About us Login Get email updates
County Fair
Print

ABC News makes our head hurt

March 03, 2009 3:36 pm ET by Eric Boehlert

With its online article headlined [emphasis added]:

Obama's Choice to Bare Arms Causes Uproar: First Lady's Sleeveless Fashion Choices Draw Criticism

We get  that first ladies make news with their fashion sense, and we get that Michelle Obama's sleeveless dresses have cause a bit of stir, and that's fine. If ABC News wants to cover that, be our guest.

But it's the pointlessly breathless coverage ("The latest arms controversy embroiling the White House...") and the lame reporting effort that makes our head hurt. Because after reading the article you discover the ABC reporter only talked to two people for the article (or at least only two were quoted); a reporter for the Politico and a reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times. But neither of them directly criticized the Obama's fashion choices.

So where was the "uproar" and  "criticism" and "controversy" coming from? The only proof ABC pointed to was the fact that some Sun-Times readers posted comments online saying they didn't like the sleeveless look in the winter. That's it. That's the premise for the entire article.

And yes, we're guessing if we went to the Sun-Times website we could find readers who left comments praising Obama's fashion. But that's not the story ABC wanted to tell.

Pass the aspirin.

Expand All Expand 1st Level Collapse All Add Comment
    • Author by fawltylogic (March 03, 2009 5:03 pm ET)
         
      I don't get it. Who cares about this and why?
      Report Abuse
      • Author by clams casino (March 03, 2009 11:53 pm ET)
           

        She looked beautiful and classy, and apparently Imaeyen Ibanga has a problem with that.

        Report Abuse

my.MediaMatters.org

Login  Sign Up

About the Blog

Feed Icon
  • County Fair is a media blog featuring links to progressive media criticism from around the Web as well as original commentary, breaking news and rapid response updates to major media events from Media Matters senior fellows and other staff.