a little from column a & a little from column b
links, videos, pics and occasionally rants from pete black
Anonymous asked: An american 'adversarial' system of politics relies on independents or 'the middle ground'. Looking at tea party candidates (the crazier ones) and their campaigning reveals an almost hermit like strategy. Angle in particular has done almost no media work, yet it doesn't seem to have hurt her. Do you think that the nature of online media (social media) lessens the quality of our democracy insomuch as candidates can viably make no public appearances, debates, take no questions etc?
I don’t agree that it is social media that has allowed some tea party candidates to avoid the mainstream media in the current midterm US elections. Rather I think it is because of two other factors: a highly partisan media, which allows candidates to only be interviewed in “safe environments” (eg. Republicans go to FoxNews and Democrats go to MSNBC); and the extraordinary influence of money, which allows candidates to use paid media and advertising to build their profile and get their message out to the public.
-
monkeytypist said:
I think it’s worth noting that the American “adversarial” nature comes from cultural factors, not constitutional ones. Ours is more closely adopted to a party system than theirs is.
-
naysayersspeak said:
I’d argue it’s also largely due to non-compulsory voting meaning that speaking to the base and getting out the vote is far more important then convincing swinging voters.
-
freedomtodither posted this
