Media Coverage

President Obama speaks at a press conference just days after the 2008 election. (AFP/Getty photo by Stan Honda)

Obama presidency an unprecedented media event

By: Joelle Shellhamer

 

 

President Barack Obama’s election was one of the most historic events in the past decade. His inauguration marked the United States’ first black president. But being the first president of African American descent was not the only thing that set Obama apart from the rest. Obama, in his own right, became a celebrity. In the months leading up to the election, his face was plastered all over magazine covers, newspapers, billboards and the internet.

      

Everyday, a new news outlet featured an Obama story. And most of those stories, proved to be in his favor. With this plethora of positive media coverage, studies have shown this bias may have strongly helped Obama to win the election. But, does the media still portray Obama as their main man as they once did?

       

The 2008 Presidential Election also marked an unconventional change in politics and its relationship with the media. For years, the most pivotal role media outlets played was to be a channel for detrimental political ads and commercials aimed at competitors. But this year, the media frenzy surrounding the election was unlike any ever seen.

       

Journalists claim that because then President-elect Barak Obama was a young, half-black, virtually unknown candidate, he was extremely newsworthy and encompassed the possibility for hundreds, even thousands of news stories.

       

Bu popular anchorman Rush Limbaugh went as far as to say that the media were following Obama with “their tongues dragging along the concrete.”

        

Liberal media bias began to take form more prominently after the Democratic and Republican conventions.

       

“The Project for Excellence in Journalism” researchers found that “John McCain, over the six weeks since the Republican convention, received four times as many negative stories as positive ones. The study found six out of 10 McCain stories were negative. Obama had more than twice as many positive stories (36 percent) as McCain – and just half the percentage of negative (29 percent).”

       

But to many Americans, it was merely second nature to hear positive Obama stories and negative McCain ones.

       

According to a poll conducted by Louis Harris and Associates for the nonpartisan Center for Media and Public Affairs, “almost three-fourths of Americans see a “fair amount” or “great deal” of political bias in the news. And by more than a 2-to-1 ratio, poll respondents said that bias is liberal rather than conservative (43%-19%).”

       

The media frenzy surrounding the election, and more specifically Obama, was an outrage to most “non-liberals” who actually noticed the unfair tilt to the candidates news stories. But most Americans not completely in-tuned with the election seemed to become “brainwashed” by the constant coverage.

       

A study conducted by Arizona State Universitystudents randomly polled Americans and asked them to name one thing they did not like about Barak Obama, they did not have an answer, not even one. But when it came to McCain, they brought up recent detrimental news stories and headlines about the Senator.

       

But is it fair to say that all media are liberals and swaying coverage to get their candidate elected? Conservative CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck doesn’t think so.

       

“The media aren’t around for their health, they’re around to make money, and if Obama drives sales or ratings, then I can’t really blame them for continuing to tap that well until it runs dry. Obama is on the cover of magazines because his face sells a lot more magazines than McCain’s picture. That’s a pro-profit bias, not a liberal bias.”

       

Whatever the reason for the pre-election Obama media frenzy, there is one thing we can say for sure, it is not the same today.

       

After Obama was elected President of the United States, his media coverage did not necessarily lessen, but it did change paths. Instead of the obsession over Obama as a person it has switched to what is Obama doing for me now. And it seems as though the media and supporters have become a lot less forgiving.

        

One might blame the fact that Americans were so quick to believe they had found the answer to their problems and thought of Obama as the end all to their struggles. Although it is an unfair stigma to expect within the first 90 days, Americans have yet to see the “change” they were hoping for.

       

Many believe the hype surrounding Obama during his campaign, paved the way for disappointment due to unrealistic expectations. According to the article “Obama Fans Now and Then” by K. Daniel Glover, “During his two years of campaigning, Barack Obama could do no wrong. Mistakes large and small were ignored or explained away by the liberal journalists who adored him and were forgiven by voters who believed they had found “The One” who would deliver hope and change to Washington. Many big names, including conservatives, bought into the media-driven hype.”

       

Unfortunately, the state of our country’s economic recession is so horrendous that is will definitely not be an overnight fix. Whether the media influenced decisions or not, Americans voted Barack Obama as the man we believe can get our country back on track. Many things are still uncertain, but there is one thing for sure, he cannot reverse years of economic damage in 90 days.