As I was searching for an article to critique for this week’s blog entry at the last minute, one of the main news topics that appeared on nearly every website was the current economic stimulus plan. The first article I ran into was from AOL news. In my opinion this article gave a good overview of Obama’s stimulus plan. I thought it did a good job of providing readers with background information about the subject matter. The main gist is that the U.S. Congress on Friday is expected to pass a $789 billion economic stimulus package that is aimed at unleashing large spending and tax cuts to help dig the economy out of a 14-month recession. The main criticism is obviously from the Republicans who opposed the stimulus plans the Democrats put forward, saying they expanded government spending too much and did not include enough tax cuts that they argued would better boost the drowning economy.

I am not one to normally read the business section of the paper because the language and subject matter is usually way over my head, not to mention I usually have no interest in the topics covered whatsoever. But in this case, our current economic situation is extremely important so I’ve found myself trying hard read articles about it. Not only do I want to be informed about our current economic situation for my own good but as Parks said in class, people still read the paper to make them feel smarter. I found an article in the New York Times that did an excellent job of putting the current stimulus plan into terms I could relate to. The article talked about the main provisions in the bill that will hit you directly in the wallet. The article really helped me understand the situation. For example, when talking about income tax, a topic I am usually not too familiar with, the article says, “In 2009 and 2010, there is a tax credit of up to $400 for individuals and $800 for married couples filing their taxes jointly. You calculate your credit, subtracted from other federal taxes you owe, by taking 6.2 percent of your earned income.” This really spells out exactly how the bill will affect you. It goes on to say, “Your eligibility for this credit begins to phase out if you’re an individual with an adjusted gross income over $75,000 or a couple with income higher than $150,000.” This article really did a great job of breaking down the proposed bill and helped readers like me understand how it will affect America in the near future.

The last article I found regarding the new stimulus plan was in the AJC. This article is a great example of local lens because it filtered the national news down to the local level. The article talked about the largest roadwork company in Georgia and how the new federal stimulus plan might provide hundreds of jobs for people they had to lay off. The article provides hope for local readers by saying that The White House projects the compromise bill will create 107,000 jobs in Georgia. Again, this was a great way of filtering national new down to a local level.
I liked seeing how one huge topic in the news, such as the new stimulus plan, can be written about in so many ways.