An analysis of media coverage of the 2000 election from
Journalism.org:Bush and Gore received roughly the same amount of coverage, with Bush dominating 24% of the stories and Gore 29%. Another 47% were equally about both candidates. This was true across print, television and the Internet.
But the parity ends quickly. As we found in two of the earlier studies, Bush continues to benefit more than Gore from press coverage. As outlined above, 24% of Bush stories were positive, nearly double the 13% for Gore.
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In contrast, the coverage of Gore was more negative. A full 56% of the Gore stories had a negative tone, compared to 49% for Bush. The remaining stories were neutral.
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Gore stories were more likely to be about the internal politics of his campaign—such as strategies for winning the battleground states. In all, 50% of Gore stories were political matters versus 44% for Bush. Given that Gore was failing to pull ahead, these stories were not particularly helpful to the Vice President.There are a ton of similarities between the coverage reported here and the coverage Kerry is getting. In particular, I notice a lot of stories about Kerry's campaign, not what Kerry is saying about the issues. So Kerry's message doesn't get out, and then the brilliant "pundits" start focusing on why Kerry's message isn't getting out -- a vicious circle created and nurtured by the liberal media.
Of course, Gore still won, despite his crappy coverage...