the kicker

"Most Used" Network Reporter of 2008

January 6, 2009

If 2008 felt like The Year You Couldn’t Escape Andrea Mitchell, that’s in part because she was the year’s “most used” network reporter (excluding the anchors), clocking 355 minutes of air time for NBC, according to Andrew Tyndall’s “Year in Review 2008” report. And Tyndall studies just ABC, CBS, and NBC, so imagine what this number would look like if it included all the minutes Mitchell logged on MSNBC. (Now would also be a good time to revisit Megan’s argument for why we should actually have seen less of Mitchell last year).

More from Tyndall’s report:

Forget about Iraq and Afghanistan. Forget about George Bush. 2008’s network news agenda was dominated by just two questions. Who would be the next President? And how deep would the recession be that confronts him.

And:

Both ABC and CBS set 21-year record lows for use of their foreign bureaus…
The Most Newsworthy Woman of the Year: Sarah Palin…The Year’s Most Newsworthy Man: Obama of course.

Liz Cox Barrett is a writer at CJR.