Compare and contrast media coverage - Research Paper Example

Making this news channel the home of the Democratic Party. Not to be outdone, Rupert Murdoch, a well known staunch backer of the Republican party set up Fox News to rival CNN in the cable and online news front. That rivalry of the two moguls was a given since politics has always been news fodder for Americans. A late comer to the cable and online news scene is MSNBC. A network known for trying to remain in the middle of the issues and never taking political sides. That is a representation for MSNBC that cannot be denied while viewing the news channel or reading the partner website.

Basically, the three news websites exist as an extension of their cable news channel counterpart. With fast breaking news reports as collated from various sources and compiled into a comprehensive article that is available for reading anytime and for free. This compare and contrast essay hopes to be able to compare the three websites in order to help people decide upon which particular site best suits their tastes in terms of news reporting and information dissemination. Since the American troop pullout from Iraq is a very hot topic this election season, I decided to look further into the way that the three sites covered the news item on an almost real time basis. Pres. Barack Obama is expected to meet with his Iraqi prime minister counterpart soon in order to discuss the pullout plan and what America's role in Iraq shall be after the full troop pullout.

It is of the utmost importance that the information regarding their meeting be as concise and informative as possible. Which is why I decided to begin our comparison testing of the sites by looking at the overall layout and presentation of information. The first thing that stood out for me was the way that the CNN website tried to keep the layout as clean and concentrated on the main news topic as best as possible. Cleverly using the “Story Highlights” tag on the left side of its news story, the reader no longer has to read the full article if they do not have the time to do so because the “highlights” are already spelled out for the reader.

The most important parts of the news story is already on hand and that mere snippet contains almost all the important information that one needs to remain truly informed of the events on hand. Fox News tended to crowd their news page covering the troop pullout and discussions between Pres. Barack Obama and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al- Maliki with other links to news items that had no direct relation to the Obama - Maliki meeting. Instead their website directed you to links of news items which were localized in setting and content.

On the other hand, MSNBC was the same as CNN in the sense that they concentrated their news item on the historical meeting between the president and prime minister. However, just like Fox News, MSNBC tended to insert different news items and links that had no relation to the story on hand and instead, concentrated on national politics such as the elections and a supreme court justice under fire. In terms of how well these three news websites present their information, what becomes evident as one reads the report is that each website has the news of the meeting between the two leaders is that the coverage and theme of reporting has a tendency to show the political inclination of the news agency.

CNN spoke highly of the way that the troop pullout happening in Iraq is the