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It's primary election season and many in the media are feverish with gloomy forecasts — not for Democrats or Republicans in particular — but for everyone campaigning to keep the seats they already have.
ANDERSON COOPER: "This season, the dirtiest name in politics seems to be 'incumbent.'" (CNN's "Anderon Cooper 360")
MEGYN KELLY: "Is this the anti-incumbent surge?" (Fox News' "America Live")
CHUCK TODD: "...this anti-incumbent fever you see here..." (MSNBC's "Daily Rundown")
DAVID GREGORY: "Who or what is behind this anti-incumbent wave?" (NBC's "Meet the Press")
On NBC's "Meet the Press," GOP consultant Mike Murphy says the trend is easy to explain.
MURPHY: "It's both parties. People think Washington doesn't work. They think a politician many of them voted for in the last presidential election didn't fix it. They think the government is out of control and that politicians are incompetant. So this is an election year where it's a bad idea to be a professional politician in either party."
But the story goes much deeper than that. The first super Tuesday primaries knocked off two incumbents: Utah Sen. Bob Bennett and — after 28 years in the House of Representatives — West Virginia's Alan Mollohan. Now, Arlen Specter — seeking a sixth six-year term — could be in danger as well.
For The Washington Post, media critic Howard Kurtz explains there's more to these losses than meets the eye.
"Specter and Bennett may simply have been weak candidates. Democratic Congressman Alan Mollohan ... had just emerged from a criminal investigation... Charlie Crist bailed out of Florida's Senate primary because he was getting his butt kicked..."
But MSNBC's Joe Scarborough turns the critical eye on himself and fellow commentators he worries are making sweeping assumptions about local races.
SCARBOROUGH: "...If you're a political pundit, watch out. We all tried to overgeneralize 2008. We heard that the Republican Party was dead."
So, do you think anti-incumbent sentiment is permeating the primaries? Or is the media just trying to create a juicy narrative?
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