Media gives campaign a breather

Well, sorta. Overall focus on the 2008 campaign dipped all the way down to 27%, and even the folks over at the cable networks dropped well below the halfway point to 43%.

In fact, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism, during the week of 5//26/08-6/1/08, radio almost caught up with cable, spending 42% of its time on the election.

Of course, the big #2 story was somewhat election related. Ex-White House press secretary Scott McClelland's tell-all book was released and easily captured the second slot on the chart with 14% -- no other story made it past 3%. Diffusive coverage of Iraq, the NASA Mars mission, natural disasters and still-on-the-radar ongoing stories split the media in any number of different directions. Click the headline to see the full coverage chart.

Story	Overall	Newspapers	Online	Net. TV	Cable TV	Radio
2008 campaign	27%	17%	16%	17%	43%	42%
McClellan book	14%	4%	11%	15%	28%	13%
Chinese earthquake	3%	3%	12%	x	x	x
US economy	3%	4%	4%	4%	1%	4%
Events in Iraq	3%	5%	x	3%	1%	1%
Gas/oil prices	2%	x	x	7%	1%	2%
Mars Lander Phoenix	2%	x	6%	4%	x	x
IA, MN tornadoes	2%	x	4%	5%	3%	1%
Iraq homefront	2%	5%	x	x	x	2%
Memorial Day events	2%	x	x	4%	x	x
Bear Stearns/JP Morgan	x	4%	x	x	x	x
Health care debate	x	4%	x	x	x	x
Immigration	x	3%	x	x	x	x
Domestic terrorism	x	3%	x	x	1%	x
War on terror	x	x	3%	x	x	x
Israel intl politics	x	x	3%	x	x	x
Myanmar cyclone	x	x	2%	x	x	x
Same-sex marriage	x	x	2%	x	x	4%
China	x	x	x	4%	x	x
TX polygamy raid	x	x	x	3%	2%	x
Manhattan crane collapse	x	x	x	x	1%	1%
Iraq policy debate	x	x	x	x	1%	x
Sudan/Darfur	x	x	x	x	x	1%

Source: Project for Excellence in Journalism

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