“I don’t know so much that it’s confusing. I do think there’s a little bit of that. But there are so many new voices out there now. I think that’s a good thing overall, in terms of having people being able to find information and read a lot of opinions all across the spectrum, so that’s a good thing,” Crossley says.

Crossley, who is African-American, appears regularly as a media critic on the PBS show “Beat the Press” and is a program manager at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University.

SFSU’s Azocar says that, whether or not news broadcasters are showcasing commentators and pundits of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds they’re going to have to reconsider their overall commitment to diversity. She believes this is especially true if national and local television news audiences continue to shrink as they have in recent years.

“I often wonder if one of the effects of not having people of color in reporting roles — and especially behind the scenes making the decisions of what gets aired — is related at all to the declining populations of people reading news, paying attention to television news and listening to radio,” she says.

Fauntroy cautions that, given the prominence of race in the 2008 presidential campaign, news organizations would be wise to strengthen their expertise in covering race and seek greater diversity among their journalists and producers.

“When the election’s over, particularly if McCain wins, then where will all these (minority pundits) go? Will they continue to be heard? Or will they be called upon only when there’s a problem?” Fauntroy asks.

“I’m not particularly optimistic going forward beyond the elections unless Obama is elected and somehow race becomes an ongoing issue,” he notes.

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