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GOVT. CHAPTER 10 Politics and the Media. Learning Objectives. The Role of the Media in a Democracy. The Agenda-Setting Function of the Media. By helping to determine what people will talk and think about, the media set the political agenda – the issues that politicians will address.
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GOVT CHAPTER 10 Politics and the Media
The Agenda-Setting Function of the Media • By helping to determine what people will talk and think about, the media set the political agenda – the issues that politicians will address. • The degree to which the media influence public opinion is not always clear.
The Medium Does Affect the Message • Of all the media, television has the greatest impact. Politicians take maximum advantage of the power and influence of television. • Television news is often criticized as being too brief and superficial. • Time Constraints – news stories must be reported quickly, sometimes only as soundbites. • Visual Medium – TV reporting relies extensively on visual elements, rather than words. • Television is Big Business – competition in the TV industry has an effect on how news is presented.
Political Advertising • Televised political advertising consumes at least half of the total budget for a major political campaign. • Political advertising first appeared during the 1952 presidential campaign. Within the next ten years, negative political advertising began to appear on TV. Political Ad Spending on Broadcast TV, 1992-2008
Political Advertising: Attack Ads, Issue Ads • Attack ads –advertising that attacks the character of an opposing candidate – have a long tradition, despite the criticism against their use during recent election cycles. • Candidates also use negative issue ads to focus on the flaws of the opponents’ positions on issues. • Issue ads are also used by interest groups to gather support for candidates who endorse the groups’ causes.
Political Advertising: Issue Ads, cont. • Issue ads can be even more devastating than personal attacks – in 1964, President Lyndon Johnson aired the “daisy girl” ad, implying that opponent Barry Goldwater would lead the country into a nuclear war.
Political Advertising: Negative Advertising Bad for our Democracy Good for our Democracy • Some argue that negative ads can backfire, creating sympathy for the candidate being attacked. • Many people fear that attack ads and “dirty tricks” may alienate citizens from the political process itself and thus lower voter turnout in elections. • Others believe that negative advertising sharpens the public debate, enriching the democratic process. • Some contend that negative ads are likely to focus on substantive political issues instead of candidates’ personal characteristics, thus doing a better job of informing the voters about important campaign issues than positive ads do.
Television Debates • Televised debates have been a feature of presidential campaigns since 1960. • Televised debates provide an opportunity for voters to find out how candidates differ on issues and allow candidates to capitalize on the power of television to improve their images or point out the failings of their opponents.
The 2008 Debates • The first debate between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama was supposed to focus on foreign policy. It took place, however, in one of the worst weeks of the 2008 credit crisis while Congress was struggling to agree on a $700 billion Wall Street bailout package. • Much of the debate was spent on economics.
News Coverage • News coverage is free, so candidates try to take advantage of the media’s interest in campaigns to increase news coverage. • Often, the media devote the lion’s share of coverage to polls and other indicators of which candidate is ahead in the race. • Campaign managers and political consultants have produced more managed news coverage - creating newsworthy events for journalists and TV camera crews to cover. • Candidate’s press advisors, or spin doctors, try to convince reporters to give the story or event a spin, or interpretation that is favorable to the candidate.
“Popular” Television • Television programs such as dramas, sitcoms, and late-night comedy shows often use political themes.
Talk Radio • Modern talk radio took off in the United States during the 1990’s. • Talk show hosts do not attempt to hide their political biases; if anything, they exaggerate them for effect. No journalistic conventions are observed. • Talk show hosts care far more about the entertainment value of their statements than whether they are true.
Talk Radio, cont. • Some argue that talk shows provide a great populist forum. • Others fear that talk shows empower fringe groups, perhaps magnifying their rage. • Those who argue that talk-show hosts go too far ultimately have to deal with the constitutional issue of free speech.
Partisan Bias • The majority of Americans think that the media reflect a bias in one direction or another. • Surveys and analyses of reporters have suggested that journalists hold liberal views. • A number of media scholars suggest that even if reporters hold liberal views, these views are not reflected in their reporting.
The Bias against Losers • Some believe that the media does play a significant role in shaping presidential campaigns and elections but the bias is not partisan; it is a bias against losers. • The media use the winner-loser paradigm to describe events throughout the campaigns; even debates are regarded as “sporting matches” which result in a winner and a loser.
“Selection Bias” • Maximizing profits from advertising is a major consideration in what television stations will choose to air. • News directors will select programming that will attract the largest audiences and the highest advertising revenues. • A survey showed that a large number of reporters (about 66%) agreed that “increased bottom-line pressure is seriously hurting the quality of news coverage.” • About one-third of journalists stated that they have felt pressure either from advertisers or corporate owners concerning what to write or broadcast.
News Organizations Online • Almost every major news organization delivers news via the Web. • Websites for newspapers have notable advantages over their printed counterparts in that they can add breaking news to their sites and they can link the reader to more extensive reports on particular topics.
Blogs and the Emergence of Citizen Journalism • There has been a virtual explosion of blogs in recent years. • Blogs are offered by independent journalists, various scholars, political activists, and the citizenry at large. Anyone who wants to can create a blog and post news or information. • The collection, analysis, and dissemination of information online by the citizenry is referred to as citizen journalism.
Podcasting the News • Another nontraditional form of news distribution is podcasting – the distribution of audio or visual files to personal computers or mobile devices, such as iPods. • Almost anyone can create a podcast and make it available for downloading. • Another new Internet technology is Twitter, a method of sending short messages to large numbers of people.
Cyberspace and Political Campaigns • Voters are increasingly using the Web to access information about parties and candidates, promote political goals, and obtain political news. • The internet can be an effective and inexpensive way to raise campaign funds. Obama’s online operation was the heart of his fund-raising success.
Cyberspace and Political Campaigns • Candidates typically hire Web managers to manage their Internet campaigns, create a campaign website, hire bloggers, arrange for podcasting, hire staff to monitor the Web for news, and track the online publications ofnetroots groups.
Cyberspace and Political Campaigns • Netroots groups may publish online promotional ads or other materials that do not represent the candidate’s position. • Netroots groups may also attack the candidate’s opponent in ways that the candidate does not approve.
Cyberspace and Political Campaigns • Citizen videos have changed the traditional campaign. A candidate can never know when a comment that she or he makes may be caught on camera by someone with a cell phone or digital camera and published on the Internet. • George Allen, former Republican senator from Virginia, was captured on video making a racial slur about one of his opponent’s campaign workers.
POLITICS ON THE WEB www.newspapers.com www.townhall.com www.moveon.org www.realclearpolitics.com www.pollingreport.com www.blogsearchengine.com www.4ltrpress.cengage.com/govt
