Role Reversal: The Attack on the Media

As the media continues to criticize candidates and candidates continue to criticize the media, a new group enters the fray: Americans.

The media’s focus on the game schema, which is the analysis of strategy and key players rather than issues, has reached a new high this primary season. After heavy coverage of Clinton’s misspoken “sniper” episode and Obama’s “bittergate,” Americans are beginning to demand to hear the actual issues.

ABC News’s debate this Wednesday is especially being hard hit for focusing too little on the issues and too much on campaign stumbles. For the first 52 minutes of the debate, the moderators focused only on the strategy and errors of both campaigns. Perhaps not coincidentally, a few hundred thousand viewers stopped watching the debate after the first hour. This could be interpreted as the public’s interest purely in tabloid style news and the game schema, or it could be interpreted as the public’s wavering enthusiasm about politics. It certainly did not help that American Idol conflicted with its air time. The popular reality TV show drew in 22.7 million viewers, which eclipsed the debate’s approximately 10.7 million viewers. Even more disheartening, this past debate was the most watched debate of the primary election.

Additional criticisms include ABC’s choice of George Stephanopoulos as a moderator alongside Charles Gibson. Stephanopoulos, a former advisor in Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign, is clearly not a top choice for a neutral moderator. Obama supporters are crying out against the injustices of the debate as they find out he may not have all of the answers. Stephanopoulos claims that his "off the issues" questions were necessary as Obama continues to dodge political bullets that will be shot if he makes the general election. In particular, Stephanopoulos questioned Obama's relationship with former political radical William Ayers. Obama was clearly frustrated with the game schema at work throughout the debate.

One debate viewer, John of New York City, responded to the New York Times’ Caucus blog “Blogtalk: Bloggers Turn Up Heat on ABC” that the “ABC moderators’ questions were embarrassing and shallow” and that the “media are desperate for attention and advertising dollars and no longer follow strict journalistic, philosophical, or political standards.”

However, not everyone was disgusted with the debate. Conservative Ed Morrissey of Hot Air said “Kudos to ABC News for taking on both candidates fearlessly. John McCain has to feel grateful not to be included.”

Although people are voicing their disgust about the media's focus on campaign dirt and strategy, their voices will probably not be enough. Unless viewers tune in for the segments of the debate that focus on the issues rather than gossip, the media will continue to focus on what they do best. When push comes to shove, ratings almost always trump journalistic integrity.