http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2010/08/kanye_west_has_a_goblet.html

I chose this article because I enjoy Kanye’s music and although he is no where near a perfect human being, he speaks from his soul.  I did not like the lead in this story.  I know the author was trying to showcase Kanye’s over the top personality but I don’t really care that much about Kanye renovating a house and I certainly don’t care about his pillows.  Definitely wouldn’t have enticed me to read forward if I didn’t have to. I also don’t like how often he author puts her opinions and assumptions about Kanye in the piece without havign it have anything to do with what Kanye actually said.  An example of this is “His tendency, in fact, is to inflate his cockiness to the point of grotesquerie, to type it out in ALL CAPS, to render it obscenely over-compensatory, and maybe even to inscribe its plush trappings with a faint tinge of penitent masochism.”  No wonder Kanye distrusts journalists.  I also didn’t like how the author kept talking about Kanye inviting her in his home.  This seems unimportant to me and is definitely a weak way to close a story.  Overall, she had a lot of good quotes and I felt like the reader got to know Kanye on more of a personal level, but the anecdotes and opinions made this a mediocre article to me.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-runaway-general-20100622

I really like the opening to this article.  ‘How’d I get screwed into going to this dinner?  It is not only a great and funny quote but it encapsulates him as a person and his feelings towards France.  This piece in general is great because of  Mcchrystal’s frank, abrasive and humorous personality.  His frankness in describing his opinions of Obama and their conflict in general is very interesting.  I also liked the use of multiple perspectives because Mcchrystals views are so adamant you need another view to give the article balance and legitimacy.  Finally I liked this quoteThe only foreign invader to have any success here was Genghis Khan – and he wasn’t hampered by things like human rights, economic development and press scrutiny because it puts in to context how difficult of a task Mcchrystal is trying to accomplish.