Hall Response - Chelsea Clements

Boy have things changed since Hall wrote “Gore Media Coverage - Playing Hardball.” Written in September/October 2000, Hall juxtaposes the medias treatment of Al Gore and George W. Bush, saying that Bush “is given the benefit of the doubt on subjects where he could be vulnerable”, while Gore is portrayed as an exaggerating liar. Gore's media coverage is marred by scandal while Bush's media coverage is about him being “a different kind of Republican”, and being a “compassionate conservative.”

Anyone who has been alive in the past six years knows that this is not the same media coverage Bush receives today. Due to failed policy with the war in Iraq and the failure of the US economy, there isn't a media outlet left in the US that has anything nice to say.

Moving towards a more recent article written in 2004 by Hall, Hall once again describes media coverage but this time talks about the war in Iraq.Hall talks about the war taking an ugly turn as the opposition organized and began to fight back. She said that viewers in this country have been shocked by news of suicide bombings, daily casualties, and the mutilation of bodies of American citizens. I've always remembered my mother telling me about the media coverage she saw growing up of the Vietnam war. She describes the coverage as more uncensored, graphic and shocking than most things that are shown today. 

Hall describes how the Iraq war has set new precedents on how journalists cover conflicts. Journalist have been embedded within Iraq in order to give continuing coverage. With each war, new journalistic tactics have been created. “How will we do it next time?”, Hall asks.
While some journalists say that embedding has been successful, others argue that embedding has negatively affected the quality of reporting. While the question of the reporter's safety has always been raised, the embedding of journalists has given US viewers a new appreciation of the US military as a whole while offering little context and perspective on the war as a whole.

For someone who considers themselves knowledgeable about the world's on-goings, I feel like I don't know the real progress of the war. Whether or not that is the fault of the journalists or the censorship of the US government in the information that is disseminated throughout the media, I don't have a broad understanding of the progress that has been made.