I think that Mayer put together a pretty good article for informing the public about how much of a vested interest Germany has in the European Union’s current debt crisis. Before reading this I knew that Germany was kind of the ringleader of the European Union, but I wasn’t aware of how much this could affect the Germans. As I interpret it, what is going on is that after emergency bailouts for Greece, Ireland, and Portugal; there is a fear that the Euro could fall. Basically everyone is getting sick of bailing other countries out and our contemplating leaving the union and bringing back their own, independent currency. I believe the article was well written, and paints a pretty vivid picture of what is going on with our friends on the other side of the pond.
One thing that I thought Mayer did a good job at is getting a wide variety of people who have already been or potentially stand to be affected by the current crisis. The first person interviewed was the former head economist of the European Central Bank. This made sense because who would know better about the Euro than the man in charge of keeping track of it. The next people interviewed were small business owners in Frankfurt. This paints a picture of the angry Germans who are working the grind every week busting their butts, and left with a bad taste in their mouths when they hear about people like the Greeks who are being bailed out with German taxpayer’s money. The next person interviewed was the CEO of the second largest financial institution in Germany. This guy also was talking about how the German’s are worried that they won’t ever get this money back that they are lending for the bailouts. This is showing how the big financial institutions are concerned, but so are the little guys. The story also talked about a family owned Glassworks Company who exports their products to museums all over the world. This was to show the other side of things. If Germany went back to its own currency it would appreciate and they would lose a lot in exports. I think her selection was a great way to add to the story. I think she brought a broad spectrum of people in order to represent different parts of the German society.
I would call Mayer’s lede, a soft lede. She introduces the story with a description of the city of Frankfurt. She just gives a brief backdrop of how the city differs so much from the traditional German City. She gives a good description of how unlike the typical quiet old fashioned city in Germany, Frankfurt was a hotbed of economic activity and was the obvious choice for the European Central Bank. It actually sounds pretty positive until you get to the second paragraph. This is where the picture of what is going on is really put on the table. Because the real story isn’t put out right off the bat is the reasoning why I would consider her lede to be soft. As for the story itself, I would definitely consider it to be hard news. We live in an age where a global economy is a real thing. Germany and the other European nations will not be the only ones affected, everyone who trades will. The fact that this story has the potential to affect all of us is definitely a reason I would call this story hard news. Not only does this story have to do with the present but it also could affect our future as well.
I had an appreciation for Mayer’s tone in the story. I thought she had a great way of conveying the way that everyday German’s feel about this issue. There were two examples of this that made me understand how the Germans felt. One was when the man said “I'm fed up with working hard so the Greeks can sit in cafes and drink coffee with brandy all day,” The other example of this was when the second man said "We're slaving while Greece parties," When I read this I thought of how it would make me feel if I was put into the same situation as these guys. I would say that she did in fact do well at showing both sides of the issue though. There was a lot of negativity towards Greece but she did show the impact that dropping the Euro would have on Germany’s huge exporting industry.
As far as art and craft is concerned, I believe the line between the two is quite grey. An interesting form to contemplate this in is one’s writing style. I would say the artistic element to one’s writing would be their creative talents. The ability to find the right words and ways to tie things together would be the largest artistic element to me. One’s craftsmanship would be more of the things that have been drilled into your head over and over by teachers throughout the years. Things like grammar, sentence structure, and punctuation.
I believe that Mayer did a great job at conveying the people of Germany’s feelings regarding the current debt crisis in the European Union. She got good quotes from a wide range of people. There did seem like there was some negativity towards Greece in the story, but then again she was just quoting the people she interviewed. It’s a current well written story with the potential to impact all of us. She wrote it in a manner that kept it interesting to read. For these reasons I would call this a good article. 