BP’s gushing oil well on the deepwater seabed of the Gulf of Mexico dominated headlines throughout the spring, with NBC’s Anne Thompson leading the coverage. It was by far the biggest Environment story of the last two decades—yet prompted no follow-up spike in coverage of energy policy, or global warming.
For the first time since 2001, the Islamic World was not the focus of foreign coverage. Instead, attention turned to the Americas--the Port-au-Prince earthquake, the Chile mine rescue, NBC’s usual shameless shilling for the Olympics in Vancouver. The narco-violence in Mexico should have made hemisphere coverage even heavier but ABC (8 min v NBC 33, CBS 21) fell down on the job.
The war in Afghanistan was less newsworthy than in 2009 (416 min v 556): CBS devoted most resources there; NBC made heavy cuts. The cataclysmic monsoon floods in next-door Pakistan (54 min) were the year’s most undercovered story.
Coverage of the Economy is a reverse indicator: it peaks during recessions and subsides during recoveries. Unemployment may still be stubbornly high yet the newshole for the economy has reverted to the mean. So apparently growth has resumed.
The midterm elections were even more newsworthy than in 1994 and 2006, the last two times the House changed hands. No-change midterms routinely get scant attention. ABC’s political team of Jake Tapper and Jonathan Karl got most face time.
The Most Newsworthy Woman of the Year was Christine O’Donnell for demonstrating the limits ot the Tea Party’s power to change politics; the Man, Tony Hayward, now has his life back.
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