The first bullion in the review states "The nations psychiatrists are deeply concerned with the five percent of Americans who approve of congress". This review was released shortly after the end of the government shutdown which negatively affected millions of Americans and was generally seen throughout America as a failure by congress. It pokes fun at the fact that congress has an approval rating at all after being unable to avoid government shutdown while trying to agree on a budget.
The first satire news story in the review covers the debt crisis and what is being done to avert America defaulting on its debts. It opens up announcing that white house officials have released the schedule of several key "shoutings" between the president and congressional leaders. This introduction of the schedule using the word shoutings instead of debates relates to its first bullion, referencing congresses lack of ability to debate and instead slide into arguments and shouting. It goes on to say that both sides are optimistic about the upcoming rounds of shouting and that they could also include a significant amount of yelling, a small number of shrieked party slogans, and even a short period of incoherent grumbling. The first statement enforces the satire used in the beginning of the story, arguing that congress is not debating, but is instead fighting, but that congress members are unaware of this fact. The second statement pokes fun at congress members using every opportunity they can during their debates to promote their party; and the third simply brings attention to how most of congress is probably upset with is own inability to get things done in a timely fashion.
The Onion also uses an actor for a fake phone conversation where he acts like white house press secretary Jay Carney and says "As always, President Obama is eager and ready to sit down with leaders across party lines shout his political views directly into their faces, and has expressed optimism that they will then scream back at him in kind..." This once again enforces that congress is unable to get things done, however this time it brings the president into the story. It is meant to show that nothing is going to get done as long as each party is shouting their views into each others faces rather than sitting down and talking things out more reasonably.
The review also touches on other unrelated topics, however its satire on the failures of congress were the main story within this weekend review. Overall I believe that The Onion does a great job of condensing news stories into satire filled spin offs that still somewhat accurately relay the news. I do not believe that The Onion would be useful or even funny at all if the viewer was not aware of the news stories that it references, as there is little to no explanation of the actual news, just poking fun at it with a funny, and possibly more open minded view. For a report on the government, the report seemed to be completely bipartisan, making fun of of both parties equally. Because of this, I think that anyone who enjoys comedy and has mostly open minded views would both enjoy and take something away from watching this, and other The Onion Weekend Reviews.
