Media Meditation #4: "Look Who We've Got Our Barack on Now!"

President Obama summons the power of God on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on Wednesday
- Credit: ReviewSTL

My Wednesday night homework routine was interrupted this week by a special edition of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. His shows have been filmed in Washington D.C. all week, leading up to a highly-anticipated joint rally with frenemy Stephen Colbert in the nations capital. What made this episode so special was that Stewart's esteemed guest would be none other than President Barack Obama. Apparently, it was the first time a sitting president has appeared on the show, clearly a major accomplishment for the show, network, and Stewart himself.



The following clip shows the beginning of the show:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Barack Obama Pt. 1
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Rally to Restore Sanity

There were a few parts of this clip that I found very interesting:

1. The overall introduction - Stewart's first words on the show verbatim read, "Hey, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Daily Show. My name is Jon Stewart. Ladies and gentlemen... please join me in welcoming the president of the United States, Barack Obama." It was incredibly simple and brief, which I took as a sign that he was eager to bring the president on stage and get the show rolling. The way he delved right into it really made me feel like the show progressed very quickly.

2. The 'Mug Force One' joke was fantastic and Obama took it right in stride. I would imagine Stewart felt like a tall pole in a windstorm as he poured him a glass of water from his own mug; the first joke is always the hardest to pull off.

3. Obama laughed a bit in the beginning of the clip, but as the interview progressed, he barely smirked. Was it strategy? Was he hurt by Stewart's ribbing? It was an interesting dynamic either way, from loose, fun Obama to stoic, presidential Obama. Yet it is still a drastic change from our last president.

Our last president... Credit: BBC

A lot was accomplished by the interview. I was surprised by Stewart's behavior during the interview. I feel like he prepared for the interview much the same way that he prepared for his appearance on Bill O'Reilly. He was giddy with excitement, as would be any presidential interviewer, but he laid into Obama with some rather uncalled for remarks. I would have never expected Stewart to joke about Obama electing Larry Summers to his cabinet and almost feigned surprised when Obama did not go along with the joke.

The thing that I liked most about the interview is Obama was allowed to talk. To me, the interview was better than any podium speech Obama has given (save maybe his acceptance speech). The interview was organic. When Obama gave a cookie cutter explanation of something, Stewart had the ability to say "wait a minute" and ask more directed questions. We also got to see Obama answer questions without a timer, without being cut off by other politicians, and honestly, he was speaking to a friendly audience in a comfortable chair. I was in no way surprised by his success in the interview, but I was certainly surprised by Stewart's "audacity" at some points of the show.

Even though this was a Liberal-Moderate president in front of a Liberal-Moderate audience, I still wonder how George Bush would have fared on ANY political show with tough questions while in office. I didn't really notice more than a question or two that Obama sort of deflected, and there were none that he declined to answer altogether. Most importantly, he admitted failures and shortcomings; to those who want transparency in office...it was perfectly exemplified in the interview. To me, this may have been the "FDR Fireside Chat" of our generation.

Media Meditation #3: SPOILER ALERT - Understanding The Social Network

I never go to the movies, ever. I'm almost always fine waiting for the movie to come to television or my friend's DVD collection. Every once in a while, though, there is a movie that is so enticing that I feel compelled to see it in the theater. Similar to the way I treat buying a CD, I hold these films on a very high pedestal, so they better live up to my expectations.

When I first saw previews for The Social Network several months ago, I was awestruck. The trailers were literally mind-blowing. I first saw the trailer in a theater and everyone groaned, half in anticipation, half saying "Really? A Facebook movie?" Well, it was only a matter of time before someone documented the social media phenomenon. This is the first trailer I saw, and the most powerful one that I've seen since:


The music is the first thing I noticed; a choir remake of "Creep" by Radiohead...moving. It captures the intensity of the movie beautifully and foreshadows the reasons why he created Facebook in the first place, a desire for acceptance and possibly because he was dumped by his girlfriend.

I finally saw the movie a few weeks ago. My reviews are mixed, but mostly positive. Here's one issue I had with the film - the CGI cold breath when the actors breathed in the "cold" Boston summer air (I assume it was not actually filmed in the winter). Apparently someone else shared my sentiments, because I found another post about the topic at MovieLine.com where they try to determine whether or not the CGI breath would ruin the movie's chances of getting an Oscar. It was so blatantly fake that I couldn't even take the cold scenes seriously; think Kevin Costner's blasphemous Boston accent in Thirteen Days...or Kevin Costner's accent in anything. It just cheapens the movie and takes you out of the experience. It was inexcusable for a movie that I thought should have been absolutely perfect.

Another critique I had was Justin Timberlake's role. I didn't get it. Whenever I thought of Sean Parker, I thought of a dumb guy, who happened to know how to program, but also took advantage of other people. I sort of got that from the movie (he tells a girl he's an elementary school dropout, which isn't true), but Justin Timberlake was just too damn cool to play Sean Parker. The movie led me to believe the viewer is supposed to like Sean Parker, but to me, he ruined the fun..or did he? Maybe he just gave great ideas. Maybe it's all Mark Zuckerberg's fault for trusting him all along. Maybe Eduardo Saverin's exclusion was his own fault for not staying involved in the project. Either way, Sean Parker/Justin Timberlake in general is an aspect of the movie that left me a skeptic.

Sean Parker looking like the
intelligent entrepreneur he is.

Credit: VentureBeat.com

The positives of the movie are not to be forgotten, though. One cool item of note, the Winklevoss twins are played by one single actor, named Armie Hammer. It seems like extra, unnecessary work to me to pick someone who looks more similar to the Winklevosses than just a finding a pair of twins that look somewhat similar.

I left the movie theater feeling 3 things:

1. I left feeling weird, which was a goal of mine. I wanted to have gone through a complete social phenomenon as I did when I created a Facebook account. I thought this movie was going to be one of the first times people stepped back to look at the unbelievable social revolution they have been so heavily invested in for years. I don't think the movie really captured what kind of effect Facebook had on the users (except for at the end when he goes back and friends his ex-girlfriend, Erica - nice touch), but it did a great job portraying everything else. Nonetheless, I felt weird.

2. I left feeling like everyone in the film was "in the wrong" so to speak, aside from a select few characters. I was compelled to feel bad for Eduardo Saverin, but I think he may have rode Zuckerberg's coattails a bit. I thought Sean Parker was a scumbag, plain and simple; how he still owns a piece of the company is beyond my comprehension. I also thought Zuckerberg came off in a totally negative light; even I thought he was an annoying asshole after seeing the film. What really surprised me was that I realized how astonishingly accurate Jesse Eisenberg's portrayal was of Zuckerberg upon watching YouTube videos of the real Mark Zuckerberg's speeches.

3. I left feeling like I wanted/needed to do something big. Mark Zuckerberg built a social network from the ground up with over 500 million users in a few weeks...as a 20-year-old...to get back at his girlfriend...

What have you done lately?

ORAL PRESENTATION: Story #25 - Prisoners Still Brutalized at Gitmo

Main points of the story

1. The Immediate Reaction Force (IRF) is a group of U.S. military that is instructed to assist with resisting prisoners during extraction and various crises that may arise (i.e. riots). They are accused of many cases of abuse, but not covered by the media.

2. Al Jazeera reported a year after Obama was elected that prisoners felt their treatment had deteriorated under the president’s brief time in office. Obama had vowed to close Guantanamo and end torture of prisoners.

3. The government refuses to appoint an independent special prosecutor to investigate the claims of abuse.

4. There are over 200 prisoners in Guantanamo and only 20 have been released under Obama after the administration made plans to close it completely.

5. Prisoners and their lawyers have reported cases of misuse of pepper spray, presence of attack dogs, extensive'
physical abuse, mistreatment of prisoners during prayer, and over-force-feeding prisoners during hunger strikes.

Image Source: http://www.buzzflash.com

LexisNexis search results on the topic

Statistical Breakdown:

Results for “Guantanamo Bay abuse” – 999+

Results for “Prisoners brutalized at Guantanamo” – 96

Relevant results for “Guantanamo Immediate Reaction Force” – 1 (only 113 words)

Pertinent links:

"The World: Soldier lifts lid on Camp Delta: For the first time, an army insider blows the whistle on human rights abuses at Guantanamo" (The Observer 2005):

"Guilty Until Confirmed Guilty" New York Times 2006):

"Closing Guantanamo" (New York Times 2009):

Analysis of search results: It is apparent that Guantanamo is in fact getting a considerable amount of attention, as it has been a hot political issue for many years now. The particular issue of the Immediate Reaction Forces, however, seems to be much less covered. Most of the stories about Guantanamo abuse seem to be editorials and focus more on placing blame than making a difference. With all this in mind, the subject is not necessarily ignored or underreported, but there are many details left out. It is also seems less reported now than it was under the Bush administration.

Image source: Amnesty International

MIDTERM REFLECTIONS: A Mass Media Breakdown

1. After studying media for eight weeks in this class, what have you learned? Please be specific.

I have learned that the media has issues that I was not aware of before taking the course. I imagine the upcoming part of the course about media censorship will be even more eye-opening in that regard. So far, I learned that many films vilify Arabs and it started before the second war in Iraq. I wonder if this is a broader issue than just with Arabs and if one could make a similar documentary to Real Bad Arabs about Caucasian Americans.

2. What is the most important thing you have learned about yourself as a critical reader, a writer, and a thinker in this class so far?

I have learned that my critical reading skills are not quite up to snuff. There is a lot of reading in this course so it provides challenging exercise for my brain, but I am still slowly improving. I think my writing is solid, clear, and concise and my thinking skills are entirely unmatched

3. What’s one thing you would do differently this first half of the semester if you were to take this class again?

I would try to stay more connected to the blog. I have tended to only check in when something is due, so I have fallen behind it a little bit. I am interested in blogging and immersing myself in the media will help me become more aware of it.

4. What’s one thing you would like me to do differently this first half of the semester if you were to take this class again?

The heavy reading in the first two weeks was overwhelming but seems somewhat necessary (read: completely necessary). Perhaps one of the books (FEED or AMUSING) could be replaced by a movie and/or revisited later in the semester.

5. Please comment on the usefulness of the power tools, our quizzes, the course blog, your personal blog, our films, and our books (AMUSING, FEED, MEDIA/SOCIETY) as learning tools.

Power Tools – The power tools are very important and help me understand the true meaning and what is really going on with our media culture. I think, above all, they apply most to our media lives out of the classroom compared to anything else we cover in class.

Quizzes – The quizzes are a good way to expose us to new forms of media and practice applying our power tools, but I often get distracted from the media txt and would argue that we often aren’t experiencing the texts the way they are meant to be experienced. Maybe if we simply watched video clips and held a power tools-based discussion, for example, it would be more beneficial.

Course Blog – The course blog is difficult to follow and keep up with, but it is helpful for the course. As I mentioned, it’s a great way to immerse ourselves in the media.

Personal Blog – The personal blog is a unique way to complete rather simple assignments and really let us let loose and express ourselves. We can even practice writing interesting blogs if that’s something we want to do.

Our Films – I enjoyed Real Bad Arabs because it was slow-paced and interesting, but I didn’t really like some of the YouTube clips we watched like “The Machine is Us/ing Us”, which made me downright uncomfortable and confused.

Books – I think FEED was an excellent book to include and focus on and I felt a tight connection with it right away. I felt the opposite about Amusing Ourselves to Death because it was a bit bland and seemed to cover things that I already noticed about our culture. Media/Society is a decent class textbook, but I think it is a bit broad for our course. For someone who has already taken Mass Media and Society as a course, I think I already have learned the basics of the media culture and I am now trying to delve deeper.

Camp Champ Radio Spot: Life with the Feed ain't so Bad After All

Script:

Devon: So what seems to be your troubles today miss?

Emily: I can’t keep track of anything! I’ve had almost every cell phone there is, but I am constantly losing them or breaking them! I just can’t keep all the info I need stored in my phone anymore, I need more space or another device!

Devon: You’ve come to the right place. Hi, I'm Dr. Rob Williams. Although the Feed is new, everyone is getting them. I’ve installed so many, it’s going to be setting the standards for how we interact.

Emily: I was worried that if I didn’t get one, I would be left out. Or worse, I wouldn’t be able to get a job.

Devon: You know, employers are going to be looking for this. You’ve made the right choice.

Emily: Its amazing that I can’t have a device that is capable of so much, and not have to hold on to it.

Devon: Yeah it truly is amazing. Communication is just as easy as a thought. Instead of hand-held, it’s brain-held.

Emily: Wow! That sounds amazing, hands free brain held world!

Devon: Just look how happy all of my customers have been!

Kelsey: I never get bored anymore. The entertainment and information is almost endless. I think about the recent baseball scores and they’re there right in front of my eyes. Talk about getting smart while just using the power of your own mind.

Darin: The feed will be available spring of 2011, the hands free brain held technology will allow you to access anything at the speed of your thoughts. Endless amounts of information that was once at your fingertips is now even closer. Shop, share, shop, share and expand your mind with the Feed. Get it now.