HESS:
Well, I'm seeing, as Bob [Lichter]
shows the number of jokes going up, I am showing the number of stories ... with substance ... going down over the first two weeks. The horse-race
stories are going up.
So you see a descending line on substantive stories, an ascending line on
horse-race stories. Now, of course, part of that relates to the fact that it's a close
election. The closer the election, the more horse-race stories you are going to
get. And some of it I think relates to the fact that we have become a very
poll-dominated news media. Now ... every single day we have a poll.
And some, of course, have to do with the peculiarities of a particular election;
1992, of course, was: "It's the economy, stupid." So that was a substance
issue. That was way up. And 1996 wasn't a very close election, Dole versus
Clinton, so the horse-race stories were way down. But what is potentially
troubling here, Judy, is that usually it's in the first month, September, that you
get your policy stories.
WOODRUFF:
Steve Hess,... thank you.
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