How the media got Obama elected

[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.

[KSigkid]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

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.

I don't know a whole lot of people who have worked on either campaign, or who have worked in high enough positions to know, but my experience with other campaigns (from the national to state levels) is that it works this way because of campaign behavior. It depends a lot on the work of the policy and communications people, and how they shape the relationships.

I'll check out the other parts of the report when I have a chance, but just wanted to make that point.

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

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.

Again - let's say there are 9 things that McCain did that were "negative" or had negative connotation for his campaign, and 1 thing that Obama did . . . would you thus be upset with a 3:1 ratio of good:bad stories?

You're simply not allowing for context here - it seems pretty clear that things like Palin's gaffes (real or perceived) were more pressing than anything the Obama/Biden camp did, and much more timely. Ayers got a lot of press time, but it happened years ago - it wasn't an ongoing story.

I guess I just don't see how you've proven any imbalance that can't be explained away by mitigating factors.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by KSig RC

Again - let's say there are 9 things that McCain did that were "negative" or had negative connotation for his campaign, and 1 thing that Obama did . . . would you thus be upset with a 3:1 ratio of good:bad stories?

You're simply not allowing for context here - it seems pretty clear that things like Palin's gaffes (real or perceived) were more pressing than anything the Obama/Biden camp did, and much more timely. Ayers got a lot of press time, but it happened years ago - it wasn't an ongoing story.

I guess I just don't see how you've proven any imbalance that can't be explained away by mitigating factors.

And I can't see how you aren't defining mitigating factors as anything that might justify the imbalance.

Think about the nutty stuff Biden said. How was it less pressing than what Palin said?

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

And I can't see how you aren't defining mitigating factors as anything that might justify the imbalance.

Think about the nutty stuff Biden said. How was it less pressing than what Palin said?

It's less "pressing" because of the nature of Palin's public vetting - I don't see why you're up in arms that "new News" takes precedent over "old News" during any given cycle. Additionally, the handling of Palin really made context control difficult - all you had were two interviews that went mediocre-to-poor, then a press corps scrambling to find any story to put up and fill the audience's hunger. That is a fault on the part of the McCain camp, and it appears to have had significant influence on which stories were reported (and even how). To separate effect from cause seems spurious at best.

We can do this for every point, if you'd like, but it won't change the fact that you're interpreting what is essentially a market-based field (news reporting, based on ad revenue and viewer demand) as something that has an implicit bias toward Obama. I mean, go ahead with that, but I don't think it's nearly that cut-and-dried, and this may very well violate Occam's Razor.