9/25/16 poll critique

I have finally settled on four news organizations to study and they are NYT, ABC News, Real Clear Politics and Five Thirty Eight.

The New York Times is endorsing Clinton; they have endorsed the Democratic Party for the last 56 years. Their homepage was filled with stories on the election, but not necessarily about the polls. Their poll results were not on their homepage either.

“Hilary Clinton for President” by Chang W. Lee and supported by the editorial board was a very biased article.

“We’re aiming instead to persuade those of you who are hesitating to vote for Mrs. Clinton — because you are reluctant to vote for a Democrat, or for another Clinton, or for a candidate who might appear, on the surface, not to offer change from an establishment that seems indifferent and a political system that seems broken.”

Real Clear Politics listed their polls on their homepage. They list national polls from many different news organizations. Although, the rules behind their own polling is not clear. They also list articles from different news organizations stating different viewpoints. They are not endorsing any particular party.

ABC News’ polls are associated with the Washington Post. All of the seven sins were clearly listed under their methodology except for when the polls were taken.

http://www.langerresearch.com/wp-content/uploads/1178a12016Election.pdf

Their front page was focused on the presidential debates, and not the polls. They seem to be leaning democratic.

Five Thirty Eight had their poll on the homepage and one article related to the polls on the same home page. Other articles were about the presidential election, but not the polls.

Their “poll” isn’t much of a poll, it’s more of a forecasts based off of numbers of previous statistics and not current voters. 

poll critique 9/19/16

Polls should not drive the news because they tend to misrepresent information at times.

According to the Montevideo article, “The season of poll watching will soon hit high gear,” poll information is sometimes misrepresented by media. According to the same article, a lead of six points or less should not be considered a “lead” if you consider the general margin of error to be about three percentage points, the only time it is a significant lead is if the points are twice the margin of error.

Another reason that polls should not drive the news is because it, theoretically, can give the public a false idea. The New York Times article, “Real-Time Election Day Projections May Upend News Tradition,” describes the way publishing early results may negatively affect voter turn-out.

Polls should be accessible to the public so that anyone can educate herself on the presidential election, but they should not drive the news because it can negatively affect the information gathered by voters and voter turn-out.

Polls shouldn’t drive the news, but when a drastic shift occurs in the lead close to election time, polls will inevitably drive the news anyway.

Realclearpolitics.com has some interesting articles related to the election and explanation of what’s happening in the polls without being entirely too formal or biased. 

Clinton currently has the lead, although Trump is quickly catching up. 

revised clinton critique

            By Caitlin Fowlkes

The article, “Inquiry Sought in Hilary Clinton’s Use of Email” in the New York Times by Michael S. Schmidt and Matt Apuzzo, was well written. The most obvious problem about the article was the fact that the reporters relied on unreliable sources in order to be the first news organization to release the story. Two serious facts had to be corrected after publication. These corrected facts were key to the story, one false fact about an investigation into Clinton and the other about a “criminal referral”. These were particularly important facts to have gotten wrong. It’s even more surprising and shameful because the story was published by one of the most reputable newspapers in America.

            The headline, therefore, was incorrect also. The investigation addressed the possible security breach with Clinton’s email address, according to the correction. The lead paragraph used a very newsy approach, setting the tone for the article as serious. Aside from the wrong information, the article used correct grammar, punctuation and spelling. It correctly followed Associated Press style. The article was very informative, but there was no room for imagery.

            The picture used with the article helped set the tone. The colors were rich and dark, Clinton appears to be refuting an allegation. Her body language looks as if she’s trying to calm down somebody, or all of America. The dark colors add a sinister air to the article and give Clinton a certain darkness. Perhaps, this is NYT’s way of adding an edge to the story without obvious bias.  

            Plenty of personal details regarding the scandal, possible investigation and trials involved with the findings are given. Although, the article can’t be considered fair or ethical because the reporters put their news coverage first before the truthfulness of the story. They published false information about a presidential candidate knowing that the information may not have been entirely true. They also caused much embarrassment to their news organization. If the article had been fact checked correctly during its first run, it would have been ethical. There is no bias in the article, only news. It would be fair to Clinton because it mentions that the emails were only considered classified information after they were reviewed once it became public that Clinton was using a private email for work. The article doesn’t make Clinton out to be a bad person, just slightly technology incompetent.

            All of the sources are correctly attribute. Although, the article was completely fair and objective in the sense that the information isn’t misleading after the corrections; it is important that the reporters included the part about the speculation of the State Department delaying the hearing on the document handling issue in order to protect Clinton. This is a key component to the story because of all the speculation of government agencies trying to protect Clinton on a number of issues. Without pointing fingers, the reporters covered all sides of the story well. Unfortunately, it is a shame to the paper and the reporters’ reputations that the story was published with such important facts incorrect.