

Overall I thought the article was written well. I think the reporter could have given the gist of the story in a few less paragraphs, the overall story seemed quite daunting to read for a browsing reader.

Apparently, all the hype surrounding the safety and usefulness of social networking sites like Myspace.com isn’t always true.   In the case of Tiffany Rubin, her Myspace account allowed her to receive an important tip in the case of her missing son, who was abducted by his father and taken to South Korea.  Claire Trapasso wrote an article about Rubin’s story for the Associated Press.  Within the first few sentences, the reader can garner that Trapasso took a features-y approach in her writing.  While I’m certainly in favor of that approach, I was a little frustrated at how difficult the lead was to identify. 

Trapasso began her article by talking about Rubin’s hopelessness until she received the tip, but I think the real news is that (a) her son was found, and (b) he was found alive.  True, the tidbit about her Myspace account playing a role in the discovery is interesting and out of the ordinary, but it’s not as important as her son’s well-being.  Also, I can’t help but wonder why someone sent her a tip on Myspace instead of calling the police, a question that was never answered anywhere in the article. 

 While this article was certainly more interesting than the standard, cut-and-dry articles that stringently follow the inverted pyramid style, I still feel that this article buried the lead and left a few too many details out.

I guess I ran out of things to talk about, and this story caught my interest. The journalism is as refreshing as the story is. The News Journal’s story of a Stetson student’s high-heeled first step into the pageant world. The main focus of the article is Jessica Rafalowski, the student who managed to win Miss Florida and is on her way to compete in the Miss USA Pageant with out any prior pageant experience. Remarkable.

The article is pretty straight forward. Not really any lead though, except, it would’ve been really cool to see an article strictly about a girl who likes to watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  Specifically Donatello, he was my favorite. Another blog perhaps.

Aside from the deceptive lead, the article goes through a simple form, biographical in nature. Because of the otherwise dull nature of Rafalowskis life, a dull article followed. And following this soporific chain: A dull blog. Good night.