Things we learned from this year’s election coverage

CNN.com

The 2008 presidential election, which began sometime at the turn of the 20th century, is now over. If your candidate won, a hearty congratulations. If not, then please stop crying and throwing things, pick yourself up, and declare your intentions to run for President in 2012 sometime this afternoon. It was really and truly a — dare I say it — historic election that, for the time being, is ushering in a new era for America. Not only because we elected our first African-American President, but because television covered the race in a way that it had not done in the 50 or so years since it started covering elections.

Much of that is thanks to technology. The rest is courtesy of the 24-hour news stations that used all forms of communications technology to get the word out about the candidates, their platforms, and what color ties they were wearing. As this moment in our lives is written down in the history books, experts will not only say that this time changed the face of America but the face of political coverage as well.

So, what did we learn from all of the maps, analysts, poll results, and angry rantings of the FOX News personalities? Well, a few things. To see what those were, go ahead and jump ahead. Don’t worry, we’ll wait.

Touchscreens are the way to go: No more white boards and erasable markers anymore. The networks have finally gone high-tech with their fancy-schmancy touch screen maps of the United States.  Zoom-in, zoom-out, change the colors, move Alaska over to the coast of New Jersey (just called Jersey to us East Coasters), reverse North and South Dakota … it can all be done with a touch of a finger, a hand, a pen or, in the case of the Spice Channel’s election coverage, a certain part of the anatomy. CNN’s Magic Map was probably the most famous throughout the coverage. The one I saw on ABC’s election night special was slightly harder to use than the one on CNN. Probably running on Vista.

Political Analysts must be labeled for recognition: Did you see all of those people in the studio who were surfing the net via their laptops? Did you know who they were? Of course you didn’t! That’s why their titles needed to be stenciled into the covers of said laptops.  Over on ABC people like George Will, a total nobody, were labeled as ‘Political Analyst’ in white, two-inch high letters. On MSNBC the guy who gets the coffee had ‘gofer’ written in 12-inch high, fluorescent letters on his laptop. He was never in front of it, of course, since he was always going out getting coffee.

The more Political Analysts, the better: You can’t have too many differing opinions on one topic. That’s why you need as many people as possible in one studio so they can express those opinions. CNN had 52,000 analysts sitting by their laptops, ready to pounce on the percentage of Sneetches with stars who voted for Obama (52%, compared with 48% of Sneetches without stars who voted for Obama). The only real qualification to be on screen: you needed to know all of the synonyms for the word ‘historic’.

ANYTHING can be used to display an electoral map: ABC used all of Time Square to promote their broadcast and show the election results. NBC used the skating rink at Rockefeller Center to display their electoral map. In 2012, all of the networks and Internet sites should get together and purchase a satellite that will establish a stable, geosynchronous orbit above the United States. Then, when each state is claimed for a candidate, the satellite can bathe it in red or blue. Sure it will freak out the residents of each state, but it will certainly look pretty on Google Earth.

Diane Sawyer is HOT: I have never been one of those who believed that 60 was the new 40. But, after watching Diane Sawyer strut her stuff over at ABC I can now verify that fact. Despite turning 63 in December, Diane looks better than a number of entertainment personalities who are still in their 20s. By the way, this is in no way dissing CBS’ Katie Couric, who is just as good-looking. It’s just that Katie is, well, cute, while Diane has that sultry look to her. Plus, she has that deep voice, and those long fingers, and…

Oh, sorry, what were we talking about? Oh, never mind!

Clacked by Richard Keller
on Nov 05, 2008 @ 14:00 EST5EDT