The same cannot be said of the off-screen campaign. Morning news conferences by the political parties have been scaled back, regional tours by leaders in their “battle buses” have been reduced and large-scale election rallies have become a rarity.  Instead, attention has been focused ruthlessly on the TV debates, prompting questions about whether this innovation has increased — or curtailed — real scrutiny.  Many analysts believe that the television debates have simply sucked the oxygen out of the rest of the campaign.  “I think this is having a swamping effect in terms of our perception,” said Charlie Beckett of the London School of Economics. “And for their own reasons, the political parties have bought into it.”  Following good performances by Nick Clegg, leader of the small, centrist Liberal Democrats, the TV debates have transformed the May 6 contest into a three-horse race, pitting him against Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Labour and David Cameron of the Conservatives.  But other expected changes have failed to materialize.  “People said this was going to be an Internet election,” said Philip Cowley, professor of parliamentary government at Nottingham University, “but there are two things dominating the election: television and direct mail. Both go back to the 1950s or 1960s in America.”  In fact, the parties have had little difficulty calculating where their effort is best focused. The first TV debate won about 9.4 million viewers and captured the public imagination to such an extent that, according to an opinion poll in The Times of London, 49 percent of respondents claimed to have watched the face-off — more than twice as many as actually did so.  Even the second debate last week, which was less readily available to many viewers, was seen by about 4.4 million viewers. The final debate, this Thursday, will be on the BBC and accessible to all.  Andrew Grice, political editor of the Independent, said that, on balance, he approved of the debates but thought they had “completely skewed” the campaign.  “You have at least two days of build-up, then you have the debate and then the inquest,” said Mr. Grice, who is reporting his seventh general election. “Then the opinion polls days later appear to be driven by the TV debates.”  Such is the importance of the TV debates that, during the last one, Mr. Grice said he had received 20 to 30 e-mail or text comments from the political parties.  All this is new in British politics.  Until recently, parties put forward specific policy ideas each morning at news conferences to try to set the agenda for the day, though this system started to become more fluid over the course of elections in 2001 and 2005 to satisfy the 24-hour TV news, Mr. Grice said.  According to Professor Cowley, the election debates may reduce scrutiny and prevent a consistent challenge of the leaders on policy. That is because if one candidate confronts another, he risks being seen by viewers as hectoring.  “The daily press conferences used to be a good way of providing scrutiny by people who knew what they were talking about,” he said.  The debates, however, have also reduced the power of the print media — parts of which are fiercely partisan — to set the agenda, since voters are reacting directly to what they see. Even the most staunch Conservative-supporting titles can no longer ignore Mr. Clegg.  Meanwhile, the new media have had a more subtle effect, proving significant for internal party communication and local campaigns in constituencies, and deemed important enough to merit some party advertising.  For example, a Google search Friday on the TV debates also brought up a sponsored link to a Conservative Party Web site highlighting the most favorable opinion poll for Mr. Cameron.  But the Internet has also acted as a check on the parties. When Conservative-supporting newspapers launched a series of attacks on Mr. Clegg, an ironic Twitter campaign, “#nickcleggsfault,” sprung up satirizing them.  Thousands of Twitter messages suggested, tongue in cheek, that the Liberal Democrat leader was responsible for almost every ill, including the eruption of the Icelandic volcano that grounded European air travel.  “Nick Clegg was seen two weeks ago poking Eyjafjallajokull with a stick,” said one message, while another added, “Nick Clegg lived in same town as a seriously ill man and never visited him, though he knows he has a spare kidney.”  Meanwhile, both Labour and Conservative election posters have also been parodied on the Internet.  Mr. Beckett, of the London School of Economics, believes that the existence of new media, along with the fear that candidates who stray off-message will be instantly exposed, have led parties to mount minimalist, risk-free campaigns.  One key crucial will be whether the advent of the TV debates increases voter turnout, which was 61.4 percent in 2005. Either way, Mr. Beckett believes they have been a big benefit.  “For 90 minutes, on a weekly basis, the public are able to look at the candidates and judge their values directly — and they also get through a lot of policy — unedited by the newspapers,” he said. “The TV debates are a terrific way to engage the voters.”
Thanks to the first-ever televised debates, the election is shaping up to be the most intriguing in a generation.