And They're Off

By Keith Boykin, in politics
Wednesday, September 3 2003, 11:00AM

Labor Day marks the unofficial beginning of a new campaign season. From now until November 2004, the news media will spend millions of dollars to cover the presidential campaign. But there's one thing they won't tell you. Most of the media coverage is illogical, formulaic and repetitive.

I've been watching presidential campaigns for 23 years now and I've seen the same thing over and over again. Every four years around this time, the media start churning out stories about the presidential campaign. But rather than educate the public about the issues, the media consistently inform us about the horse race.

The issues rarely get discussed, except in the context of how those issues affect the strategy of the race. We may learn, for example, that Howard Dean opposed the U.S. war with Iraq and criticizes Bush's economic policy, but we won't learn much else. We may discover that John Kerry is a Vietnam veteran with an heiress wife, but we won't discover his positions on the issues. The media will tell us that Joe Lieberman is a Jew who ran for vice president, but don't expect to hear anything substantive.

Reporters always accuse candidates of avoiding the issues (and many do), but when the candidates discuss the issues, the media yawn. Don't expect CNN to tell you about Bob Graham's latest position paper. But if Bob Graham goes to the hospital for another operation, you'll hear all about it.

With some notable exceptions, most of the campaign media coverage in the next 6 months will follow a very rigid, formulaic method of communicating limited information to the public. These are the four major patterns you can expect to see.

1. The People Are Not Excited

A poll released over the Labor Day weekend showed two-thirds of Americans surveyed could not name one of the nine candidates seeking the Democratic presidential nomination. That was somehow supposed to be news. It's not. It's a formula.

Fifteen months before any election, very few Americans ever know the candidates. The primary campaign hasn't begun. The media coverage hasn't been concentrated. People aren't paying attention. That's not new. That's the way it always is. Who knew much about Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton 15 months before their elections?

The idea that the public isn't paying attention is used by the media to suggest the candidates aren't that exciting, but that's an old worn out formula that's simply designed to sell newspapers. The media need something to talk about, so they make a story where there is none.

2. The People Want More Choices

The Labor Day poll also showed that half of registered Democrats would like more choices in the campaign. Big deal. That happens almost every election cycle for the party without an incumbent in office. But there's an inconsistency between this question and the earlier poll question. How is it that people want more choices when they don't even know the candidates?

All this number reflects is that people aren't familiar with the names of the candidates yet, but the media will use the story to continue asking whether Al Gore or Hillary Clinton or Wesley Clark will jump in the race. That's an old media formula to try to keep things interesting.

In the 1970s and 80s, the media consistently speculated whether Ted Kennedy would run for office. In the 1980s and 90s, they speculated whether Mario Cuomo would run. In the late 90s, they speculated whether Colin Powell would run. Now Hillary and Al Gore are the two top subjects of speculation.

Call it the the "white horse syndrome." The media love to cover stories of unusual candidates and last minute replacements who will ride in on white horses and create a serious challenge to the incumbent president. That leads us to the third pattern of coverage.

3. The Incumbent Is Invincible

Almost every presidential election is initially cast as a story of David and Goliath. The president, of whichever party, represents the giant Goliath. He is pictured as a formidable opponent with the resources of the most powerful office in the world at his disposal. The president, of whatever party, usually raises a lot more money than his competitors, which helps underscore this point.

Expect to see a lot of this coverage pattern in the coming months. President Bush will be described as a strong figure who is raising millions of dollars, leading in the polls and avoiding the internecine conflict of the other party. He'll also get credit for "winning the war" in Iraq and reviving the economy, if it comes around.

Polls particularly help this pattern. Most good candidates know the only poll that matters is the one on election day, but the media will sell us the polls to prove that Bush can't be defeated. We heard the same story in 1991 when George Bush Sr. held a 90 percent approval rating, but Bush went on to lose the election the following year.

Positive poll numbers will be portrayed as a feather in the president's cap, then each feather will be portrayed as a nail in the coffin of his Democratic rivals. One day, the news will change, and another pattern will emerge.

4. The Incumbent Is Vulnerable

Reporters often alternate between patterns three and four throughout the campaign. Every new poll will be used as evidence of one pattern or the other. The reporters will claim to see trends and momentum to indicate that one candidate or another is doing well or poorly.

In the recent Labor Day poll, only 38 percent said President Bush would be re-elected, but 50 percent said they think a Democrat can win. That means Bush is vulnerable, in theory. In reality, it depends on which Democratic candidate wins the primary race. It's easy to express support for an imaginary opponent and harder to maintain that support once the opponent has faced an onslaught of negative campaigning to redefine his image.

When voters were asked the same question about Bush's father in October 1991, 66 percent said he would be re-elected. That means little Bush is already running behind his defeated father. That can't be a good sign for Bush. But there is a silver lining in the clouds. Bush's father's re-election number dropped 20 points in the next month.

Using the Formula

There are a few other patterns in campaign news coverage as well. You'll hear a lot about how so-and-so "flip flopped" on this issue or that issue, but you won't hear a lot about the issue itself. Around November, you'll start to hear rumors about which candidates might drop out of the race. Then in December and January, you'll hear a lot about "the expectations game."

The media don't really care who wins or loses the primary races. They care about expectations. If you come in third and you were expected to come in second, you're doing badly. But if you come in second instead of your expected third, you've got momentum. Even if you win, you could lose, if you don't win by the expected margin of victory.

Sounds a lot more like a horse race than a campaign to be the leader of the free world. But that's how we do politics here in America. Enjoy the race!

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