Though the economy topped the mainstream news agenda, Obama’s troop drawdown announcement gave Afghanistan its biggest week of coverage in a year. And while mainstay subjects—the campaign and the Mid-East—continued to make news, the surprise arrest of one of the FBI’s most wanted dominated the end of the week.
It was a diverse news week that started off with the arrest of the IMF chief, but ended with the media focused on strained U.S.-Israel relations and the problems with the GOP presidential field. Meanwhile, attention to the aftermath of the bin Laden raid continued to diminish dramatically.
The fighting in the Mideast, and especially Libya, topped the news last week, narrowly ahead of the U.S. economy. But perhaps the most interesting development was the emergence of the presidential campaign as a major story—thanks in large part to one controversial candidate-in-waiting.
First it was Egypt, then Bahrain and last week, Libya as the media focused on yet another country in the rolling and roiling season of Mideast revolution. Back at home, the faceoff between pro-union forces and Wisconsin’s Republican governor fueled coverage of the week’s second-biggest story.
The violence in Libya and the political standoff in Wisconsin continued to drive the news agenda last week while a potential government shutdown and a significant health care development got about the same attention as the misadventures of a troubled actor.
Last week the economy—or one nuanced element of it—led bloggers’ conversation. And the No. 2 topic was a famous athlete’s domestic situation. Meanwhile news (and rumors) about the iPad topped a tech-heavy news agenda on Twitter.
Last week, bloggers tackled the situation in Egypt as both reporter and commentator. More were critical of Obama’s actions but the discussion moved far beyond the current president. And two of the most-viewed videos on YouTube featured scenes of the protests in the streets of Cairo.
For much of last week, the dominant topic in the news was the installation of a new Congress as well as its impact on politics, public policy and the Obama administration. But over the weekend, an attack that occurred about 2,000 miles from Washington D.C. quickly commandeered the attention of the media and the nation.
The state of the troubled U.S. economy, the old reliable of news stories, was the biggest topic in the news last week. But the media also focused on some new TSA screening techniques that seemed to poke and provoke some travelers. And continued coverage of the midterms focused on new power players in Washington.
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