The 2008 U.S. election proved that a new dawn for politics has arrived. We now have seen the power of web 2.0 and how it can shape a political landscape. We also saw how the Millenials are engaged. How did this all happen? The answer is two words: MARKETING and MONEY. The rule of the game (anywhere) is the one with the bigger war chest, wins. But there is something else about this election that was also not seen in a long time: STRONG MEDIA BIAS.
We can go on and on (which I will because there will be other things I will be ranting about this election), but for the sake of this page, I can safely say that Obama won because he vastly outspent McCain. Even Chris Cilizza of Washington Post (one of the newspapers who endorsed Obama) agrees with many of us who observed the political circus.
According to Nielsen Company, from June through November, Obama ran 419,667 ads in local markets while McCain ran 269,992 ads — a difference of nearly 150,000 ads. In the final month of the election, the ad difference was even greater with Obama’s campaign running 210,425 local ads as compared to just more than 97,000 for McCain. Obama also had one-and-a-half times as many spot TV ads than John McCain during the general election season (6/08 to 11/08), double when he started running ads in January during the Primaries.
SPOT TV ADS: June-Nov 2008
| Barack Obama | 419,667 |
| John McCain | 269,992 |
Local Ad Spending by Both McCain and Obama
Other notable campaign facts from Nielsen’s research
- Obama’s ads were on the airwaves over twice as much as McCain’s in the final month before the election (210,245 vs. 97,023 ad buys).
- McCain took early advantage of Obama’s long primary battle with Hillary Clinton, which ended on June 3rd. McCain bought over three and a half times more spot TV ads than Obama in June (26,594 to 7,251), the only month that McCain beat his opponent in that category.
- McCain made a major push with national buys in September, out placing Obama 10 to 1 in cable and network ad buys.
- The two candidates alone combined for almost 850,000 total ad buys dating back to January.
Here are some statistics presented by ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group:
Daily Tracking versus Actual Popular Vote From ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group
This figure show results of the daily tracking polls, and the actual popular vote (blue). Main pollsters are colored, so that relative bias can be seen. The trend line is a less smooth through all points.
State tracking results from ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group
The result for each state (blue, red) and polls for each state over the week leading up to the election are shown as a dot plot. From top to bottom, the order of the states is from most Republican to most Democratic.
Median is represented as a black dot, all polls as large white dots, and median of last week’s as a grey dot. Vertical lines mark 5% points difference.
Obama tracking results from ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group
McCain tracker from ISU Statistical Graphics Working Group
These figures show the daily tracking results separately for Obama and McCain, and the actual result. Tracking polls low-balled the McCain %.
So, how fair was U.S. Elections this time compared to the 2000 or 2004?
Lesson learned here is that politics still truly local and money greases the machines. It is a dirty world we live and work in.
[...] 2008 US Presidential Elections Synopsis Part 2 Posted in news, politics, society, trends, web 2.0 Tagged: 2008, ads, Chris Cilizza, Democrats, Hillary Clinton, marketing, McCain, Media, Millenials, money, Nielsen Company, Obama, Presidential Elections, Republicans, Statistics, tv, … [...]
[...] 2008 U.S. Presidential Elections Synopsis Part 2 The 2008 U.S. election proved that a new dawn for politics has arrived. We now have seen the power of web 2.0 and how it can shape a political landscape. We also saw how the Millenials are engaged. How did this all happen? The answer is two words: MARKETING and MONEY. The rule of the game (anywhere) is the one with the bigger war chest, wins. But there is something else about this election that was also not seen in a long time: STRONG MEDIA BIAS. We can go on and on (which I will because there will be other things I will be ranting about this election), but for the sake of this page, I can safely say that Obama won because he vastly outspent McCain. Even Chris Cilizza of Washington Post (one of the newspapers who endorsed Obama) agrees with many of us who observed the political circus. According to Nielsen Company, from June through November, Obama ran 419,667 ads in local markets while McCain ran 269,992 ads — a difference of nearly 150,000 ads. In the final month of the election, the ad difference was even greater with Obama’s campaign running 210,425 local ads as compared to just more than 97,000 for McCain. [...] [...]
[...] 2008 US Presidential Elections Synopsis Part 2 The 2008 US election proved that a new dawn for politics has arrived. We now have seen the power of web 2.0 and how it can shape a political landscape. We also saw how the Millenials are engaged. How did this all happen? … [...]
[...] 2008 U.S. Presidential Elections Synopsis Part 2 The 2008 U.S. election proved that a new dawn for politics has arrived. We now have seen the power of web 2.0 and how it can shape a political landscape. We also saw how the Millenials are engaged. How did this all happen? The answer is two words: MARKETING and MONEY. The rule of the game (anywhere) is the one with the bigger war chest, wins. But there is something else about this election that was also not seen in a long time: STRONG MEDIA BIAS. We can go on and on (which I will because there w [...]