Covering Debates

The "strange" and "weird" political year, as George Bush called it, also proved to be a quirky media year. "Who would have predicted, even in 1988," Congressman Markey said, "that Larry King, Phil Donahue, and Tabitha Soren of MTV would wield nearly as much influence in presidential politics as Peter Jennings, Dan Rather, and Tom Brokaw?" Each voter could customize his campaign information, Markey added: "The recipe might include a little MTV, perhaps a talk show or two, some CNN, and maybe a dash of network news."

Along with giving voters more options, the press paid more attention to voters in its campaign coverage. James M. Bernstein, a journalism professor at Indiana University, studied debate-related coverage and found "a greater focus on the importance to voters" in 1992. While the two campaigns were negotiating debate arrangements, news coverage stressed that the wrangling was forcing voters to wait. In post-debate analysis, Bernstein said, ABC devoted as much air time to a focus group of undecided voters as it devoted to its own correspondents.

Even so, the audience still wants expert analysis, according to Jennifer Lawson of PBS. Her network's post-debate analysis "got an incredibly large audience," she said. "That suggests to us that there's this continuing hunger, not only for the debates, but also for programs that help people think about what happened in a thoughtful way."

The attention paid to voters had another effect on coverage of debates, according to Jonathan Alter of Newsweek. "Spin is dead," he declared. Rather than listening to the campaign spin-controllers, reporters now listen to the electorate via instant polls. "The press is very wary of drawing firm conclusions in the immediate aftermath of a debate until they see how the people are responding."

Looking ahead to 1996, Joe Peyronnin said that CBS will try to offer a variety of information and formats. The morning program may use town meetings to discuss issues, and, as in 1992, air lengthy interviews with the candidates. The evening news will provide more in-depth reporting and background than in years past. The magazine programs will more frequently address campaign topics.

As another way of involving the audience, Peyronnin said that CBS hopes to do more with interactive technology, which allows viewers to express their opinions via telephone. ABC's Wald, however, questioned the merit of such expressions of opinion. The calls may represent an interested minority, he said, and not a majority. The approach may also imply that opinion is firmly set, whereas in fact "people reconsider constantly."

Other network executives are also looking ahead to 1996. Ed Turner of CNN hopes to achieve "a more civilized treatment of the primaries." PBS wants to look more closely at "how the media plays a key role in this whole process now," according to Jennifer Lawson. Susan Swain said that C-SPAN will "do more and we're going to do it earlier." In fact, she added, C-SPAN will probably start broadcasting from New Hampshire soon, "because we've heard from the governor of the state that there are presidential candidates already plying the trails."

On one issue that occasioned much handwringing in 1988 and 1992 -- the brevity of soundbites on the evening news -- the executives foresaw little change. The networks may air entire speeches or extended excerpts, CNN's Turner said, but not in the evening newscasts. "The nine-second thing doesn't trouble me," he said. "What troubles me is, are we as journalists getting the essence of the story, be it nine seconds or ninety-nine seconds?" ABC's Wald agreed. He noted that his network offers extended analysis on "American Agenda" and "Nightline," "but the criticisms coagulate around the evening news programs, which are what they are -- they aren't going to change very much."

Marvin Kalb championed the Shorenstein Barone Center's "Nine Sundays" proposal, which envisions two presidential debates and one vice-presidential debate, five issue discussions between individual candidates and panels of reporters, and, on the final Sunday before the election, closing speeches by the candidates. At least in 1992, responded Peyronnin of CBS, "Nine Sundays" was unnecessary. "The candidates were everywhere," he said. "I mean, we couldn't get them off the air."

Finally, speakers agreed that future campaigns will be affected in part by technological and programming changes that can't yet be fully foreseen. "Technology is moving so quickly that these techniques are apt to change radically," Kalb said. Wald noted that computer bulletin boards and other specialized media are growing rapidly. "They will not be large four years from now, but will be large eight years from now," he said. "They will allow ad-hoc discussion groups that could turn out to be reasonably important, in terms of those people who actually vote."

James M. Bernstein
Assistant Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University
Our early analysis of media coverage indicates that the news media recognized the importance of debates to voters in 1992. In contrast, post-debate analysis in previous years has focused on the importance of the debates to the candidates.
The change, we think, is a good sign. One of the main reasons for having televised presidential debates is because of their value to voters. Our data and other data show this. We believe that the more the news media recognize voters as a participant in the debates, the greater legitimacy the debates will have.

Susan Swain
Senior Vice President, C-SPAN
We really did cover all of the third-party candidates. I recall a fairly painful session in New Hampshire at the alternative presidential candidates' headquarters. They were all on the ballot, and they got five minutes of time on C-SPAN to explain why. Some were coherent, some not quite so.
After the debates, we decided to do our own third-party candidates' debate. We assembled three of the third-party candidates for ninety minutes, and gave them the questions off the debate videotape. Although the viewership for that was small, those folks did get an opportunity to participate in the format and make their views known.