NYT reprint of '08 E. Edwards' article on the press in the primaries. It's good.

[Captain Hilts]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/opinion/27edwards.html?_r=1

Did you, for example, ever know a single fact about Joe Biden’s health care plan? Anything at all? But let me guess, you know Barack Obama’s bowling score. We are choosing a president, the next leader of the free world. We are not buying soap, and we are not choosing a court clerk with primarily administrative duties.

What’s more, the news media cut candidates like Joe Biden out of the process even before they got started. Just to be clear: I’m not talking about my husband. I’m referring to other worthy Democratic contenders. Few people even had the chance to find out about Joe Biden’s health care plan before he was literally forced from the race by the news blackout that depressed his poll numbers, which in turn depressed his fund-raising.

And it’s not as if people didn’t want this information. In focus groups that I attended or followed after debates, Joe Biden would regularly be the object of praise and interest: “I want to know more about Senator Biden,” participants would say.

But it was not to be. Indeed, the Biden campaign was covered more for its missteps than anything else. Chris Dodd, also a serious candidate with a distinguished record, received much the same treatment. I suspect that there was more coverage of the burglary at his campaign office in Hartford than of any other single event during his run other than his entering and leaving the campaign.

Who is responsible for the veil of silence over Senator Biden? Or Senator Dodd? Or Gov. Tom Vilsack? Or Senator Sam Brownback on the Republican side?

The decision was probably made by the same people who decided that Fred Thompson was a serious candidate.

[RandomThoughts]

1. Yep, but I think they picked Obama thinking he was easiest

For their main pick to beat. No offense to President Obama.

But the black out, and silly stories about some candidates were quite obvious. That is another reason why the media has to be changed.

[Captain Hilts]

3. I'm not sure I understand what you're saying here. nt

[RandomThoughts]

8. The media attention focused on Obama and Clinton

It was as if they wanted that to be the two that fought for the Democrat primary. I think the thought was that was Clinton's easier road then going against Biden or some of the others, so they were not given any coverage.

However it could have been that Obama was their plan B, but I don't think it was. Clinton was picked to win back before 2004, one of the reasons they sunk Kerry.

[Captain Hilts]

9. The media wanted Obama and Clinton, that's for sure. Both were better stories. nt

[RandomThoughts]

10. I will say this, it took a heck of alot

For Obama to pull off that primary win, he did earn the win for sure.

And I don't think it is just better stories, when they did cover the other candidates they had negative fluff stories about aliens and haircuts...

Which is actually funny, Harry Aliens. LOL. I don't believe in aliens though :)

[dalaigh lllama]

11. I think the media aka corporations thought the Republican candidate

could beat a woman or a "black" man, and so they did heavy promo for Obama and Clinton and little or nothing on the others. (And weren't they surprised and dismayed when America didn't go for the default white dude?) Just my cynical lil' opinion.

[Captain Hilts]

14. No, I don't. Anyone that could read basic polling data could see that this was the Dems' year.

The media also torpedoed the R's best candidate, Mitt Romney. Romney could actually talk about policy like a thoughtful human being, something McCain was completely incapable of.

Romney was the R's best candidate, by far, and his numbers would have gone up during the Sept financial crisis, instead of McCain's gong down.

[Muttocracy]

2. I loved that when she wrote it. Had her husband dropped out earlier,

Richardson would have been 3rd, Biden 4th. Not that it would have changed any final results. Biden might have stuck around for NH but it still would have been a BO/HC race.

[Captain Hilts]

4. It's hard to say. I really like Richardson, but, somehow he did not seem poised enough

to be president. And, his resume shows he obviously has it, but he just didn't come across well.

I remember watching C-Span late one night and watching a show that was a film of a talk that Biden gave to about 40 people in Iowa about how to deal with the Middle East. I was pretty darned impressed and really began to rethink the Senator from MBNA.

This primary cycle had the best crop of candidates to choose from we've ever had. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I remember watching one of the early debates and thinking, okay, I like something about all of 'em!

We've got a deep bench on our team.

[Muttocracy]

6. I liked Richardson "on paper" but he was awful in the debates

and with the weirdness in NM (whatever happened with all that?) I'm glad he wasn't the nominee.

[Captain Hilts]

7. Yeah, me too, as much as I liked/like him. nt

[masuki bance]

5. EE on the primaries- "We can't make John black, we can't make him a woman"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x5026280

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/08/08/elizabeth-edwards-cant-make-john-black-or-a-woman/

[MADem]

13. But we can make him a skirt-chasing babydaddy...and the only "media" that covered that was the

National Enquirer....

[NYCGirl]

15. The only thing that made Edwards a "skirt-chasing babydaddy" was Edwards

himself. Maybe it was a good thing (for him) that the press wasn't paying more attention to him.

[FrenchieCat]

12. If the decision was made by the same people who decided that

Fred Thompson was a serious candidate, then these folks had no powers to make any decisions really. :shrug:

Obama won Iowa, period. Not the media, not anyone else.
That's why Iowa and New Hamsphire are so important....
because retail politics is what matters, not what the national media says.
Iowans have been around the block. They ain't stupid.

He wasn't endorsed by the Des Moines Register,
he wasn't endorsed by many Unions...
but he was endorsed by Iowans!

The media had little to do with it. Just ask Reverend Wright!

[Midwestern Democrat]

16. Biden talked about this issue at an event in Iowa I attended right before

the Iowa caucus. A woman in the audience asked why he wasn't getting more media coverage and Biden answered by comparing his 1988 run for president to his 2008 run. Biden said that in 1988 the national media outlets had far greater resources invested in field reporting - as an example, he said that early in the '88 primary season he was speaking at a NH house party and David Broder was in the audience taking notes. By 2008, the national media outlets - due to budget cutbacks - had nowhere near this level of field reporting strength. They pretty much reported the campaign from the studio and didn't send their reporters to the field until the week before the Iowa caucus.