People watching the election coverage last night: 71.5 million. Of course, that’s across all the networks. Breakdown as follows:
ABC 13,135,000
CNN 12,304,000
NBC 12,018,000
FxNews 9,044,000
CBS 7,829,000
MSNBC 5,889,000
FOX [...]

I have been watching Saturday Night Live this season. A show which does timely political satire can only benefit from absurd current events, and this election season has been nothing if not absurd. SNL’s biggest bootstrap has been Sarah Palin, a woman with so many comic hooks that she might as well be wearing a [...]

The Politics-Is-Good-For-Television meme I brought up a couple of weeks ago takes it to the extreme:
On average, Obama’s 30-minute primetime infomercial managed to outperform usual broadcast network programming in the time period.
The Obama special was seen by 26.3 million viewers across broadcasters CBS, NBC and Fox, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings.
I don’t know what [...]

A couple of weeks ago I marveled at the huge splash that politics was making in TV ratings. The news channels are up, SNL is more watched than it’s been in years, people even watched the debates, for heaven’s sake. You got a media company, you can’t go wrong with politically-themed entertainment.
Except.
Except in the movies. Oliver Stone’s take on [...]

This entry is a follow-up to Dan K’s previous article on how politics has become hot show biz.
First of all, I agree: It’s compelling stuff, the whole “future of American society and civilization” deal. It’s high-ratings event coverage, all right. However, I will part company with Dan’s rather Swiftian suggestion we have sponsored elections, [...]

I just got this email from the estimable Mr. Cheese.
Dear American Citizen:
In most states, today is the deadline for voter registration. Take 3 minutes and register to vote TODAY.
Please visit loungethevote.com to register, and let’s lounge the vote.
If you’ve ALREADY registered to vote, then take those 3 minutes and visit shop.richardcheese.com and buy a [...]

The Hollywood Reporter scooped me this morning. I was thinking of writing a commentary about the surprising amount of interest in the presidential election, and here comes James Hibbard in his LIVE FEED blog. He opens:
Have Nielsen ratings ever been so politicized?
– Barack Obama received record-breaking viewers for his Democratic National Convention speech.
– John McCain’s [...]

I covered the TV ratings for both conventions here, and they were historically high. Obama held the record for most-watched acceptance speech, that is until McCain took the record by another 500,000 viewers. Palin was pretty close too. Biden, not so much.
But there’s all kinds of fascinating qualifiers for these ratings, and they add up [...]

Like I said on the show BEFORE THE REPUBLICAN RATINGS CAME OUT, this is less an indication of candidate popularity than an indication that there’s nothing better on TV. Capitals for you “liberal media bias” mavens. Anyway, John McCain’s acceptance speech beat Obama’s acceptance speech!
McCain’s address at the Republican National Convention on Thursday night was [...]

Don’t pretend there’s no connection: Hollywood Reporter gives prelim numbers for Obama’s acceptance speech.
Barack Obama’s historic acceptance speech for the Democratic presidential nomination Thursday night was seen by 38.4 million viewers — 57% more than watched John Kerry four years ago — and was the most-watched convention speech ever.
Thursday night’s viewership set a new record [...]