Pack Journalism in the Republican Debate

This story, published in The Washington Post, discusses the Fox News/Google sponsored Republican Presidential Debate, held on September 22.  Currently, the contenders for the Republican ticket consist of Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Jon Huntsman, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, and Rick Perry.  As the election goes on, the field will slowly diminish to an eventual presidential candidate, but this particular article seems to be trying to hasten the process.  Although these presidential debates are pseudo-events, and have little affect this early on the final outcome, the way the media covers the debate is interesting.  If you were to read this article, with no knowledge of the election, you might come to believe that this is only a two person race between Mitt Romney, and Rick Perry.  There is literally no mention at all of the other candidates in the presidential race in this article.  Chapter four in our textbook suggests that the media is involved in pack journalism, which is when reporters cover the campaign and offer homogeneity in their news stories of the candidates and campaigns.  This article reinforces this theory because of the way the media covered this as a story after the debate.  Most of the attention of the post debate news was focused on the fiery discourse between Romney and Perry about Social Security, health care, and other issues.  It also reinforces the theory of campaign coverage as a competition, and the media being the decider of who won and who lost.