Framing

Learning about framing has helped me to better understand and digest how different cable news outlets present news to their viewers because I now know what to look for (e.g. keywords, tone, context) when viewing the broadcast.

What framing is essentially is how the media presents something to its viewers.  Reporters and editors are responsible for deciding what stories should be covered, but framing comes into play when deciding how to present those stories to the audience. What you can end up with is the same story covered by many different news outlets, but very different view points on the story.

For example, say a bus crashes on the highway. Now one media outlet may cover the crash through the eyes of the victims, describing what they went through and how tragic the incident was, but another outlet could bring up an issue with how the bus company hires its employees (professionalism, experience, background checks), and try to find out the reason behind the crash. That is just a simple example of how framing works.

Framing becomes dangerous when it's used to alter context/information the viewers receive, like in this example from The Daily Show. Sean Hannity's show edited video footage of a speech given by President Obama, and in the process took a quote about taxes out of context. Assuming the average viwer doesn't take the time to go and look at the entirety of Obama's speech, they now think Obama said something that he didn't say. Basically, the viewers of Hannity's program that night were given false information due to how the news outlet chose to show Obama's speech.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-september-9-2010/are-you-ready-for-some-midterms----msnbc-s-political-narrative