The Media Monitors' Top 20

The Media Monitors’ Top 20

Finally! Proof that Wayne Swan is more Ralph Willis than Paul Keating , writes Patrick Baume.

If anyone had any doubts that Wayne Swan is more Ralph Willis than Paul Keating when it comes to media interest and that there’s a certain love amongst journalists for the working class lad from Vaucluse, the below table shows the Shadow Treasurer ahead of the Treasurer in May. We’ve gone deep into the archives for a precedent, no luck so far…

Martin Ferguson bolts into the Top Ten, in a week that has shown that while the Opposition quickly settled into the ‘every pollie for themselves’ role of first term opposition, the Government is taking a little longer to settle into this whole “we’re runnin the place now” vibe.

Jenny Macklin’s two cents on petrol and gee up on Native Title got her back up to a more suitable position, ditto Joel Fitzgibbon thanks to clearly the most important issue of the week, “Taniagate”.

TW	Move	Position	Politician	Press	Radio	TV	Internet	Total
1	0	PM	Kevin Rudd	1,604	8,186	4,620	8,889	23,299
2	0	Opp Leader	Brendan Nelson	699	4,408	2,134	3,671	10,912
3	1	Shadow	Malcolm Turnbull	399	2,638	1,012	3,061	7,110
4	-1	Cabinet	Wayne Swan	486	897	342	4,790	6,515
5	0	Premier	Morris Iemma	264	1,423	187	2,966	4,840
6	2	Premier	Anna Bligh	260	993	620	1,418	3,291
7	55	Cabinet	Martin Ferguson	48	1,586	740	243	2,617
8	22	Cabinet	Jenny Macklin	154	929	541	895	2,519
9	1	Backbench	Alexander Downer	207	1,033	384	739	2,363
10	2	Premier	John Brumby	160	784	304	940	2,188
11	7	Shadow	Nick Minchin	173	917	626	378	2,094
12	1	Cabinet	Julia Gillard	171	769	144	644	1,728
13	2	Outer	Chris Bowen	68	1,026	195	427	1,716
14	-4	Cabinet	Nicola Roxon	74	792	26	807	1,699
15	9	Cabinet	Penny Wong	84	597	123	720	1,524
16	-9	Cabinet	Stephen Smith	72	89	4	1,113	1,278
17	4	Shadow	Joe Hockey	112	447	338	250	1,147
18	7	Cabinet	Peter Garrett	158	369	34	561	1,122
19	17	Cabinet	Joel Fitzgibbon	68	553	90	318	1,029
20	8	Premier	Alan Carpenter	129	245	27	595	996

The media may love Malcolm, but talkback callers don’t seem to share the same fascination. They seem to think a couple of blokes named Kev and Wayne are in charge.