Dow Jones Insight-2008 Presidential Election Media Pulse: Media Swings Even More...

Dow Jones Insight-2008 Presidential Election Media Pulse: Media Swings Even
More Strongly for Obama as He Turns Attention to Afghanistan; Economy Still
the Top Issue for Candidates

NEW YORK, July 22 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Results from the Dow Jones
Insight-2008 Presidential Election Media Pulse show that, even with the issues
of faith and race set aside, Barack Obama continues to receive more media
coverage than John McCain as the two candidates go head-to-head on hot-button
issues such as the Middle East and the economy.
For the past week from July 14-21, Obama was mentioned 60,654 times in all
tracked mainstream and social-media sources, for a 59% share, compared with
McCain's 42,463 mentions, or 41% share. Excluding mentions occurring in the
context of faith and race only dropped Obama's share two percentage points, to
57%.
In the same period, as Obama began his Middle East trip, he was mentioned
in reference to Afghanistan 8,299 times, or 61% of all mentions of the two
candidates, well above McCain's 5,355 mentions, or 39%. Despite McCain's
strong criticism of Obama's stance on Iraq, Obama still remained ahead on the
issues of Iraq, Israel and Iran in media coverage.
Media in Swing States Favoring McCain?
Despite Obama's heavy media attention, Dow Jones Insight finds that the
media in the Swing States are opting to highlight McCain more frequently than
their Red State and Blue State counterparts as these battleground states will
be heavily watched in the coming months.
Broken down along the Red State/Blue State/Swing State divide, Dow Jones
measured headline mentions to gauge what the press considers the most
important parts of the election story each day. During the period July 14 -
July 21, McCain drew his highest share of headline mentions from mainstream
press in the Swing States, with a 38% share (or 3,070 mentions), compared to
36% in the Blue States and 34% in the Red States.
Fuel Prices, Jobs Cuts and Housing Slumps - Oh, My
Given the current state of the economy, Dow Jones Insight tracked several
new issues playing key roles in the overall economic picture -- namely fuel
prices, the housing market and the jobs situation. Despite the dire tone of
the discussion around these topics in some corners of the media, it appears
that on the whole the press and bloggers are talking about them in relation to
the candidates somewhat less than expected.
Of the 24 key domestic and international issues currently tracked by Dow
Jones Insight, only one of the new topics -- fuel prices -- cracked the top
10. The issue was mentioned in the context of the candidates 27,443 times in
all tracked sources (mainstream and social media) during the period
June 20 - July 20, making it the eighth-most-discussed issue. The topic of
jobs ranked 11th, while the state of the housing market placed near the bottom
of the list in the 21st spot.
The Top Ten Issues for the Presidential Race
1. Economy
2. Faith
3. Fundraising
4. Taxes
5. Energy
6. Terrorism
7. Afghanistan
8. Fuel Prices
9. Environment
10. Iran

The Dow Jones Insight-2008 Presidential Election Media Pulse provides a
high-level view of a competitive media landscape and demonstrates how
candidates and issues are covered in the media and how that coverage changes
over time. Dow Jones Insight combines proven research methodologies, trusted
content and advanced text-mining and visualization tools to deliver strategic
qualitative and quantitative media measurement metrics. Organizations use the
analysis to nurture their reputation, demonstrate the effectiveness of their
communications strategies and achieve business objectives. The platform
processes nearly a million articles, Web pages, blogs and message board posts
per day.
The charts are available at http://dowjonesinsight.blogspot.com/ and can
be reproduced in print and online media. For further information about the Dow
Jones Insight solutions or The Dow Jones Insight-2008 Presidential Election
Media Pulse, please contact Shannon Sullivan at +1 609 627 2312 or
shannon.sullivan@dowjones.com
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SOURCE Dow Jones & Company

Shannon Sullivan of Enterprise Media Group Public Relations for Dow Jones &
Company, +1-609-627-2312, or Fax: +1-609-627-2301,
shannon.sullivan@dowjones.com