22 July 2008

Media in Swing States Favoring McCain?

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff


As we’ve stated before, we think counting headline mentions is a good yardstick for measuring what the media considers to be the most important parts of the election story each day. This time around, we looked at headline mentions in mainstream press, broken down along the Red State/Blue State/Swing State divide.

During the period July 14 – July 21, Obama drew the highest share of headline mentions from mainstream press in the Red States, accounting for 66% of all headline mentions of the two candidates (or 3,072 mentions), compared with McCain’s 34% (or 1,552). Obama also led in Blue States, where sources put his name up top only slightly less often, with 64% (or 5,575 mentions) to McCain’s 36% (or 3,109). In the Swing States press, however, while Obama still enjoyed a sizeable lead, it was smaller than in either Red or Blue States. As shown in Chart 3 below, press outlets in Swing States chose to highlight McCain’s name 38% of the time (or 3,070 headline mentions) to Obama’s 62% (5,001 mentions).
Chart: Headline Mentions in Swing States

Methodology: Figures in the chart reflect mentions of the two candidates in headlines in newspapers, Web sites, and television and radio broadcasts originating in the states listed below. Note that not all 50 U.S. states are included in the three groups.

Blue States are defined as those that were carried by the Democrats in all four of the most recent presidential elections: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin. Red States are defined as those that were carried by the GOP in all four of the most recent presidential elections: Alaska, Alabama, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Wyoming. Swing states are defined as those that were carried twice by the Democrats and twice by the Republicans in the four most recent presidential elections: Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Fuel Prices, Jobs Cuts and Housing Slumps – Oh, My

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff


With the current state of the economy a hot topic, we have begun tracking several new issues that are playing key roles in the overall economic picture – namely fuel prices, the housing market and the jobs situation. Considering the direness of the discussion around these topics in some corners of the media, it appears that on the whole, the press and bloggers are talking about them in relation to the candidates somewhat less than we’d have expected. As always, this may or may not be a reflection of where the candidates want to take the conversation, but it shows the amount of attention the media and bloggers are giving the issues as they cover the candidates.

Of the 24 key domestic and international issues currently tracked by Dow Jones Insight, only one of the new topics – fuel prices – cracked the top 10. The issue was mentioned in the context of either candidate 27,443 times in all tracked sources (mainstream and social media) during the period June 20 – July 20, making it the eighth-most-discussed issue. The topic of jobs was referenced 22,335 times, ranking it 11th, while the state of the housing market came up a surprisingly low 5,578 times, putting it way down the list in the 21st spot. The issue of the economy as a whole, however, rose to the top spot among all issues, potentially offering some proof that politicians prefer to talk in generalities rather than offer specific plans.


We will update this table regularly to provide an at-a-glance view of how coverage of the issues fluctuates over the course of the campaign.

Methodology: Mainstream press sources include more than 6,000 newspapers, wires, magazines, radio and TV transcripts and more than 13,000 current-awareness news Web sites. Social media sources include 2 million of the most influential blogs and more than 60,000 message boards.

Obama Continues to Lead in Total Mentions

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff


While McCain received fewer mentions in the context of all four countries discussed above, the totals are actually more competitive than they first appear, given that McCain is still receiving less coverage than Obama overall. In the same week analyzed above (July 14 – July 21), Obama was mentioned 60,654 times in all tracked mainstream and social media sources, for a 59% share, compared to McCain’s 42,463 mentions, or 41% share.

Even after stripping out all mentions pertaining to the issues of faith and race (on which Obama has consistently trounced McCain), Obama still drew 57% of all mentions in the seven days compared with 43% for McCain.

Taking that split into account, Obama still bested McCain on Afghanistan and Israel – as his share on the two issues exceeded his share of all coverage minus the two excluded issues – while McCain improved his performance on Iraq and Iran, as his share on those issues exceeded his share overall.

Methodology: Mainstream press sources include more than 6,000 newspapers, wires, magazines, radio and TV transcripts and more than 13,000 current-awareness news Web sites. Social media sources include 2 million of the most influential blogs and more than 60,000 message boards.

Obama and the Middle East

Dow Jones Insight Staff

Also ranking high and moving up in the table of issues is that of Afghanistan, where Obama stopped on his current tour of the Middle East and Europe and toward which he says the U.S. must shift its focus, instead of Iraq.

In the period July 14 – July 21, as Obama geared up for and then began the trip, he was mentioned in reference to Afghanistan 8,299 times, or 61% of all mentions of the two candidates in conjunction with Afghanistan in mainstream and social media sources. That was well above McCain’s 5,355 mentions, or 39%.

He also exceeded McCain in mentions of Iraq and Israel, both also destinations on his tour, as well as Iran. In all tracked sources, Obama was mentioned 2,052 times in relation to Iraq, or 54% of the total, while McCain drew 1,779 mentions, or 46%. McCain kept the totals close by responding to the Obama trip with a steady stream of criticism of Obama’s earlier opposition to the surge of troops in Iraq and his proposal to withdraw combat troops within 16 months.

On the issue of Israel, Obama received 1,427 mentions, or 59%, compared to 990, or 41%, for McCain. Obama was mentioned 1,416 times (54%) in relation to Iran, compared to McCain’s 1,217 (46%).

Methodology: Mainstream press sources include more than 6,000 newspapers, wires, magazines, radio and TV transcripts and more than 13,000 current-awareness news Web sites. Social media sources include 2 million of the most influential blogs and more than 60,000 message boards.

08 July 2008

Obama Maintains Clear Lead over McCain in Media Mentions

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff

Barack Obama continues to be the candidate to beat as he goes week after week with more coverage than John McCain.

Not surprisingly, for much of the primary season, McCain took a back seat to the excitement of the race between Obama and his then rival Hillary Clinton. When Clinton stepped out of the spotlight, we started looking closely at the Obama-McCain tallies, expecting the numbers would get closer during the dog days of summer campaigning. And the numbers have tightened; but in most cases only modestly.

Over the past month, McCain has closed the gap, but he’s still maintaining his self-proclaimed “underdog” status when it comes to his count of individual mentions in the mainstream press and across social media, according to analysis conducted using Dow Jones Insight.

The basic measure of this is through total media mentions. In the seven-day period ending July 7, Dow Jones Insight tallied 90,882 mentions of either candidate across all media types. Obama racked up 56% of those mentions to McCain’s 44%.

Looking at a subset of the U.S. media – just newspapers and broadcast outlets in the Red States, Blue States and Swing States – we see a closer race. The analysis shows 54% for Obama and 46% for McCain in each of these three groups. In the past these numbers have always been close, but this is the first time we've noticed they are in lock-step, demonstrating to us that the media are on the whole not being swayed by the the voting tendancies of their audience.



When one considers just message boards and blogs, the numbers typically lean more toward Obama, though this week McCain cut three percentage points off Obama’s lead, making the social media breakdown 57% for Obama and 43% for McCain.



Methodology: Mainstream press sources include more than 6,000 newspapers, wires, magazines, radio and TV transcripts and more than 13,000 current-awareness news Web sites. Social media sources include 2 million of the most influential blogs and more than 60,000 message boards.

Perhaps Headlines Tell the True Story

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff

Our favorite media metric for measuring election coverage comes from counting headlines. This seems to be a good yardstick by which we can measure what the media considers to be the most important parts of the election story each day and what the blogging community is countering with. We see this as a measure of what’s top-of-mind for the editors and bloggers. This week when counting all headline mentions of either candidate, we found 31,193 across all media. A decisive 63% of those were Obama mentions to 37% McCain mentions. (Headlines mentioning both men were essentially counted twice, once for each of them.)

Bloggers are very much still focused on Obama with the split there this week at 66% to 34%.The mainstream press is slightly more even-handed with a 61% to 39% breakdown, again favoring Obama.

When Considering only Policy Issues, the Numbers Start to Even Out

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff

Certainly not all mentions of candidates’ names are ones the campaigns are pleased to see. So it follows that more is not always better; and saying "Obama leads McCain in media mentions" doesn't paint the full picture.

Obama does seem to continue to garner a lot of coverage about what we consider to be non-substantive issues – talk of his faith, his race, his fundraising and his wife. During the seven days ending July 7, Obama saw 13,591 of his mentions being in context of one of these four discussions. McCain had his name mentioned in the context of one of these, half as many times (6,910 mentions).

Overall, the picture continues to favor Obama, but when looking only at mentions of the candidates in the context of what we consider important policy issues facing the nation, the media-coverage race is nearly a dead-heat.

Depending on which issues you include or exclude, the tally slips one way or the other, but remains close. For example we see a statistical tie when looking at the sum of coverage of the economy, the environment, health care, taxes, gun control, energy, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and terrorism. In the seven days ending July 7 we tallied 64,392 mentions of Obama in close proximity to one of these issues and 64,081 for McCain. For each issue the two are consistently very close.




Methodology: Mainstream press sources include more than 6,000 newspapers, wires, magazines, radio and TV transcripts and more than 13,000 current-awareness news Web sites. Social media sources include 2 million of the most influential blogs and more than 60,000 message boards.


Media Bias Can Sneak in if You’re Not Watching Carefully

By Glenn Fannick
Dow Jones Insight Staff

Here is an interesting observation we came across while conducting other analysis.

If you think news editors can’t have an impact on their readers’ perception of the news, consider this.

A July 6 news analysis by an Associated Press reporter paints a pretty negative picture of the state of the McCain campaign. “John McCain calls himself an underdog. That may be an understatement,” so states the lede of political reporter Liz Sidoti’s piece. McCain trails Obama “in polls, organization and money while trying to succeed a deeply unpopular fellow Republican in a year that favors Democrats.” The article goes on to point out some highlights, but it’s mostly gloom for McCain.

The article ran in several newspapers including the El Paso Times, The (Columbia) State, Myrtle Beach’s The Sun News, The Beaufort (South Carolina) Gazette and the Lincoln (Nebraska) Journal Star. In every case, the headline that topped it was: “Analysis: McCain struggles to regain footing.”


Now, the piece also ran in Utah’s conservative Deseret Morning News (owned indirectly by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). There the headline seems to have lost the “struggles” (and the word “analysis”) saying only “McCain Regaining Footing.”