WASHINGTON — Big Bird is endangered. Jim Lehrer lost control. And Mitt Romney crushed President Barack Obama.
Those were the judgments rendered across Twitter and Facebook Wednesday during the first debate of the 2012 presidential contest. While millions turned on their televisions to watch the 90-minute showdown, a smaller but highly engaged subset took to social networks to discuss and score the debate as it unspooled in real time.
Until recently, debate watchers would have waited through the entire broadcast to hear analysis and reaction from a small cadre of television pundits. Social media has democratized the commentary, giving voice to a far wider range of participants who can shape the narrative long before the candidates reach their closing statements.
"People still use old media to watch the debates, but they use social networks and other new media to have influence, voice opinions and be involved," said Scott Talan, an assistant professor of communication at American University who studies social media and politics. "Old media is not dead; it's growing. But now we have more people involved and engaged because of digital means."
The political conversation plays out across a range of social platforms, especially on the industry giant Facebook and on Twitter, the social networking hub where opinions are shared through 140-character comments known as tweets. Reflecting the changing times, many television analysts now monitor Twitter and Facebook feeds and use information gleaned from those platforms to inform their punditry.
Twitter announced shortly after Wednesday's debate that it had been the most tweeted event in U.S. political history, topping this year's Republican and Democratic National Conventions.
With 11.1 million comments, Wednesday's debate was the fourth most-tweeted telecast of any kind, coming in just behind the most recent Grammy awards, MTV's Video Music Awards and the Super Bowl, according to William Powers, director of The Crowdwire, an election project of Bluefin Labs, a social analytics firm. It was far higher than the previous political record holder: the third night of the Democratic National Convention in September, which drew 2.5 million comments.
A significant spike in social media commentary came from women, The Crowdwire found. Some 55 percent of comments about the debate were made by women, compared to just 39 percent during the Republican primary debates.
Unlike the wider viewing audience, debate watchers who comment on social media "are politically engaged in the strongest possible way," Powers said. But, he added, "it's a bit of a hothouse population. It does skew younger, and I'm not sure how much middle America is represented."
Twitter scored Romney the debate's clear winner according to Peoplebrowsr, a Web analytics firm. The group found 47,141 tweets mentioning Romney and "win or winner" compared to just 29,677 mentioning Obama and "win or winner."
Romney was also the top tweet in battleground states including Florida, Ohio, Nevada and Colorado, Peoplebrowsr found.
Search engine Google announced the debate's four most searched terms: Simpson-Bowles (the bipartisan fiscal commission Obama appointed); Dodd-Frank (a Democratic-backed financial reform law); Who is Winning the Debate; and Big Bird.
The debate, focused on domestic issues, was a numbers-heavy discussion of the economy, debt and entitlement reform. It produced strong reactions on Twitter from its earliest moments, from the candidates' attire and appearance — "Obama: solid blue tie with dimple. Romney: red tie with stripes, no dimple," tweeted publisher Arianna Huffington — to Jenga, a stacking game Romney and his wife, Ann, were said to have played with their grandchildren before the debate.
From there, the social chatter settled into a few major themes.
— Big Bird. Early in the debate, Romney said he would defund public broadcasting to help bring down the deficit but added that he liked Big Bird, a popular character on PBS' "Sesame Street." Social networks immediately responded, with participants posting spoof photos of Big Bird and other "Sesame Street" characters on Facebook and setting up parody Big Bird Twitter accounts.
During a lull in the debate, an ABC news executive tweeted, "avian life is outstripping human life in this debate." Another viewer with the Twitter handle A CookieMonster wrote, "Obama killed bin Laden. Romney put a hit on Big Bird."
— Jim Lehrer. The veteran PBS newsman was widely panned as the debate moderator, with viewers complaining he asked weak questions and did a poor job of keeping command of the debate's time and tempo. Lehrer's name became a trending topic on Twitter, and his performance drew jeers from countless participants. "Jim Lehrer is like the grandpa at dinner table who falls asleep and wakes up randomly shouting," tweeted a woman with the Twitter handle of Bookgirl96.
— Romney's big win. Social media participants marveled at Romney's strong outing and pronounced Obama's debate performance flat, non-energetic and meandering — a dud. While Obama has been leading Romney in battleground state polls in recent days, the consensus on social networks was that Romney's debate performance had breathed new life into his campaign.
Obama supporters were some of his toughest critics. Andrew Sullivan, a pro-Obama writer for The Daily Beast whose Twitter feed, Sullydish, has a loyal following, declared: "This was a disaster for the president." Joe Mercurio, a New York media buyer, wrote on Facebook: "It could have been worse."
JMJ posted at 11:14 pm on Thu, Oct 4, 2012.
I agree on the point that Jim Lehrer overstepped and did not act professionally by butting in to the debate far too many times, and not letting each candidate finish their statements. He also allowed each candidate to interrupt the other. Jim Lehrer needed to put a sock in it and just moderate, instead of spouting like a leaky whale in shallow water. So to speak.
Mij14I posted at 5:09 am on Fri, Oct 5, 2012.
Jim Lehrer is Jim Lehrer and naturally PBS is for big government to assure their funding. That one is simple. It may take some time to find areas and pet projects that cost One Hundred Million to Say six hundred million dollars a year. Then it is discovered two things can be done with them. . . . First, administration and funding of many of those type of programs benefit a number of people in a few states. So those states benefitted by those programs take full administrative and financing responsibility. Two, programs with a wide base of beneficiaries of a specific demographic will find they can get funding through state agencies or private charities when more spendible income is available through increased earnings and incomes and the broader tax base.
I outright laughed how both Obama in Denver and Wisconsin and Al Sharpton on MSNBC Thursday. The only response they, apparently authored by the democrat leadership, was to make light of Romney's metaphoric example using PBS as the prime example. Don't be fooled . Obama is far from having a high IQ; Sharpton is and uppidy blowhard!
getreal2105 posted at 1:30 pm on Sat, Oct 6, 2012.
What most GOP middle income people fail to understand is the impact Romney will have on their household budget.
Romeny proposes to:
Eliminate federal funding for Medicaid and let each State take care of their own Medicaid. [ Your taxes will increase and more will die from lack of care]
Eliminate federal funding to Planner Parenthood offices. [ Low income women will have no where to go for basic physicals and birth control, more unwanted babies will be born and more single mothers without help. Your local taxes will increase to help the poor.
Eliminate Obama care and go back to the way things were. [ Ever met someone denied health insurance for a pre condition??? Most file bankruptcy and many die, you pay for their healthcare now....get it]
Eliminate PBS/Education funding. [Back to the 1950's again]
Spend 2 trillion more on military.............for what? More wars in the Middle East, as Romney/McCain already are talking about invading Iran and Syria
Romney proposes to push many federal funded programs back to the States. You federal taxes will remain the same but your State taxes will sky rocket to the moon............get it.............
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Yu Geng told the Guangdong people consonance, no need to lay bare, with the horizon self less Meet mention the deja vu.
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