The first presidential debate between Barack Obama and John McCain netted 52.4 million viewers and a 31.6 household rating. Tonight the candidates for vice president debated and many are speculating that the VP debate will out-rate the presidential debate.
It seems possible. For one, the presidential debate ran on a Friday when fewer people are typically home watching TV than Thursday. Plus, for reasons that aren’t really clear to me (and can’t be attributed entirely to Tina Fey!) Palin seems to have a lot of star power.
So who ya got? The presidential wannabes or the veep wannabes?
Which Debate Will Have Higher Ratings?
- VP Wannabes (75%, 207 Votes)
- Presidential Wannabes (25%, 70 Votes)
Total Voters: 276
Loading ...
I think that the VP debate will get more viewers than the Presidential one. I agree with you, Sarah Palin does have a lot of star power (everytime she’s on TV I have to watch)
Well, everyone I know watched this hoping to see what would be mocked by Fey Saturday Night. Having Palin up there is just more potential for entertainment than the Obama/McCain debates. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen.
The veeps for sure — plus it doesn’t hurt that this debate was aired in a plush, Thursday primetime slot while the other one was on a Friday.
I think Sarah Palin is a draw cause most people want to see her screw up and some pervs out there thinks she’s hot and hope she has a wardrobe maulfunction or something……..I watched it and I got tired of hearing her say the word Maverick and how she kept dancing around questions I want to get back to the energy ugh……Joe Biden won in my opinion
Man, I’d vote for the first Presidental wannabe that has a wardrobe malfuction. Double votes if they are wearing Underoos!
I watched to see how bad she’d botch it. She didn’t, so i was left entertainmentless for the night.
I normally get perturbed when people espouse political views, but i thought biden rocked it and the dems will have my vote for the first time since 96
Maybe it’ll get like over 59 or 60 mil viewers.In my opinion she was neutral( not bad- not great), Joe won.
“Hey Joe there you go again, prefacing your remarks by looking backwards”. Winning moment.
She was terrific, she really connects with people. Joe Biden looked as if he had dirt in his mouth the whole night. Very miserable looking person.
The VP debate will have the most viewers so far, if only because of Palin’s appeal to the Republican base coupled with the media’s assurance that Palin would look like an idiot up there. She didn’t. In fact, she came off looking quite capable. Joe Biden’s been in the Senate for three decades, and is supposed to be some foreign policy giant and a good debater, and she fought him to a draw on policy and a win on personality. That’s a huge deal.
That said, now that this race is heating up and nobody delivered the knock-out blow last night, I would imagine the next Presidential debate will have even more viewers.
28.0/40 in the overnights for ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX.
FrankJ, you talk like a man who operates a conservative-leaning blog and who once ran a t-shirt modeling competition to get dates…
My guess is the VP debate will have about as many viewers as the Presidential debate. The difference, though, is that I think the ideological composition of the audience will be very different. The people tuning into the VP debate were, I think, mostly focused on seeing whether Palin would implode or not. (Republicans of course did not want to see her implode; Democrats did). I think the proof in the pudding will come if the viewership fell off during the last half hour of the debate. By then, the people looking to see if Palin would implode would have been satisfied/disappointed that she did not, and would have walked away.
Can’t imagine what that number will be once cable viewers are included.
FrankJ,
You sound like a guy with a conservative-leaning blog who probably does things like hold t-shirt modeling competitions to get dates.
Seriously, I think the ratings will be virtually identical between the VP debate and the first Presidential debate. To the extent they’re larger, that may just be a function of the day-of-the-week (i.e. people are more likely to be out and about on a Friday night than a Thursday night). What will be different, I think, is the ideological composition of the audience. I think a lot of Democrats and Democrat-leaning folks will have watched that debate to see if Palin would fall flat on her face and get humiliated. When she didn’t, they probably will lose interest. The proof in that pudding will be to see the half-hour-level data across the networks, as well as to see who tuned into what network(s) to watch the debate.
I predict the second debate will get a lot of attention, but the third won’t. This election is looking increasingly over; as a result, I believe people will be interested in seeing how the candidates respond to questions about the bailout (which will come in next Tuesday’s debate), but interest will fade after that.
Even from the short stints I’ve seen so far, it looks like Palin creamed over Biden….whilst i might dislike this slightly-odd VP Candidate, i’ve gotta admit – she has viewing power!
Why thursday! I have to wait another week for the office!
Outlander, haha…no. Not me. But I know who you’re talking about. Guess I can’t fault him for having a cool name like me.