{"id":90815,"date":"2007-05-10T00:00:01","date_gmt":"2007-05-10T05:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/2007\/05\/10\/pej-talk-show-index-april-29-may-4-2007\/"},"modified":"2024-04-14T04:12:36","modified_gmt":"2024-04-14T09:12:36","slug":"pej-talk-show-index-april-29-may-4-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/journalism\/2007\/05\/10\/pej-talk-show-index-april-29-may-4-2007\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP Debate has Talk Shows Buzzing"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n\n

The day after the May 3 Republican presidential debate in California, the verdict starting rolling in on America\u2019s talk shows.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

On his May 4 radio program, conservative bellwether Rush Limbaugh offered \u201csome preliminary comments\u201d that seemed to bode well for former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney. \u201cI thought Romney looked Reagan-esque,\u201d offered Limbaugh. \u201cHe was very articulate and quick.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

As for the two Republican candidates atop the early polls, Limbaugh seemed unimpressed. Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani \u201cdid stumble a bit\u201d on the abortion question, he said, and Arizona Senator John McCain \u201cto me, didn\u2019t quite measure up.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

That night on the Fox News Channel\u2019s \u201cHannity & Colmes,\u201d Republican strategist Karen Hanretty seemed to feel largely the same way. Giuliani, she asserted, \u201ccan\u2019t have it both ways\u201d on the abortion question. \u201cHe is a pro-choice candidate. He should simply run as a pro-choice candidate.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

The assessment of McCain was harsher. Calling him \u201ctoo intense and over-prepped,\u201d Hanretty said the senator reminded her of \u201cSlim Pickens, in the movie \u2018Dr. Strangelove.\u2019 You know, the character waving his hat over his head as he rides the H-bomb to world destruction.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

If the mainstream media post-mortems tend toward caution about about picking debate winners and losers, the talk shows last week were hardly burdened by such reticence. That helped make last week\u2019s big GOP debate\u2014with 10 candidates sharing the spotlight\u2014the biggest talk topic of the week. With about half the campaign-related segments connected to the debate itself, the 2008 race for the White House was the biggest subject, filling 28% of the talk airwaves from April 29 through May 4, according to PEJ\u2019s Talk Show Index.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

The campaign was also the biggest story in the general News Index (at 13%). But it got more than twice as much attention in the talk show menu (28%). That general pattern of talk hosts using their shows to significantly magnify two or three of the biggest news stories was again evident last week. The second biggest talk subject, the Iraq war policy debate, filled 20% of the talk airtime, in contrast to 12% of the newshole in the media overall. And while the controversy over former CIA director George Tenet\u2019s new book, \u201cAt the Center of the Storm,\u201d accounted for 5% of the general news coverage, it represented 13% of the talk show conversation last week.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

The other two top-five topics were stories that\u00a0were also political. The immigration debate, the fourth biggest subject (at 6%), was dominated by CNN\u2019s Lou Dobbs, a tireless advocate for tougher enforcement policies. On the week when there were May 1 immigrant-rights rallies across the country, \u201cLou Dobbs Tonight\u201d aired 13 of the 21 talk segments that focused on the topic.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

Another story that managed to take on an ideological tinge was the \u201cD.C. Madam\u201d saga, the fifth biggest talk subject at 4%. This story, which threatened to expose a number of influential Beltway figures who had used an escort service, fizzled when ABC\u2019s \u201c20\/20\u201d decided not to name names in its much-anticipated May 4 report. But earlier in the week, the radio talkers had a field day.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

[showing up]<\/p>\n\n\n

On the other side of the political spectrum, liberal radio talker Randi Rhodes seized on the fact that one Bush administration State Department official had resigned after being linked to the escort service. (He argued he was only getting massages.) So she aired a satirical bit that was designed to sound like an R-rated commercial for \u201cConserva-girls, the escort service just for Republicans.\u201d <\/p>\n\n

The Talk Show Index, released each Friday, is designed to provide news consumers, journalists and researchers with hard data about what stories and topics are most frequently dissected and discussed in the media universe of talk and opinion\u2014a segment of the media that spans across both prime time cable and radio. (See About the Talk Show Index.)<\/a> PEJ\u2019s Talk Show Index includes seven prime time cable shows and five radio talk hosts and is a subset of our News Coverage Index<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

Aside from the proclivity of talk hosts to put considerably more emphasis on the biggest news stories of the week, another area where the Talk Index and general News Index tend to diverge is the bottom of the top-10 story list. The kind of spot news or breaking events that often helps fill out the second half of the News Index are sometimes ignored by the talk shows. \u00a0<\/p>\n\n

This past week, such significant news stories as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice\u2019s meeting with the Syrian foreign minister, Queen Elizabeth II\u2019s U.S. visit, Rupert Murdoch\u2019s bid to buy Dow Jones, and the turmoil inside the Israeli government after the report on the 2006 war against Hezbollah all failed to make the list of top 10 talk topics.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

Instead, the bottom half of the top-10 talk topics included the health of Cuba\u2019s ailing leader Fidel Castro (7th biggest topic at 1%), White House Press Secretary Tony Snow\u2019s return to work after cancer treatment (eighth at 1%), and the U.S. conflict with Iran (tenth at 1%).\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

While the talk universe is often known for its passionate ideological arguments between left and right, there are times\u2014albeit rare\u2014when both sides actually find themselves in agreement.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n\n

Last week former CIA director Tenet\u2014on a media tour to promote his new book\u2014tried to distance himself from the decision to go to war in Iraq while claiming he was being made a scapegoat for the unpopular policy.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

That managed to anger conservatives who resented his criticism of the White House and were suspicious about his motives. \u201cFor him to be the guy that\u2019s out there doing the second-guessing is as ridiculous and absurd a situation as you can imagine,\u201d declared conservative radio host Mark Belling, subbing for Limbaugh on April 30. \u00a0\u201cThis guy was wrong all along.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

It also managed to anger liberals who wonder why Tenet wasn\u2019t raising doubts about the war when he was in a position of power in the administration.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n

\u201cHow many are paying attention to the whore tour?\u201d asked liberal radio host Ed Schultz on his May 1 show. \u201cThat\u2019s we are now calling the George Tenet book tour\u2026He sold his soul on a book tour.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n\n

It\u2019s a rare public figure that can bring America\u2019s fractious talk hosts to agreement, but as correspondent Kelli Arena noted in a report on Dobbs\u2019s April 30 show: \u201cGeorge Tenet is finding out it\u2019s not easy to rewrite your own legacy.\u201d\u00a0<\/font>\u00a0<\/font> <\/p>\n\n

Mark Jurkowitz of PEJ<\/em> <\/p>\n\n

Top Ten Stories in the Talk Show Index<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n

1. 2008 Campaign – 28% <\/address>\n\n
2. Iraq Policy Debate – 20%
<\/address>\n\n
3. George Tenet Book – 13%<\/address>\n\n
4. Immigration – 6% <\/address>\n\n
5. DC Escort Scandal – 4%<\/address>\n\n
6. Events in Iraq – 1%
<\/address>\n\n
7. Fidel Castro’s Health – 1%
<\/address>\n\n
8. Tony Snow’s Health – 1%<\/address>\n\n
9. LA Police Actions at Immigration Rally – 1%<\/address>\n\n
10. Iran – 1% <\/address>\n\n\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n

Top Ten Stories in the broader News Coverage Index<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n

1. 2008 Campaign – 13% <\/address>\n\n
2. Iraq Policy Debate – 12%<\/address>\n\n
3. Events in Iraq – 7%
<\/address>\n\n
4. George Tenet Book – 5%<\/address>\n\n
5. Immigration – 5%<\/address>\n\n
6. Condoleeza Rice Trip – 4%<\/address>\n\n
7. DC Escort Scandal – 2%<\/address>\n\n
8. Queen Elizabeth Visits the US – 2%<\/address>\n\n
9. Murdoch Bids for Dow Jones – 2%<\/address>\n\n
10. Israel\/Lebanon Conflict – 2%<\/address>\n\n

Click here<\/a> to read the methodology behind the Talk Show Index. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The talk shows were not shy about picking winners and (especially) losers at last week’s Republican face-off in California. And while the sex scandal involving a D.C. escort service managed to divide the talk hosts along ideological lines, a former CIA director’s book tour actually achieved the rare feat of bringing them together.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sub_headline":"PEJ Talk Show Index April 29 - May 4, 2007","sub_title":"PEJ Talk Show Index April 29 - May 4, 2007","_prc_public_revisions":[],"_ppp_expiration_hours":0,"_ppp_enabled":false,"ai_generated_summary":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"apple_news_api_id":"","apple_news_api_revision":"","apple_news_api_created_at":"","apple_news_api_modified_at":"","apple_news_api_share_url":"","apple_news_api_pending":"","apple_news_is_preview":false,"apple_news_is_hidden":false,"relatedPosts":[],"reportMaterials":[],"multiSectionReport":[],"package_parts__enabled":false,"package_parts":[],"datacite_doi":"","datacite_doi_citation":"","_prc_seo_qr_attachment_id":0,"spoken_article_player_enabled":true,"displayBylines":true,"footnotes":"","prc_watchers":[],"_prc_fork_parent":0,"_prc_fork_status":"","_prc_active_fork":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[],"tags":[],"bylines":[],"collection":[],"datasets":[],"level_of_effort":[],"primary_audience":[],"information_type":[],"_post_visibility":[],"formats":[458],"_fund_pool":[],"languages":[],"regions-countries":[],"research-teams":[527],"workflow-status":[],"class_list":["post-90815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","formats-report","research-teams-journalism"],"label":false,"post_parent":0,"word_count":1163,"canonical_url":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/journalism\/2007\/05\/10\/pej-talk-show-index-april-29-may-4-2007\/","art_direction":false,"_embeds":[],"watchers":[],"table_of_contents":[],"report_materials":"","report_pagination":{"current_post":null,"next_post":null,"previous_post":null,"pagination_items":[]},"parent_info":{"parent_title":"GOP Debate has Talk Shows Buzzing","parent_id":90815},"materialsOrdered":[],"chaptersOrdered":[],"partsOrdered":[],"partsEnabled":false,"datacite_doi":"","prc_seo_data":{"title":"GOP Debate has Talk Shows Buzzing","description":"

The talk shows were not shy about picking winners and (especially) losers at last week’s Republican face-off in California. And while the sex scandal involving a D.C. escort service managed to divide the talk hosts along ideological lines, a former CIA director’s book tour actually achieved the rare feat of bringing them together.<\/p>","og_title":"GOP Debate has Talk Shows Buzzing","og_description":"

The talk shows were not shy about picking winners and (especially) losers at last week’s Republican face-off in California. And while the sex scandal involving a D.C. escort service managed to divide the talk hosts along ideological lines, a former CIA director’s book tour actually achieved the rare feat of bringing them together.<\/p>","schema_type":"Article","noindex":false,"canonical_url":"","primary_terms":[],"custom_schema":[],"og_image":0,"indexnow_submitted_at":null,"gsc_index_status":null},"prepublish_checks":{"prc-image-alt-text":{"status":"incomplete","message":"1 image is missing alt text.","data":{"count":1}},"prc-about-this-research":{"status":"incomplete","message":"Add an \"About this research\" details block.","data":null},"prc-paragraph-count":{"status":"complete","message":"Found 24 paragraphs.","data":{"count":24}},"prc-internal-link":{"status":"complete","message":"Found 3 internal links.","data":{"count":3}}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"relatedPostsOrdered":[],"bylinesOrdered":[],"acknowledgementsOrdered":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90815"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90815\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":130646,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90815\/revisions\/130646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"bylines","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bylines?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"collection","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/collection?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"datasets","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/datasets?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"level_of_effort","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/level_of_effort?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"primary_audience","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/primary_audience?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"information_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/information_type?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"_post_visibility","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_post_visibility?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"formats","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/formats?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"_fund_pool","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_fund_pool?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"languages","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/languages?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"regions-countries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/regions-countries?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"research-teams","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-teams?post=90815"},{"taxonomy":"workflow-status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alpha.pewresearch.org\/pewresearch-org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/workflow-status?post=90815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}