The Media and the 2012 Election: Taking the ‘Fun’ Out of the Fundamentals?

Although the next presidential election is more than two years away, pundits are already trying to parse the meaning of polling data even though trial heats polls this far in advance of the election are practically worthless. The same goes for the recently concluded Conservative Political Action Conference straw poll won by Rand Paul for the second year in a row – it likely tells us little about who the Republican nominee will be. No matter – the fact that these polls don’t tell us much won’t stop pundits from endlessly hyping them – after all, they have to write something!

Before we wander too far down the garden path of media misinformation, however, it might do well to revisit some of the more glaring media misconceptions regarding the 2012 presidential election. In a piece I have coming out in the American Political Science Association journal Perspectives on Politics I take aim at what I see as five enduring myths promulgated by many (but not all!) journalists in the aftermath of that contest. CONT.

Matthew Dickinson, Middlebury College

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