mericans have never been less interested in campaigns and elections. The more they see and hear of political candidates, the more their interest wanes. And yet some people are convinced that Americans would be better off if only there were more politics on TV.
The idea is a perennial: Make broadcasters give politicians more face time. Browbeat them into creating new opportunities for candidates to get on the air. After all, the argument runs, the airwaves are public property, so TV executives have a duty to serve the public interest.
In The Washington Post last week, Paul Taylor - a former Post reporter who heads the Alliance for Better Campaigns - complained that of the 18 pre-New Hampshire debates the presidential candidates have taken part in, only two were aired on a national network, and neither was shown in prime time.
''Mind you,'' he wrote, ''the national networks have been willing to deploy their `A' list of anchors'' to moderate debates. ''But air time? Get serious. And so our presidential campaign has been downsized to a niche event ... suitable for cable.''
Meanwhile, the time spent on the networks' p.m. news shows to cover the presidential race is only half what it was at this point four years ago. And at the state level, Taylor claims, political coverage has dried up: TV stations in California's largest cities, he writes, ''devoted less than half of 1 percent of their news coverage to the governor's race'' in the fall of 1998.
His solution? Five minutes nightly of ''candidate discourse'' during the month leading up to an election, a proposal made by an advisory panel, the Gore Commission, in 1998. Taylor says this could be voluntary, but he and many others have also urged Washington to require free air time for candidates. Broadcasters should ''remind themselves,'' he remarks, ''that they are obliged, as a condition of the tens of billions of dollars worth of licenses they receive from us for free, to serve the public interest.'' Note the implied threat.
Taylor has plenty of company. A letter calling on TV executives to adopt the five-minutes-a-night rule was signed by more than 90 big shots, from the president of Harvard to the president of the AFL-CIO. ''These segments could take a variety of forms,'' the letter suggested, ''including interviews, issue statements, or mini-debates.'' Once again there was a hint that if broadcasters don't yield willingly, they may be made to do so unwillingly:
''From whom much has been given, much is expected. Broadcasters have been given licenses valued at tens of billions of dollars, free of charge, to operate the public airwaves. In return, you have pledged to serve the public interest.''
(Query: Why should the airwaves be public - i.e., government - property in the first place? The usual answer is: because the spectrum of broadcast frequencies is limited. But what isn't limited? There is only a fixed supply of land - should all real estate be the government's, too? We take it for granted that land should be bought and sold on the open market, with the state's role restricted to recording the transaction. Why shouldn't frequencies be bought and sold in exactly the same way?)
The notion that Americans are starving for more exposure to politics is cockeyed. The debates didn't air on the three broadcast networks? So what? They aired on C-SPAN, on CNN, on MSNBC, and on Fox, not to mention local cable outlets like New England Cable News and local broadcast stations like WHO in Iowa and WMUR in New Hampshire.
There is an ocean of political media out there. Millions of Americans who like their public affairs unfiltered watch C-SPAN, listen to C-SPAN Radio, and tune into local access channels that cover town hall. Tens of millions of other politics-watchers find their way to CNN, MSNBC, and Fox, or to the endless array of Web sites that offer political news, analysis, and commentary.
Every presidential campaign is available at the click of a mouse; so is every member of Congress, every governor, and nearly every challenger. From poll results to position papers, from the latest political ads to the latest political jokes, a citizen with an interest in politics can find it all on the Internet. True, not everyone has gone digital; everyone soon will. And the Internet has not yet repealed newspapers, magazines, and political journals of every flavor.
Fussing over the lack of live candidate jaw-jaw on network TV is so 1980s. Pre-cable, pre-Internet, pre-all-news channels, Taylor's lament might have made sense. But why should we care now if over-the-air broadcasters cut back on political coverage? Broadcast is a steadily shrinking slice of an ever-expanding media pie. The reason it devotes more attention to weather and sports than to candidate forums is simple: That's what most viewers want. Political programming gets lousy ratings. Why should TV stations be browbeaten into airing what its customers won't watch? Because Paul Taylor or the Gore Commission deem it in the ''public interest?''
It is a fallacy that TV broadcasters, because they are licensed by the government, have an obligation to serve the public. The government would never presume to tell newspaper editors how much space to devote to election coverage. It has no business dictating to TV stations either. Let Americans with a yen for politics turn to C-SPAN or PoliticalInsider.com. Let those with a yen for ''Wheel of Fortune'' turn to NBC.
Jeff Jacoby is a Globe columnist.
