Convention coverage won't be hard to find

If this year's epic presidential-primary coverage wasn't enough to put you off politics, rejoice!
The next two weeks will be a political wonk's paradise as broadcast and cable networks cover the Democratic and Republican conventions, and Barack Obama and John McCain.
In broad strokes, television will have pretty much the same offerings for the Democrats in Denver this week and for the Republicans in St. Paul, Minn., next week.
ABC, NBC and CBS will each offer one-hour reports at 10 each night of the conventions (up from three nights of coverage in 2004), tonight through Thursday and Sept. 1-4. PBS will air three hours of coverage each night, beginning
at 8.
For CBS Evening News anchorwoman Katie Couric, an hour of convention coverage in prime time will give her the opportunity to do more of what she enjoys most.
"I really miss doing as many interviews as I used to," Couric said.
Although she still does interviews occasionally on Evening News, including a recent one with the president of Georgia, she'll do more during the convention coverage, including live webcasts at CBSNews.com and CNET.com each night after network coverage ends.
"I think there's something about the Web vibe, and I know that makes me sound very out of it to use the word vibe, but I'm looking forward to being able to have more casual but hopefully hard-hitting coverage, if that's not too counterintuitive," she said. "We're booking people as we speak."
On cable, viewers will be able to watch convention coverage for up to 20 hours a day -- from 6 a.m. to 2 a.m. daily on MSNBC.
Whether cable networks will use that time for actual coverage or just as an outlet to allow their talking heads to bloviate further remains to be seen.
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