On Friday night in Las Vegas, I watched local newscasts for 95 minutes. I watched the 10 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. newscasts on KVVU, Las Vegas Fox affiliate, and the 11 p.m. newscast on KTNV, the ABC affiliate. Of the 50 ads broadcast, 32 were political.
This includes advertisements for and against ballot questions (the equivalent of propositions in California; 6 ads), candidates running to become County Commisioners in Clark County (10 ads), Congressional candidates (6 ads), and, of course, the Presidential candidates (10 ads). Again, this is anecdotal evidence. However, 16 out of 50 ads relating to candidates for Federal offices is something you won't see in California.
What surprised me most was that I had seen or heard of almost all the advertisements that were aired regarding the Presidential race. In retrospect, I should have expected that the campaigns, the parties, and the major independent groups would be the only organizations running ads during newscasts since they seem to be such highly coveted venues for political advertising.
Though I have seen some ads sponsored by independent groups I hadn't heard of before, those ads were aired on the cable news channels on Saturday afternoon. As to the local newscasts, there were three Bush-Cheney ads (one on each newscast), three Democratic National Committee ads (one on each newscast), and one ad each for Kerry-Edwards, Move On (pro-Kerry), and the Progress for America Voter fund ad (pro-Bush). The only Presidential campaign ad that was entirely new to me is an anti-Bush ad from the League of Conservation Voters focusing on an issue unique to Nevada, namely, the storage of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain.
Posted by Elliott Wainwright at October 30, 2004 05:13 PM