New York ? Around the time the presidential race began, Janet Jackson came undone on the Super Bowl telecast, giving rise to the term “wardrobe malfunction” and igniting a public outcry heard all the way to Capitol Hill.

Now, as Election Day nears, CBS News is nose-deep in hot water for its recent expose on President Bush’s military record that relied on apparently fake documents. Among viewers who long ago branded Dan Rather a liberal boogeyman, this was the last straw.

Such events bookend a year where TV wasn’t just a medium for political expression, but a political battleground as well. Viewers, polarized by sights as far afield as the Super Bowl and Baghdad, suspected television of furthering the rift with secret agendas that distorted the truth of what they had seen.

Or didn’t see. What did it mean when CBS News announced recently that it had shelved a “60 Minutes” report on the rationale for war in Iraq because it would be “inappropriate” to air it so close to the election? Was this an act of journalistic responsibility? Or a desperate bid to make peace with the Bush administration?

Meanwhile, what did it mean that ratings for Fox News Channel soared — even beating ABC, CBS and NBC in head-to-head competition at the Republican convention? Easy, said fans of the network: Here was a rare outlet for fair-and-balanced journalism. Easy, said others who regard the network as a mouthpiece for a vast right-wing conspiracy: With Fox, that conspiracy has tightened its grip.

And what did it mean when NBC’s “The West Wing” — which dramatizes a progressive Democratic presidency — announced that Alan Alda would join the show as a Republican senator with aspirations for the White House? Was his addition just a way to rejuvenate a series past its prime? Or a sop to conservative viewers who always thought “The West Wing” has a liberal tilt?

The presidential campaign’s version of the Super Bowl kicked off Sept. 30 with the first of three televised debates between Bush and his Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry.

But supplementing those unique joint appearances, Bush and Kerry each was popping up just about anywhere that promised a cordial reception. Kerry tried to lighten things up on CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman” and Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.” Bush went fishing on the Outdoor Life Network.

The candidates also popped up in dueling campaign commercials. And even more contentiously, in commercials made by supporters on the candidates’ behalf. For weeks, a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth blasted Kerry the war hero as a war coward. Other veterans fired back in ads defending Kerry’s service.

President Bush appears with with Roland Martin on Martin's fishing show for the Outdoor Life Network, in this April file photo. Bush and Democratic rival Sen. John Kerry have both used television to take their messages to a larger audience.

If the level of combativeness reached laughable heights, it wasn’t lost on TV’s comedians.

“Tonight” show viewers were reminded that Bush was pledging “to destroy terror networks wherever they operate.” Then host Jay Leno added, “By ‘terror network,’ it’s not clear if he meant al-Qaida or CBS.”

And on “The Daily Show” parody newscast, fake anchorman Jon Stewart was hailed by many fans as not just a source of chuckles, but a refuge for political insight.

“We turn our attention,” he intoned one night from behind his anchor desk, “to the biggest swing state in this year’s presidential election.” He paused meaningfully. “Iraq. Think of it as Ohio … a bloody, intractable Ohio.”