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Networks arenot in the news-coverage business

A record total of 38.3 million viewers watched Obama's acceptancespeech Thursday, according to Nielsen Media Research. An average of8 million watched on CNN alone, easily besting the broadcastcompetition on ABC, CBS and NBC. Of course, nobody on theRepublican side approaches the media star power of Obama; McCainhimself takes potshots at his own speaking skills. But last week,the three news cable networks each posted average prime-time gainsof more than 50% compared with the '04 convention; those gains areunlikely to fade away entirely in Minnesota.

THE conventions are making it clearer than ever before that thebroadcast networks have, for better or worse, permanently ceded tothe cable outlets their role as the nation's politicalprognosticators. That was the historic role that NBC first carvedout more than 50 years ago for anchors Chet Huntley and DavidBrinkley.

As CNN/US President Jon Klein told me late Thursday: "Networks arenot in the news-coverage business anymore. They put on newscasts."

If that seems a self-serving exaggeration, consider that while CNN,Fox News and MSNBC indulged in wall-to-wall coverage in Denver, thebroadcast networks hewed to their recent pattern of devoting onepaltry hour per night to the proceedings. The broadcast journalistswere out there gamely trying but were handicapped covering a storythat everyone else was swarming and where old-fashionedplay-by-play seemed irrelevant. It was perhaps to the broadcasters'detriment that the grand drama promised by the Clintons and theirsore supporters dissolved into Hillary shutting down the roll calland the Democrats displaying stage-managed unity.

"The idea of a contested convention went away pretty quickly,"Marty Ryan, Fox News' executive producer of political coverage,told me.

So what news there was, outside of the speeches everyone saw andinterpreted, lurked in the margins. CBS trumpeted Katie Couric’s webcast interview with Michael Dukakis , the failed Democratic candidate of 1988, who apologized toAmericans for not defeating George H.W. Bush, which he believespaved the way for the presidency of Bush's son. The labors ofCouric and her broadcast colleagues barely registered, though;Matthews' rant and other sideshows at MSNBC generated far moreattention. Overall, the broadcasters' convention ratings stank.

I contacted the three network news divisions to get their take;none responded.

The broadcast vacuum has created other opportunities. When Imentioned to PBS' Jim Lehrer that his network is doing thecomprehensive, yeoman-like convention reporting that ABC, CBS andNBC used to do, he warmly intoned: "Amen." PBS drew an average of 3million viewers for its nightly coverage last week, down 14% fromthe 2004 Democratic convention but still very high by PBSstandards, and not far from the numbers for its bigger broadcastcousins.

Lehrer faulted the broadcasters for "bad editorial judgment" inlimiting convention coverage. "My God, we're talking about one ofthe most important presidential elections we've had in this countryin some time," he said.

A sense of triumph seems missing at the cable networks, however.That's probably because they remain locked in the bitter ratingswars that have dominated so much of their energies this decade.

CNN's Klein is reveling in the network's Democratic-conventiondominance, with prime-time ratings up 82% compared with four yearsago. He insists CNN is doing well because it has found a middlepath to covering politics. "The other guys have staked out theextremes of the political spectrum, leaving reasonable Republicansand Democrats only one place to get reliable, non-spininformation," Klein said.

But Fox News and MSNBC are posting ratings gains that are nearly asimpressive. And Fox may do exceedingly well this week, if itsrecord-breaking numbers from the '04 GOP confab are any indication.

ALTHOUGH MSNBC may be deliberately courting the liberal extremistswith its star Olbermann and his on-air anti-Republican blasts, FoxNews has actually been mending fences with Democrats, recentlyhiring former Hillary Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson as acommentator. And there is evidence that Fox News' audience is infact far less politically skewed than either CNN's or MSNBC's. Asurvey this month from the Pew Research Center for the People andthe Press found that 39% of Fox News' viewers were Republican, 33%Democratic. CNN was 51% Democratic and just 18% Republican, whileMSNBC was 45%-18% in favor of Democrats.

But the political tilt of the cable audience might matter less thanits size -- which is large and growing. The conventions play tocable's strength at saturation coverage and instant analysis.
 


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