Matt Drudge Loses His Media Bearings
Ding dong the witch is dead
 


Matt Drudge is sort of stuck in a weird place in time right now: four years ago he was able to sway MSM stories with the spin on his site, with his Swift Boat Veterans for Truth that derailed the Kerry campaign. And a lot of conservatives, and (non-conservatives!) still go to the "Republican Huffington Post" to hear how one of the big new media outlets is calling the presidential race.

But now that it's obvious to even the most loyal McCain supporters that their candidate is trailing behind in the polls, how does a guy like Matt Drudge both accurately report the facts while creating his own narrative?

Is it even possible for Matt Drudge to remain relevant after the credit crisis boosted Obama so far ahead in the polls that there seems to be no turning back?

For instance, Drudge spent last week going all-in on the McCain "comeback" narrative. But rather than aping the line, most of the press corps demurred, simply because the nationwide polling data did not support the claim. In fact, as Howard Kurtz noted on washingtonpost.com on Monday, the press has pivoted in the opposite direction, with even conservative media commentators declaring the cause lost for John McCain.

At this point, Drudge isn't even bothering with the polls. Last week the front page of Drudge even showed Obama leading (albeit within the margin of ever), which was the wrong story to be selling to loyal Drudgies.

So without completely fabricating falsehoods about the election, Matt Drudge is forced instead to compromise and market in fear tactics: "What if Obama was president, and there was another terrorist attack?" seems to be the story today, but jaded cynics such as yourselves might notice that Drudge is already putting the emphasis on Obama winning.

And that can't be a very comfortable position to find himself in.

Oct 21, 2008 · 56 views (beta) · Link · 10 Responses
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Comments (10)

No. 1 · ILoveAmerica

Again Jossip trying to fly on the coattails of Drudge…Drudge reported what Obama's VP nominee said!!! Oh that's right if it is news that ADVERSELY affects Obama (like the truth!) then it is racist, smear tactics, fear mongering…hmmmm you guys must REALLY be nervous to go after Drudge. After all he did have the scoop on the Devil with the Blue dress now didn't he? I thought Obama had it all sewn up? Hmmmmm maybe not

Posted: Oct 21, 2008 at 1:29 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 2 · fiona

Well, the truth is the people have made up their minds. The paid journalists have no influence, they are just scrabbling for a place in the news. Drudge is overenamored of his place in relevant news. Truth is, their is an overwhelming majority of Americans who will be independent determinants of the next leader of the USA. We are not all lemmings.

Posted: Oct 21, 2008 at 4:00 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 3 · Darth Paul

Why does ILoveAmerica hate freedom?

Posted: Oct 21, 2008 at 4:52 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 4 · Jack Herrington

I could never understand the appeal of The Drudge Report. It's just a link farm. The 'site' itself is lousy. It's designed like crap. And what's with all the Courier? Ridiculous. Lamest site ever.

Posted: Oct 21, 2008 at 7:08 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 5 · JJ

Yup. Lame ass site.

Posted: Oct 21, 2008 at 7:44 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 6 · Chris Jones

Can he stay relevant? Drudgereport is like in the top 5 most trafficked sites on the net. He often gets more traffic than Yahoo! news. In the last 24 hours he's had more than 26 million hits. That kind of traffic is inconceivable. Huffington and Kos get around 2 million hits a day. Drudge gets more hits in an hour than those sites get in a single day.

Posted: Oct 21, 2008 at 11:18 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 7 · Bonx

The truly saddest point came just one day ago and I was expecting it to be mentioned here as evidence of the Drudge decline: On the front page of the Drudge report was posted a tied poll between Obama and McCain–furthering his claim of a McCain comeback.

Unfortunitly for McCain, and for Drudge, the statistically tied poll was not from a major polling organization, but instead, was the Nickelodeon Kids Vote:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com.....-with.html

Posted: Oct 22, 2008 at 1:17 am · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 8 · Carly

"That kind of traffic is inconceivable." Yes it is, Chris Jones. About a month ago he had a widely reported headline in the upper right-hand column on his page thanking readers for record hits at his site. The numbers were … inconceivable. The number of hits he posted for the month alone was *more than double the number of every man, woman, and child in the United States,* and the year-to-date number he posted was just shy of the entire population on the planet. Just sayin'.

Posted: Oct 22, 2008 at 2:47 am · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 9 · Rollo Tomasi

>albeit within the margin of ever

whoa … that's deep.

Posted: Oct 27, 2008 at 1:17 pm · @Reply · [Flag?]
No. 10 · Mark Houdren

The traffic stats for Drudge are at wikipedia. He had 2 million visitors in September 08, vs Huffington's 4.5 million.

Posted: Oct 28, 2008 at 1:08 am · @Reply · [Flag?]
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