Surprise Vice President Selection Finally Puts McCain in the Coverage Lead

By Dow Jones Insight Staff

If the selection of Palin accomplishes nothing else, it did finally push McCain’s media coverage past Obama’s, something no other McCain media strategy had achieved.

During the Democratic convention held August 25-28, Obama had significantly widened his coverage lead in all media sources tracked by Dow Jones Insight, including mainstream and social media, peaking on the 28th and 29th with much talk about his acceptance speech. But McCain stole the show on the 29th with news of his vice presidential nominee, and held the lead for the next several days. We will check back in our next analysis to see if he can maintain the lead beyond the Republican convention.

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.