OCR Text |
Show Airing Democracy: Politics and Broadcast Television Travis Currit Causes What lies at the root of this decline? Several explanations offer themselves-that politics is ill-suited for television, that the political process itself is increasingly shallow, that the changing media environment is forcing changes in broadcast political coverage. Some of these explanations seem to be greater contributing factors than others, but none seem to be a definitive, "silver-bullet" answer. It is tempting to accept the simple explanation that politics makes bad television, dismissing the subject as far too boring, complicated, and serious for a medium that makes its primary living by being entertaining. Indeed many broadcasters, citing polls done by their marketing consultants that show little public interest in watching news on politics, have adopted the adage "politics is ratings poison," and thus shy away from all things political on their news broadcasts. However, abundant evidence discounts this adage. First of all, the premise that politics is something the public does not want to watch on television is defeated by the polls mentioned previously in which the public states that they look to television as their number one source of political information. Television station news directors often counter this, however, by citing their own polling data which shows the public to be very uninterested in viewing political reporting. But there is evidence, as pointed out by Tom Rosensteil and Dave Iverson in an October 2002 article for the Los Angeles Times, that "the research that has dominated TV consulting about covering public life is faulty" (2002). They use data from the Pew 2002 Believability Survey to show deficiencies in a standard survey from one of the nation's major television consulting firms: The Pew Research Center conducted a nationwide poll that included the standard consultant question on politics. Only 29 percent said they'd be very interested in that kind of reporting. Yet when people were asked whether they'd be interested in "news reports about what government can do to improve the performance of local schools," the percentage of "very interested" jumped to 59 percent. Similarly, when participants were asked whether they'd be interested in reports on what government could do to ensure that public places were safe from terrorism, the percentage of "very interested" rose to 67 percent" (Rosensteil and Iverson 2002). This information leads us to the conclusion that, while standard, political-insider strategy and maneuverings based coverage would typically fail to hold viewers' interests, well-done, policy based coverage could easily connect with viewers and attract a large audience. There are numerous examples of stations that have had considerable ratings success through a devotion to politics. A South Carolina station airing a special about political advertising garnered more viewers than popular quiz show ]eopardy!-typically a powerhouse for that time slot. Likewise, in Orlando, Florida, a debate between Gov. Jeb Bush and opponent Bill McBride managed to be the highest rated program at 7 p.m., the heart of prime time. In addition, stations in West Palm Beach, Tampa, Miami, Jacksonville, and Ft. Myers also aired the program, which came in first in the time slot in three of those markets (Rosensteil and Iverson 2003). The Hearst-Argyle station group, one of the largest station groups in the country, has launched a "Commitment 2004" program which mandates its stations "provide the most comprehensive news coverage of national, state, and local campaigns possible" (McAvoy 2004). Hearst-Argyle stations must commit five minutes a day to candidate-centered coverage during prime time in the month before an election. This has had far from negative effects on the stations' ratings and financial success: News Director Michelle Butt reports that her newscasts held or grew their audience during the time frame. Dan Weiser at Sacramento's KCRA says the political reporting didn't hurt the station's market lead. At WYFF in Greenville, where the news department produced an aggressive series of reports about political advertising, News Director Andy Still and reporter Brad Willis say they got more viewer response than for anything else they've ever done (McAvoy 2004). The expanded coverage also makes the stations a very attractive target for political advertising, a fact reflected by the station group's January net political revenues of almost $3.9 million, "more than offsetting the prior year revenues garnered for the 2003 Super Bowl" (Hearst-Argyle, Inc. 2004). In addition, television's attempts to achieve higher ratings through superficial and gimmicky political coverage are misguided. A five-year study of local television done by the Project for Excellence in Journalism that analyzed more than 1,200 hours of news and more than 30,000 stories suggests that "by several measures quality, as defined by broadcast journalism professionals, is the most likely path to commercial success, even in today's difficult economic environment" (2002). Given this information, the broadcasters' cries of "ratings poison" can be dismissed. Clearly, if properly done politics can mix well with television news, even though currently broadcasters barely even try. However, the decline of political broadcasting cannot be pinned wholly on misinformed broadcasters refusing to act in their own self-interest. Other factors must be at work. Another possible explanation, perhaps even more cynical than the first, is that the political process, especially elections, has become less substantial, thus making any coverage of politics necessarily superficial and horse-race oriented. One serious flaw in this assessment is the assumption that politicians are primarily responsible for the content of political coverage. The majority of the time, this is not the case. News stories are far more likely to be the result of newsroom decisions or reporter enterprise than brought about by the candidates themselves. In addition, candidates are actually far more issue oriented, positive, and substantial in their speeches, debates, and even advertisements than the coverage of those same events (Jamieson 1996). And while it is true that politicians to some extent can exert influence over the topics 76 |