By Michael S. Johnson
Delta Airlines’ Sky Magazine had a 26-page spread last month on the Midwest’s new tourist hotspot, North Dakota . It featured Governor– and now U.S. Senator-elect– John Hoeven, who gets much of the credit for making North Dakota one of the most prosperous states in the country.
Never heard of John Hoeven? The reason is the media all but ignored him and his Senate campaign. He won by a wide margin.
In fact, in a new study by the PEW Research Center , which tracked media coverage of candidates in 2010, he didn’t even make the list. At the top of the list was Delaware ’s Christine O’Donnell, who lost by a wide margin.
Christine O’Donnell was never a serious candidate, particularly after she was compelled to run a campaign ad declaring that, “I’m not a witch.”
The media obsession with O’Donnell followed a pattern. Of the top ten candidates covered, according to Pew, tea party races
accounted for six of them: Rand Paul in Kentucky, Joe Sestak who ran against tea party-backed Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania; tea party candidate Sharon Angle and her opponent Harry Reid in Nevada; and Charlie Crist, who ran against tea party favorite Marco Rubio in Florida. In gubernatorial races, the top attention getter was tea party candidate Carl Paladino, who got whooped in New York , and Jerry Brown, who defeated tea party favored Meg Whitman in California .
The excessive coverage of the tea party not only exaggerated its influence and created some very unkind impressions of its activists but more importantly it also contributed to the further decline in the quality of coverage of American politics.
The unbalanced treatment of tea party races conforms to the media’s penchant for trying to turn American politics into a spectacle and putting a very narrow and rigid face on the Republican Party, to boot.
Coverage that focuses so much on theatrics, amplifying the anger and exaggerating the extremes, and constantly demonizes politics and politicians just makes it that much harder for the system to function. It makes it more difficult to attract good candidates and ensure an informed electorate, creating more fire than light. It further and unnecessarily erodes public trust in its institutions of government.
It is reasonable to predict that the new members of the U.S. Senate who will eventually make their mark on history are not the same people on whom the media have been transfixed over the past 12 months. We know they won’t be Christine O’Donnell and Sharon Angle. And it may not be Rand Paul or Pat Toomey, either. Those more likely to contribute more to the governance of the country are those the media largely ignored: Hoeven, Rob Portman of Ohio, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, John Boozman of Arkansas, Dan Coats of Indiana, Roy Blunt of Missouri and Mark Kirk of Illinois. We know Paladino won’t be one of the nation’s promising new governors, but he got all of the attention over potential luminaries such as Martinez , NM ; Haley , SC ; Snyder , MI ; Dauguard SD ; Haslam , TN ; LePage , ME ; Corbett , PA ; or Branstad , IA.
The media coverage this year reminded us of 1980, when press attention was fixed on outspoken Senate candidates Paula Hawkins of Florida and Jeremiah Denton of Alabama, when it should have been focused the real workhorses in that class, Warren Rudman of New Hampshire, Slade Gordon of Washington, Charles Grassley of Iowa and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.
Politicians and pundits will scrutinize the results of the 2010 elections ad nauseum. While they are contemplating outcomes, the media should be contemplating the coverage that may have influenced those outcomes. The media should ask themselves a lot of questions:
How bad was the partisan bias, particularly in light of the media’s Democratic echo chamber coverage of foreign funds in campaign ads, John Boehner’s ties to K Street lobbyists and the influence of third-party campaign spending?
Has the media gone overboard with coverage of political theater and the absurd (Meg Whitman’s cleaning lady, Carl Paladino’s out-of-wedlock daughter, and Alan Grayson’s TV ads all made prime time on evening news)?
Did the media fact check rumors, gossip and accusations before printing or broadcasting them?
Did the media overexpose the personal lives of candidates and their families?
Did the media provide balanced coverage of opposing candidates and viewpoints?
Has the media blurred beyond distinction what used to be clearer lines between reporters and commentators and journalists and entertainers?
Did the media abuse the use of anonymous sources?
Maybe so many Americans believe our political institutions are broken because the journalistic institutions that convince them it is true are broken, too. Reforms of the latter may be required before reforms of the former.
Editors’s Note: Mike Johnson is a former journalist, who worked on the Ford White House staff and served as press secretary and chief of staff to House Republican Leader Bob Michel, prior to entering the private sector. He is co-author of a book, Surviving Congress, a guide for congressional staff. He is currently a principal with the OB-C Group.