Mideast viewers saw many political ads

[Ron Burgundy]

AP - Television viewers in the Midwest got an eyeful of politics during local newscasts last month, but most of it was in the ads, not the news.

WASHINGTON - Television viewers in the Midwest got an eyeful of politics during local newscasts last month, but most of it was in the ads, not the news.

A study by the University of Wisconsin-Madison's NewsLab found that in the month before the Nov. 7 elections, television stations in seven Midwest markets aired an average of 4 minutes and 24 seconds of political ads and 1 minute and 43 seconds of election news during a typical 30-minute broadcast.

The study analyzed early and late evening newscasts on 28 stations in five states. The markets were Chicago, Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Cleveland, Columbus, Ohio, and Wisconsin's Madison and Milwaukee. Most regions featured competitive gubernatorial, Senate or House races that resulted in significant spending on political advertising.

Ken Goldstein, a political scientist who directed the study, said the coverage of politics and elections increased in the past month and reached its peak in the week before the election. But Goldstein said the news stories tended to focus on the horse race aspect of politics rather than on the views and policies of the candidates.

"There was an overwhelming focus on strategy and polling as opposed to a focus on the issues," he said.

Broadcasters criticized the study as "shoddy" for not including morning and noontime newscasts, public debates and weekend programming in the analysis.

"Local stations air political coverage during many dayparts, and not just in the narrow time frame of weekday evening newscasts," said Dennis Wharton, a spokesman for the National Association of Broadcasters.

The NewsLab study comes in the midst of debate over liberalizing rules that limit how many radio and television stations a company should be permitted to own in a single market. Foes of media consolidation claim that greater concentration in ownership leads to less local news coverage and does not serve the public interest.

The Federal Communications Commission plans to hold hearings before deciding the issue.

Christine Merritt, executive vice president of the Ohio Association of Broadcasters, noted that Ohio television stations aired several debates by gubernatorial and Senate candidates that the NewsLab study would not have counted in their analysis because they were not part of the evening newscasts.

"The question is how much credibility to give to results of the survey," she said.

According to the university study, the newscasts carried an average of nearly nine political ads. But ads were also part of the political story. Coverage of politics included attention to the preponderance of negative ads as well as the strategic placement of ads by the national political parties. As a result, the study found, more than one in 10 election stories mentioned or focused on a specific political ad.

"Television stations are giving viewers the equivalent of a junk food diet," said Mike McCabe, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, a watchdog group that wants broadcasters to provide free air time for political debate.

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Associated Press Writer John Dunbar contributed to this report.