How the media got Obama elected

[Munchkin03]

Originally Posted by srmom

So, now it is post election, and what kind of reporting is done regarding the stock market? There are small boxes that show the declines on the front page with - "story continued in section D (the business section)."

So, even though the market is lower than before, it is now back section news???

Are they trying to put the genie back in the box?!? Unfortunately, it may be too late!

Is this media manipulation?

Maybe where you are. Our paper of record has about 50-50 finance/politics. My hometown paper tends to have local news as the front; they're pretty insulated from a lot of what goes on with the economy, so it may not be that important to the editors.

I wonder how much of it is just saturation. Are people tired of hearing about the bad economy?

[moe.ron]

One thing that people seems to forget, Obama went through a harsher and longer primary. Everything that could've came out about Obama came out during the primary. By the time the election came around, there was nothing new to talk about. It was the same thing with McCain. However, Palin is a different story. She was a clean slate and with McCain and Obama completely vetted out, Palin was the next person to be vetted.

Nothing about biases, just that Palin was an unknown and she had a story to be told. McCain camp messed up royally and did not told the story well.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by moe.ron

One thing that people seems to forget, Obama went through a harsher and longer primary. Everything that could've came out about Obama came out during the primary. By the time the election came around, there was nothing new to talk about. It was the same thing with McCain. However, Palin is a different story. She was a clean slate and with McCain and Obama completely vetted out, Palin was the next person to be vetted.

Nothing about biases, just that Palin was an unknown and she had a story to be told. McCain camp messed up royally and did not told the story well.

I disagree. Other than the Reverend Wright stuff, I don't think most Obama stuff got much actually critical coverage even in the primary by the traditional media, to the point that the Clinton folks were pretty angry about it. I also think Biden got off really lightly considering how many ridiculous things he said during the campaign. If you know about them, it might be a reflection of your willingness to watch Fox or your reading on the internet.

It may be possible to justify extra scrutiny of Palin from her nomination onward for the reason you suggest. But it doesn't really explain why there was so little coverage of any of her actual governance. I think people know troopergate, Wasilla rape kits, and maybe interest in removing books from the Wasilla. They also know the fact checking on the Bridge to Nowhere story. Can anyone report any other action by Palin in her elective history? Does that make sense if it's an unbiased press?

We need to know about her husband's flirtation with the Alaska Party and hear critics from the lower 48 of her Predator Control programs, but nothing about successful programs that contributed to her initially high approval ratings in Alaska?

Is it really reasonable to just assume that there weren't any?

[KSigkid]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

I disagree. Other than the Reverend Wright stuff, I don't think most Obama stuff got much actually critical coverage even in the primary by the traditional media, to the point that the Clinton folks were pretty angry about it. I also think Biden got off really lightly considering how many ridiculous things he said during the campaign. If you know about them, it might be a reflection of your willingness to watch Fox or your reading on the internet.

It may be possible to justify extra scrutiny of Palin from her nomination onward for the reason you suggest. But it doesn't really explain why there was so little coverage of any of her actual governance. I think people know troopergate, Wasilla rape kits, and maybe interest in removing books from the Wasilla. They also know the fact checking on the Bridge to Nowhere story. Can anyone report any other action by Palin in her elective history? Does that make sense if it's an unbiased pressed?

We need to know about her husband's flirtation with the Alaska Party and hear critics from the lower 48 of her Predator Control programs, but nothing about successful programs that contributed to her initially high approval ratings in Alaska?

Is it really reasonable to just assume that there weren't any?

Look, I'm as conservative as anyone, but other than a show or two (Today show/Matt Lauer springs to mind), I didn't see any overwhelming bias either way. I thought the networks were pretty fair on everything.

A part of it could also have been the cooperation given by the campaigns. It seemed that Obama's camp was a bit more cooperative than McCain's camp. Now, a lot of those times Obama, Biden, etc. were simply offering platitudes and sound bites, but it was something. I thought McCain's camp should have done a lot more to try to control the message going out to the public, and to shape the media coverage. Maybe that's the ex-journalist/media relations person in me...

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by KSigkid

Look, I'm as conservative as anyone, but other than a show or two (Today show/Matt Lauer springs to mind), I didn't see any overwhelming bias either way. I thought the networks were pretty fair on everything.

A part of it could also have been the cooperation given by the campaigns. It seemed that Obama's camp was a bit more cooperative than McCain's camp. Now, a lot of those times Obama, Biden, etc. were simply offering platitudes and sound bites, but it was something. I thought McCain's camp should have done a lot more to try to control the message going out to the public, and to shape the media coverage. Maybe that's the ex-journalist/media relations person in me...

I think you're more willing to fault McCain/Palin than I am. I tend to think it the media's job to avoid being controlled more by one campaign. While an argument can be made the Palin's contacts with the press were limited (and, at least in the widely seen interviews, terrible), it's harder to say that about McCain.

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

I disagree. Other than the Reverend Wright stuff, I don't think most Obama stuff got much actually critical coverage even in the primary by the traditional media, to the point that the Clinton folks were pretty angry about it. I also think Biden got off really lightly considering how many ridiculous things he said during the campaign. If you know about them, it might be a reflection of your willingness to watch Fox or your reading on the internet.

It may be possible to justify extra scrutiny of Palin from her nomination onward for the reason you suggest. But it doesn't really explain why there was so little coverage of any of her actual governance. I think people know troopergate, Wasilla rape kits, and maybe interest in removing books from the Wasilla. They also know the fact checking on the Bridge to Nowhere story. Can anyone report any other action by Palin in her elective history? Does that make sense if it's an unbiased pressed?

We need to know about her husband's flirtation with the Alaska Party and hear critics from the lower 48 of her Predator Control programs, but nothing about successful programs that contributed to her initially high approval ratings in Alaska?

Is it really reasonable to just assume that there weren't any?

Selection bias at its worst - what do we know about Obama's 'governance' as a Senator? As a State Senator? How much of this was produced by the media?

Modern political campaigns are dominated by negativity, to the point where it's "who is the least bad?" on some level. We don't remember "good" things - we note bad. It's classic selection bias.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by KSig RC

Selection bias at its worst - what do we know about Obama's 'governance' as a Senator? As a State Senator? How much of this was produced by the media?

Modern political campaigns are dominated by negativity, to the point where it's "who is the least bad?" on some level. We don't remember "good" things - we note bad. It's classic selection bias.

Which is why I think it's all the more important that there were many more negative stories on McCain/Palin than positive ones.

Have we posted this here before? The Pew Research thing about the campaign?
http://www.journalism.org/node/13307


ETA: Remember the conservative press's commentary about Obama's voting "present"? I don't think Palin's record is as complicated. I also think that coverage of Obama's record wasn't going to be as helpful to him as focusing only on his campaign message. I'm sure I'm guilty of my own selection bias, and I'm not trying to suggest a vast media conspiracy. I just think that this election was particularly bad in terms of a failure to provide good quality, unbiased coverage of both tickets.

[KSigkid]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

Which is why I think it's all the more important that there were many more negative stories on McCain/Palin than positive ones.

Have we posted this here before? The Pew Research thing about the campaign?
http://www.journalism.org/node/13307

But the research summary by Pew seems to say that the stories were reactive, and it doesn't make any conclusions as to whether those stories affected the voters. Additionally, it seems pretty broad in what it cites as "negative" and "positive" stories. From my reading, a story that Obama was doing well in the polls would be classified as "positive," while a story saying that McCain's numbers were falling would be "negative."

Also, I'm not saying that the media was "controlled" by a campaign, so to speak. But, the campaigns have a lot of power to shape the story, to shape the coverage. Again, I've seen both sides of it, albeit from a much more limited scale (in both reporting and media relations). But, the opportunity is there for a campaign to shape the news cycle to a certain extent, and Obama and his people did a better job of seizing that opportunity.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by KSigkid

But the research summary by Pew seems to say that the stories were reactive, and it doesn't make any conclusions as to whether those stories affected the voters. Additionally, it seems pretty broad in what it cites as "negative" and "positive" stories. From my reading, a story that Obama was doing well in the polls would be classified as "positive," while a story saying that McCain's numbers were falling would be "negative."

Also, I'm not saying that the media was "controlled" by a campaign, so to speak. But, the campaigns have a lot of power to shape the story, to shape the coverage. Again, I've seen both sides of it, albeit from a much more limited scale (in both reporting and media relations). But, the opportunity is there for a campaign to shape the news cycle to a certain extent, and Obama and his people did a better job of seizing that opportunity.

I think some of the stories were reactive, but I don't think it explains the complete imbalance.

I agree that there was a more cooperative role between Obama's campaign and the media, but I tend to assume this is because of media behavior and you assume it's because of campaign behavior. Without knowing what efforts the McCain campaign made, it's hard to really know.

EATA: I'm editing this again. If you look at page two of the report, it breaks down all the stories by type so you can see that while the coverage of polls was positive for Obama, so was almost everything else. And maybe offering support from your point about the failures of the McCain campaign, the only stories that were overwhelmingly negative for Obama were reports on McCain's attacks on Obama. But go to page three of the report and see that McCain got some of his worst negative coverage when he started to attack Obama.