news coverage. "3 The Sierra Club obt ained leverage through media coverage ofthe campaign and through variety of actions int ended to emphasize recent decreases in fleet fuel economy and the seriousness of the global climate change issue. The news media regularly report ed on fuel economy data and regulation, and the act iv ists and the indust ry provided information influence those reports. For example, environmental activist s railed against the int rod tion of the Hummer H2, which was sufficient ly heavy that it was not subject to any fuel economy st andards. Earlier, the Sierra Club had campaigned against the Ford Excursion which it dubbed the Ford valdez. Ford decided to drop the excursion In 2003 the Bush administration increased the light truck standard to 22.2 mpg by nodel year 2007. The administrat ion argued t hat the increase would save 2. 5 billion gallons of gasoline, but critics claimed that the automobile industry was already planning increases greater than in the new st andard. Daniel Becker of the Sierra Club called the action by the Bush administ ration"irresponsible. The big three aut makers crit icized the new st andard as costing more than it was wort h and cost ing the nation badly needed jobs III Overview A Literature on the News media The impact of the news media on public polit ics is broadly observable(Graber(2000)) For example, following the oil crises in the 1970s Erfle and McMillan(1990)found that media coverage affect ed the price of home heat ing oil relative to the price of bunker oil sold to elect ric utilities. They concluded that oil companies restrained their price increases to rest all a public reaction and possible new regulation. Stromberg (2001)has shown that as the u.s. radio audience increased in the 1930s more relief funds were allocated to count ies Besley and Burgess(2002), Besley and Prat (2001), and Besley, Burgess, and Pratt (2002)st udied models of polit ical agency focusing on the relat ion bet ween an incumbent officeholder and an elect orate that obt ained information from the news media. Besley and Burgess considered a model in which the media provides informat ion about government performance to the elect orat e, and this induces the government to be responsive to th The New York Times, january 8, 2003news coverage.”3 The Sierra Club obtained leverage through media coverage of the campaign and through a variety of actions intended to emphasize recent decreases in fleet fuel economy and the seriousness of the global climate change issue. The news media regularly reported on fuel economy data and regulation, and the activists and the industry provided information to influence those reports. For example, environmental activists railed against the introduc￾tion of the Hummer H2, which was sufficiently heavy that it was not subject to any fuel economy standards. Earlier, the Sierra Club had campaigned against the Ford Excursion, which it dubbed the Ford Valdez. Ford decided to drop the Excursion. In 2003 the Bush administration increased the light truck standard to 22.2 mpg by model year 2007. The administration argued that the increase would save 2.5 billion gallons of gasoline, but critics claimed that the automobile industry was already planning increases greater than in the new standard. Daniel Becker of the Sierra Club called the action by the Bush administration “irresponsible.” The big three automakers criticized the new standard as costing more than it was worth and costing the nation badly needed jobs. III. Overview A. Literature on the News Media The impact of the news media on public politics is broadly observable (Graber (2000)). For example, following the oil crises in the 1970s Erfle and McMillan (1990) found that media coverage affected the price of home heating oil relative to the price of bunker oil sold to electric utilities. They concluded that oil companies restrained their price increases to forestall a public reaction and possible new regulation. Stromberg (2001) has shown that as the U.S. radio audience increased in the 1930s more relief funds were allocated to counties with more listeners. Besley and Burgess (2002), Besley and Prat (2001), and Besley, Burgess, and Pratt (2002) studied models of political agency focusing on the relation between an incumbent officeholder and an electorate that obtained information from the news media. Besley and Burgess considered a model in which the media provides information about government performance to the electorate, and this induces the government to be responsive to the 3 The New York Times, January 8, 2003. 4