Homework

Problems with article:

1) Author uses himself numerous times but it has no importance on the article. Using himself doesn't neccesarily illustrate any points of interests, doesn't create an imagery, etc, it just mentions himself.

2) The article is very long. Over detailed I'd say. For anyone not a doctor and not a uber-medical enthusiast I'd say this article's length and detail would frighten casual readers. I'm still shaking. To play devil's advocate against myself, I like to have the details and information available, but when you read, especially McCain's section, some of the released information could have been summarized.

3) Focus/Goal: It was clear to me that they were trying to share the importance of knowing our possible president's health, but at times it just felt like a Term Paper than an article. In addition, there wasn't much of a goal with this article, nothing the journalist was trying to achieve besides sharing information. This may seem like a tough call, but I say this mainly because, for example, the reader reaches the Obama section, the journlalist runs out of steam and talks at length about smoking, as if we haven't seen a truth commercial. Or going into needless details over things that didn't need reiteration seemed to me like the author was trying to squeeze more juice out of a dried orange. It felt more like the article was droning on.

I also felt that the journalist wanted to stop this thing and talk about why they think sharing medical history is important, but this only came in bits and a little at the end.

4)Journalist style: Again, it felt like a Term Paper. Across different possible journalism articles, it felt too much like a Thesis and not enough like an article for a paper. The lead wasn't too bad, but was over. Information wasn't varied by importance but rather whatever came next I suppose. The conclusion felt more like the conclusion of an essay or the rather bad stories where an author tries to summarize everything in a paragraph or two.

5) Bad Ending: The quote wasn't something I'd want to go out on. It didn't have punch, in my eyes, that makes you go "Wow. That was a good story" and it didn't make me think "That makes sense due to the story". I think the last quote, if you end that way, should in itself relate to or summarize the story but leave a little punch, or style, for your article. I felt neither.

6) Not enough quotes, I think, but a lot of reference.

The Good:

It tried to be fair across the board, avoiding bias, by stating simply facts. It didn't take sides.

It tried to cover each candidate, so that, even the ones that took little space at least were mentioned.

It reported what info was obtained and what couldn't be due to lack of participation.