Prepared by Upstream Analysis

1
Democratic Presidential DebatesShift in Focus

• Prepared by Upstream Analysis
• April 10, 2008

2
Methodology

• The tag clouds on the following pages represent
  the 50 words most frequently used by Sen. Hillary
  Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama in the Democratic
  presidential debates held on April 26, 2007, and
  February 26, 2008. The larger the font size, the
  more frequently the term was used by the
  candidate.
• A stop list of the most commonly used words in
  the English language was used to filter out terms
  such as and, of, the, etc.
• Tag clouds of debate text were based on
  transcripts provided by the Federal News Service
  and CQ Transcriptions via The Associated Press.
• Visualizations were generated using TagCrowd.com.
• Elements of debate format (e.g., number of
  candidates involved, differences in questions
  posed to each candidate, length of response) may
  influence results.

3
Sen. Hillary Clinton

• April 26, 2007
• February 26, 2008

• A very focused debate performance with the key
  message, Im ready to be president
• War terms include attacked, Iraq, security, war
• Domestic policy terms include health care,
  immigrants

• Less focused debate performance with the emphasis
  on issues rather than message
• Iraq and war almost nonexistent
• Emphasis on affordable health care, insurance,
  issues, jobs, NAFTA, tax(es)

4
Sen. Barack Obama

• April 26, 2007
• February 26, 2008

• Less focused debate performance message unclear
  (making decisions, perhaps?)
• War terms dominate intelligence, Iraq/Iraqi,
  military, nuclear, security, terrorism,
  terrorists, threat, war
• Domestic policy terms include health care,
  insurance, families

• More focused debate performance with the emphasis
  on health care and drawing a distinction with
  Sen. Clinton
• Iraq mentioned, but Pakistan more prominent
• Emphasis on affordable health care, community,
  issues, jobs