With the 2010 midterm season upon us, bloggers of various political stripes last week focused intently on politics and the state of the U.S. economy. On Twitter, technology topics again led the way. And the most popular YouTube video was a phony satirical story about a young pop idol.
The online rhetoric heated up last week as bloggers from the left and right responded to statements from two controversial GOP figures. On Twitter, users marveled over an unorthodox space launch while on YouTube, the subject of UFOs was front and center.
Thanks to polls, prognosticators and personal attacks, the congressional election cycle galvanized the news media last week. The economy finished as the No. 2 story, with the foreclosure crisis once again driving the narrative. And a noteworthy news industry firing, that of NPR’s Juan Williams, triggered an impassioned journalistic and political debate.
No other event or story generated much attention as the battle for Congress was finally resolved, accounting for more than half of last week’s coverage. Once the voters had spoken, the media pivoted from polls and predictions to post-mortems and projections about the new political landscape. And not surprisingly, President Obama was at the center of the narrative.
The country’s ongoing mortgage crisis sparked outrage from many bloggers last week while others discussed the compatibility—or lack thereof—between faith and science. On Twitter, images of the rescued Chilean miners drew cheers. And on YouTube, a movie star’s surprise visit to a school received millions of views.
Conservative bloggers last week expressed outrage over a passage from Bob Woodward’s new book. Tweeters were galvanized by a security flaw on Twitter. And YouTube viewers were interested in some provocative statements a GOP Senate candidate made on television more than a decade ago.
Anti-war and anti-Obama bloggers weighed in last week over the costs of the Iraq conflict and a quotation on a new rug in the Oval Office. On Twitter, the New York Times publisher’s prediction about the future of print from drew attention. And a YouTube-based talk show proved very popular.
A backlash against columnist David Broder’s suggestions for Obama united bloggers last week while and Comedy Central’s Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear got mixed reviews.
This fall’s big story—the 2010 midterm elections—showed little sign of abating last week as some heated campaigns sparked much of the media’s interest. Faulty foreclosure procedures helped make the troubled economy the No. 2 story, while the passing of a milestone in Afghanistan drove coverage of the third-biggest story.
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