The impeachment of a President of the United States, for only the third time in our country's history, is one of those occasions and the Joplin Globe, along with all of the remaining daily newspapers in this country, had the added responsibility this morning of creating a product that served to tell the details of the event, plus serve as a souvenir edition.
The lead headline- Impeached- told the whole story and was the headline used by many newspapers today.
The Globe's selection of accompanying photos was also appropriate with Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi poised to bang her gavel as the lead photo and a smaller photo of President Trump below it.
No matter which side you fall on, the Constitution makes it clear impeachment is a creature of the House of Representatives and Wednesday's vote was Nancy Pelosi's big moment. (Whether it is something she will celebrate for the long term will be determined in November 2020.)
The Globe led with the Associated Press, but localized the story with a sidebar featuring comments from Trump supporters and opponents.
The Globe regionalized coverage in a second sidebar with statements from area representatives and reserved the left column for the two most prominent local stories- the appointment of a new police chief for the City of Joplin and the ruling that the defendant in a local murder case is competent to stand trial.
The newspaper devoted the entirety of page six to the impeachment, offering a package of graphics from its parent company, CNHI, that detailed what impeachment is, the history of presidential impeachments and what will happen now when the articles are delivered to the Senate.
With an internet news product, you have the opportunity to recreate your product minute by minute.
A newspaper has one opportunity to get it right. While there was nothing spectacular about today's Joplin Globe, there was not any need for anything spectacular.
All it needed was to tell a story of history in the making.
Today's Globe did just that.
No comments:
Post a Comment