Media Politics 2.0

McCain-Palin w/Katie Couric

2008-09-30T08:00:00.002-05:00

As most political watchers know, Governor Palin has had almost no public moments where Senator McCain is not somewhere nearby and controls the situation.

However, Governor Palin has had some moments by herself - first with Charlie Gibson and then with Katie Couric. And the clips out and about show a less than solid response to a number of questions.

As part of the CBS interviews, Senator McCain audited or sat in on one of the interviews. While the focus was on Governor Palin, Senator McCain became the overactive parent as the questions unfolded. I am sure this kind of treatment is likely to further endear himself to women voters..

NOT!!!

See the following:

Fiction and/or Fact - You Decide Which is Which

2008-09-29T13:47:00.008-05:00

A lot of talk and attention has been focused on the portrayal of Governor Sarah Palin by Tina Fey, overshadowing an equally solid characterization of President Clinton by Darrell Hammond.

Last weekend I think we saw fiction anticipating reality with the Hammond/Clinton pairing, which I felt was stronger. (Fey/Palin was fiction following reality.)

See if you agree..

First, Darrell Hammond on Saturday night:

And then on Sunday, President Clinton:

Move over Tina, Darrell may have a niche that lasts beyond the upcoming election.

Fiction Between Fact

2008-09-28T08:00:00.003-05:00

Last week we saw the first half of the Katie Couric/Sarah Palin interview. (We will look at how the interview was parsed, later this week.)

Last night, Saturday Night Live took on the interview and offered this clip:

And as this use of Tina Fey and Amy Pohler has taken on increased web interest, and use in blogs like this one, NBC has stepped in to take down the postings that are not part of the NBC sites.

Read Sarah Lai Stirland's blog on this situation with an interesting link to the way Governor Palin has been portrayed in the media.

Moving at the Speed of the Internet

2008-09-27T08:00:00.004-05:00

Last night, Senators McCain and Obama debated in the first of three televised presidential debates.

In 1960, on the same date - September 26, John Kennedy and Richard Nixon debated. After the debate, Kennedy was deemed to have done well. The Kennedy campaign took some of the footage and a few days later, crafted a television advertisement to play off of his debate performance.

Last night's debate has already produced its first commercial - in fact the commercial came out within a few hours of the debate having been finished. This advertisement was for Senator McCain, yet featured Senator Obama.

Expect more of the debate footage to surface in the days ahead as commercials for both. History does repeat itself.

Parsing the News Interviews

2008-09-26T08:30:00.021-05:00

The CBS network had its hands full on Wednesday, September 24. David Letterman was the jilted talk show host, who was left looking through the tv monitor as his previously scheduled guest went for the interview with CBS News Anchor Katie Couric. (See blog from yesterday.)

While the interview was part of a well done news package, according to at least one respected report, CBS almost buries its lead and its scoop by not giving one immediate access to the story and the video. Rather, you need to burrow through the links and if it is more than a day or two ago, as it is now, you need to go back several pages. And then you have three flavors - the entire CBS Evening news:

Or the 11 minute segment from the news cast:

Or a clipped 5 minute segment on the news of his suspending his campaign:

And while this gives the viewer choices, the ways these clips are tagged leads to some frustration, if not outright abandonment of site if one wants to find out what McCain had to say about the economy, which is why folks are supposedly wanting to hear the Senator speak.

And I will not get started about the short ad fronting each CBS news segment. CBS - you give away the product elsewhere, why clutter up our viewing for each segment with an advertisement. For those who want more control and access to their CBS news products - and less advertising interuptions, check out the CBS News offerings on iTunes. And one can even get the discussed CBS News show with McCain here in its entirety and ad free.

Strange Bedfellows

2008-09-25T18:00:00.002-05:00

Earlier this year, Russell Peterson published Strange Bedfellows, which argued how the late night comedy circuit had become part of the campaign trail and what it meant for political discourse.

This followed some earlier research which found that many younger voters got their news and information more from shows such as THE DAILY SHOW or COLBERT REPORT than conventional news short.

In all, there was a cry sent up from the mainstream media and some campaigns about how this was debasing the process.

Yet the parade of candidates continued and the symbiotic, if not parasitic, relationship between candidates and late night comedy continued. Until.....

last night (September 24) when Senator John McCain suspended his campaign and canceled his appearance on THE LATE SHOW with DAVID LETTERMAN.

But did he really suspend his campaign. As the video played out on LETTERMAN, it became apparent that McCain had dumped the LETTERMAN appearance to be interviewed by Katie Couric on the CBS Evening News. So, the Republican candidate for President dumps the second most watched late night show to appear on the third most watched television news show gives one pause to wonder who was behind not only this brilliant scheduling change, but did so amidst live satellite feeds which made the cover argument of rushing back to DC to work on the budget crisis an outright lie.

See the edited footage from the September 23 Letterman show:

A Response

2008-03-24T09:25:00.003-05:00

Lost amidst the uproar over Reverend Wright's comments is the response of the mainstream Protestant leaders, as well as the United Church of Christ leaders.

Dr. Martin Marty, University of Chicago religious historian, has said that he never failed to leave one of Reverend Wright's services without feeling renewed and uplifted.

And the head of the United Church of Christ, spoke at the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago and made these comments:

He Is Not Always Satirical

2008-03-23T07:32:00.000-05:00

The Daily Show regularly spoofs presidential candidates and campaigns, so they began their coverage of "The Speech" in a similar fashion. But don't leave before the piece finishes, this was not conventional Jon Stewart:

Reactions - Part Two

2008-03-22T07:31:00.000-05:00

The work of the Brave New Films organization, followed up with a second round of Fox News attacks on "The Speech."

Reactions - Part One

2008-03-21T07:28:00.002-05:00

Usually you leave attack politics to a rival political campaign, not so here.

While most of the cable news networks found much to praise with the speech, the Fox News Network was not so enamored.

The Speech

2008-03-20T07:25:00.002-05:00

While originally billed as a speech where Senator Obama would address the issues that had surfaced around Reverand Wright, the speech unfolded as something more. Putting a great deal of distance between this speech and other presidential campaign speeches. In many quarters, it was even being compared to the "I Have a Dream" speech of Reverand Martin Luther King.

"The Speech" was posted on YouTube and while its length suggested it may not have heavy viewing, it quickly caught on and was projected to surpass 2.5 million views by the coming weekend.

You can add to that total:

A second video

2008-03-19T09:24:00.001-05:00

While this could be a trend that will not die, another video of Reverend Jeremiah Johnson is making the rounds. (And more are likely to follow.)

Obama's Pastor

2008-03-18T09:21:00.001-05:00

The following video is making the rounds that shows Senator Obama's pastor making what many would consider incendiary remarks.

Reverend Wright's church, as well as Obama's and Oprah's, is the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.

He Is Not Gone..

2008-03-17T10:54:00.002-05:00

While all of the other Republican candidates have ceased campaigning as Senator McCain is now the nominee, Representative Ron Paul is still making the rounds and working the internet to garner support for his positions, if not his candidacy. He also has not been absent from the internet. Here is one of the more interesting videos you are likely to see as we near the end of the primary season:

Tracking the SuperDelegates

2008-03-10T15:53:00.003-05:00

A group known as the SuperDelegate Transparency Project has a widget that each day is updated to show the latest SuperDelegate totals.

You can see more about their work by going to their website:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Portal:Superdelegate_Transparency_Project

The Original Red Phone Ad

2008-03-06T09:47:00.006-06:00

Commentators were all over the airwaves and newspapers comparing the Clinton commercial with one from 1984. Ironically, the Clinton and Obama ads did not have red phones - just beige units.

Here is the original red phone ad from the 1984 campaign of Walter Mondale.

Ask yourself which one is the more fear mongering?

Confusing Ads

2008-03-05T09:39:00.001-06:00

There has been a lot of commentary about the Clinton 3 AM campaign ad.

This is the ad:

The Obama campaign, which usually responds in a style intended to advance his position, released this ad:

For the person just watching the second ad, you are almost half way into the ad before you realize it is NOT the Clinton spot. Most advertising experts will say you have about 3 seconds to make an impression on a television viewer. For the voters yesterday, many probably believed they saw the Clinton ad more times than they did. The Obama campaign needs to rethink the response they offer up to this ad in the future.

And now live from New York - Hillary

2008-03-02T08:51:00.005-06:00

In their second week back on the air, SNL does another debate opener.

Modeled on the latest debate, they keep the same plodding pace.

Here is the sketch from the NBC site.

Only the last few minutes save it from another starts fast and fizzles out:

Here is the editorial response to the sketch.

One wonders where this Hillary has been.

Another will.i.am video

2008-03-01T08:44:00.001-06:00

His earlier video captured Senator Obama with the "Yes We Can" refrain.

This one uses "We are the Ones." Examples like this show the ways that media politics 2.0 can bring into the discussion, not the paid media consultants, but regular citizens/artists with their vision of things. This message is about Senator Obama, but it is will.i.am's message.

How Is This Going to End?

2008-02-21T07:19:00.004-06:00

In almost every interview that I do, the questions keeps returning.

How can either of the two Democratic candidates win this contest?

As the delegate index makes clear, the answer is in the hands of the superdelegates.

How does the intensity of competition between the two reach some kind of resolution?

In tonight's debate, there was a more collegial tone and while a few points were made, there was not the Armageddon that some predicted. And in fact, the closing comments of Senator Clinton might be the way they find closure. (Some said it was her valedictorian speech, others said it was her effort to reach a higher ground for discourse for the final weeks.)

You judge:

Speaking of Delegates

2008-02-20T07:16:00.003-06:00

As the rest of the country peridically emerges from DADD - delegate attention deficit disorder - where they focus more on who is ahead and who has been winning, the Clinton campaign decided to offer their spin on the matter. (As one who tracks delegates, there are almost as many totals as their are calculators. I use an average of four different national organizations totals.)

Check out Delegate Hub to see how the Clinton campaign is presenting the matter.

Can we expect Senator Obama to introduce one soon?

New Delegate Index Released

2008-02-19T07:11:00.003-06:00

Today we released the latest iteration of the delegate index project where we take existing results of delegates won, superdelegates who have committed to a particular candidate, and then take public opinion polls from upcoming states and apply them with the individual state rules to determine a projected delegate count.

The latest totals calculated through the end of the primary/caucus period give:

Democrats (2025 needed to win)
Obama 1608
Clinton 1701

with the remainder currently uncommitted.

Republicans (1191 needed)
McCain 1431
Huckabee 337

Read the entire release at IGPA.

This is what change looks like..

2008-02-12T04:54:00.001-06:00

From Senator Obama's speech tonight in Madison, WI.

Senator Obama nows appears to have a lead of approximately 150 delegates. 1158 to 1009.

From the Pages of the Sunday Papers

2008-01-29T21:15:00.000-06:00

To a series of television ads in the SuperTuesday states, Carolyn Kennedy Schlossberg does an advertisement for Senator Obama that uses her endorsement from Sunday.

From Daughter to Uncle

2008-01-28T21:30:00.000-06:00

There are times when free media does so powerful a job of making points that no punditry or paid advertising can do much except to sit back and watch it happen.

If yesterday was historic with Carolyn Kennedy Schlossberg's editorial, today the stakes were raised with the senior Democratic Senator in Congress endorsing Senator Obama. This is rhetoric not readily heard on the campaign trail, save when Obama either acknowledges victory or concedes defeat.