The final New York Times/Siena College polls, released yesterday, showed a virtually tied race. Kamala Harris is clearly favored in states that account for 226 electoral votes, while Donald Trump is favored in states that account for 219. To win, Harris will likely need at least 44 combined electoral votes from the seven battleground states, while he will likely need 51. But surprises remain possible. A highly regarded Iowa poll, for example, shocked many political analysts over the weekend by showing Harris ahead there — a potential sign of her strength with white voters. Alaska is another state where she has a small chance for a big upset. Trump could pull off his own surprises in New Mexico or New Hampshire.
You can explore all of the combinations through this map.
1) What is the best path to the White House for each candidate?
2) Which candidate benefits most from the Electoral College? Why?
With Election Day right around the corner from Halloween, it is festively fitting for people around the nation to dress up as the next potential president on the scariest day of the year. Since 1996, Spirit Halloween has accurately predicted who would win the presidency based on sales of presidential candidate masks.
Many journalists were 'embedded' with the troops in WWII. The legendary Ernie Pyle from western Indiana wrote columns on their grinding ordeal and uncomplicated courage. Armed only with a typewriter, Pyle personalized war reporting, creating a bridge between the everyday soldier, whom he dubbed GI Joe, and the American populace.
As a roving correspondent for the Scripps-Howard newspaper chain, he earned wide acclaim for his accounts of ordinary people in rural America, and later, of ordinary American soldiers during World War II. His syndicated column ran in more than 300 newspapers nationwide.
At the time of his death he was among the best-known American war correspondents. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1944 for his spare, poignant accounts of "dogface" infantry soldiers from a first-person perspective. "No man in this war has so well told the story of the American fighting man as American fighting men wanted it told", wrote Harry Truman. "He deserves the gratitude of all his countrymen."
In 1854, London Times reporter William Howard Russel reports on the charge of the British Light Cavalry Brigade in Crimea. He writes of soldiers ill-fed, ill-led, and left on the field to die. Prince Albert is furious. Russell's reporting turns the public against the government, prompting history's first order of military censorship. Henceforth any reporter who reports information that could be useful to the enemy will be expelled. Russell is hailed as the 'father of war reporting.'
Bias is hard to avoid, but it can be really damaging - leading us to make poor choices without fairly weighing up the facts.
As human beings, we all bring a point of view into the world, and that point of view colors how we learn about and interact with it. This is built up from the moment we are born and will continue to evolve until we die. With that in mind, we should always be aware that we cannot react to anything in a completely objective manner.
That same logic holds true for media. All news outlets are organizations and made up of people. This means that editors, reporters, commentators, and researchers that work in journalism bring their point of view to work with them every day, and it is borderline impossible for them to completely separate themselves from the stories they report. It is therefore logical to assume that even the hardest news will be colored, to a certain extent, by the person reporting it. At a microlevel, when looking at a story, this point of view can manifest itself in a variety of ways that we should be on the lookout for:
Value as fact: In softer news, the presenter might attempt to pass off their beliefs as fact. This is especially true of punditry and opinion sections (think Tucker Carlson, Rachel Maddow, Sean Hannity, or Stephen Colbert) where the presenter is often attempting to confirm their own worldview and make that worldview more presentable to the consumer. If a worldview or set of values is stated, we should automatically be on the lookout for bias in how the story is presented.
Presentation of the facts: In hard news, it’s important to keep an eye on how the facts are presented. Were questions left unanswered? Was information omitted that could have been vital to building a clear picture of events?
Credibility and accuracy of sourcing: Did the story source a diverse array of credible viewpoints and make the effort to flesh out who or what they are and put the information gleaned from them in context? The less you notice this in a story, the more on guard you should be for bias.
Cherry-picking: How are sources represented in the story? Are they analyzed in depth or just at a glance?
Sensationalism: Does the language in the headline or body provoke an emotional response? If it does, it’s likely that you’re consuming something intentionally biased and seeking to elicit that reaction to further the agenda of its author.
Commentary: Does the story draw a specific conclusion? Do they tell you in the presentation of facts whether they judge a source to be credible or portray them in a positive or negative light? In general, we should be skeptical of any reporting that attempts to pass judgement on a source. It may be accurate, but further research will be needed on the part of the consumers to independently confirm this judgement for themselves.
Fighting BIAS can be even harder than detecting it, especially when we already have strong preconceived opinions...
The fear of phobias. Phobias are actually quite common, affecting more than 10% of the U.S. population. Phobias are the most common mental disorder in the United States, but far more women than men are affected by phobias. In many cases, people are able to recognize that their fear is irrational and therefore take steps to overcome their phobia. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, only about 10 percent of reported cases become life-long phobias.
Welcome to the home page of Mr. Kelly's Current Events class. This course looks at the role of the media on international, national, state, local, and school wide levels. Although the content is constantly changing there are recurrent themes including domestic and foreign policy, the economy, war, crime, and the environment. Here you will find assignments, online discussions, and your grades. Be prepared to keep up with weekly reading assignments and be respectful of each others opinions on this site.
