USA Today: Pushing John Edwards Out of the Race?

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A USA Today article analyzing the electability of presidential candidates running in Iowa barely mentioned John Edwards, even though Edwards is the only Democrat besides Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama who consistently polls in the double digits in Iowa, according to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), a media watchdog group that analyzes the accuracy of corporate media from a left-leaning perspective. The December 18 USA Today article titled Poll: Electability becoming more important to Dems, proposed hypothetical match-ups of Clinton and Obama against Republicans Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee, and discussed how each Democratic candidate might fare against the Republicans without mentioning Edwards, even though a CNN survey done December 6-9 showed Edwards polling consistently better against Republicans than either Clinton or Obama. FAIR cites Edwards' campaign focus on corporate influence over government as a possible reason for the squeeze, and says the USA Today article is "a good example of corporate media striving to narrow down the Democratic primary field."