Obama/McCain: Is Election Coverage Getting Out of Hand?
by Reg Seeton

Is political coverage of the battle for the United States presidency reaching a point of critical mass? Well, first of all, like I've said a few times around here in the past, I keep a variety of networks on the tube as background noise while I'm working. When anything gets to be too much or too repetitive, I turn it off or change the channel. Given the endless marathon of coverage surrounding the U.S. election, hearing news analysts repeat themselves like a bunch of talking parrots in suits gets old fast. Now that the nearly year-and-a-half lead-in to the party elections is over and the actual battle for the White House has started, it almost feels like a new age election coverage is upon us. When the new President is sworn into office in January, will it be the end of election coverage for a couple of years, or will it be the start of a new, ongoing campaign that lasts for the next four years? That might seem like a wild, far-fetched idea, but I'm not joking. We might not see an actual bid get underway by potential candidates for the 2012 election, but will the media start the campaigns for them?

As far as network and cable TV coverage is concerned, we've come to expect a feeding frenzy for ratings during an election. This past week, according to MarketWatch, CNN led the way in cable after Hillary Clinton took to the stage at the Democratic Convention with a 13% increase in ratings over Monday night as 26 million people tuned in to see her speech. There's no reason not to think that when the final numbers are in, Wednesday night's ratings for Bill Clinton's speech should be even better. However, unlike previous years and the various races for the White House, election coverage has shot through the roof given the increasing popularity and growth of the Internet. Long gone are the days when election coverage ended with the six o'clock news. Both cable and the Internet have widened the goal posts on election coverage, with around-the-clock analysis from several different angles - some interesting, some unnecessary. But at what point does too much of a good thing begin to overexpose and devalue the product?

Although it's relatively easy to keep network TV coverage at arm's length, it's nearly impossible to escape election coverage on the Internet. It's everywhere; all day, all night, 24-7, not stop, around the clock. As far as mainstream online news goes, all you need to do is visit the main pages of Yahoo, Google News, and any one of the cable websites like CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News to see the extent of coverage. Add to that, foreign news outlets such as the BBC, CBC, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, and more, including the Middle East, are also keeping pace with the U.S. Presidential race. If that's not enough coverage for one year, the U.S. election has dominated social news sites like DIGG, Reddit, Newsvine, the new Yahoo Buzz, and many more. To a large degree, given the global democracy of social networks, citizen coverage of the U.S. election has reached a level of insanity.

News coverage and reporting is one thing, which I don't have a problem with at all, but factual inaccuracy, speculation, political spin, and alleged media bias is a completely different ball game. Given how one blog post on a popular news or political based website could possibly influence more readers than any print publication or TV network, competition between news outlets, coverage of the election, and the public's hunger to stay abreast of the events has turned into one giant, manipulative, cut-throat game of "Risk" on a global scale. So, who should you believe and who should you rely on for your news? Whatever your answer is, just because you see something on the Internet doesn't mean it's true. Just because you see someone on TV, the fact that they're on camera doesn't give them instant credibility.

This isn't confined to the election, however. Late Wednesday afternoon on a popular cable news show, the host asked his "strategist" guest whether it's was true that the levees in New Orleans were in such bad shape that he found old newspapers stuffed inside one and holding it up. That very well may be true, which isn't the point here. The guest's response was, "Well, I didn’t find it personally, but it was reported in the news." How does that relate to election coverage? When you're continually getting news and updates on the election from third, fourth, fifth, and sixth hand sources, there's a point when it's not news at all. Oftentimes when people see something non-stop for months on end, even years, there's a point when overexposure sets in and the images and messages are meaningless. It's like your boss giving you the same stern lecture over how your productivity is too low and you're not doing enough for the company. At a certain point, you tune it out. In a lot of cases, it has the opposite effect. Is election coverage getting out of hand? Who knows, but there's a built-in exit strategy available to everyone... it's labeled "off" on your remote.