John McCain tops other candidates in media coverage

But not all media coverage is good.

Sure it may be true that 492 term Senator John McCain is receiving more media coverage than anyone else in the race for President, but it seems to me he's not getting very favorable coverage either (being constantly bashed by members of his own party and all). Remember Ann Coulter claiming she'd rather vote for Hillary? Then there's Michelle Malkin who's been railing on and on about how "liberal" he is for weeks on her blog. Also, questions about McCains bad temper. And more on McCain's temper.

In the last week, Senator John McCain has surpassed even Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton in the amount of news coverage he has received.

The media effectively anointed Mr. McCain as the Republican front-runner after he won Florida. At the same time, reporters were writing up a storm about how conservatives were trying to deny Mr. McCain the crown. All of this made for a frothy brew of coverage for the week of Jan. 28 to Feb. 3.

Last week the presidential election dominated 51 percent of the nation’s news coverage, the highest level since PEJ began counting. The week’s events included the Florida primary, a Republican debate and the first one-on-one Democratic debate between Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton.

Mr. Obama, who got 34 percent of the coverage last week, was about even with Mrs. Clinton, who got 32 percent. These two have long dominated the political coverage, so Mr. McCain’s spike in visibility is noteworthy.

And for the record, Bill Clinton only garnered six percent of the media coverage last week.

UPDATE: And how could I have forgotten to mention the "not so breaking news" that John McCain dumped his first wife after she was crippled in a car crash and the fact that Cindy McCain is a known pill head! I'm sure the media will reemphasize this story when John McCain wins the Republican nomination too. And they should too, given that McCain comes from a party that rails on and on about their "morals," but as we all know, in reality, they're nothing more than a bunch of hypocrites.

McCain fell like a brick for Cindy, who was the heir to a brewery distribution business worth millions. For several years afterwards the McCains endured Washington gossip that he had dumped his first wife - who had been crippled in a car accident - in favour of a trophy bride to enhance his political ambitions.

It was in the late 1980s, after a series of miscarriages and giving birth to three children, that Cindy developed spinal problems and was prescribed painkillers after surgery. Her husband and family had no idea she was secretly taking pills stolen from a charity she had created called the American Voluntary Medical Team, which sent mobile surgical units to war zones. When federal agents began to investigate gaps in the charity’s records, Cindy telephoned her husband, a senator in Washington, and confessed.

She admitted at the time that the 1994 episode had “nearly destroyed both of us”. But she underwent treatment and attended meetings of Narcotics Anonymous as part of a deal with prosecutors who dropped charges.