Amateur Politicians And The Presidential Election

Mayhew examines the congressmen activity in Washington that is useful to engage in for the purpose of reelection. The first activity is advertising, defined by making a conscious effort to disseminate one’s name in a positive light among constituents to gain a favorable view. They emphasize personal qualities such as:

           The U.S. electoral system was created to give every citizen a say in who their elected officials should be, but this system has failed miserably. The right to vote is a basic right that needs be provided to every American regardless of such traits as political party, religion, or ethnicity. It is unethical to deny a person the right to vote and historically that has been a major problem in the United States. Our election system is completely corrupt and voter rights is not the only problem, strategically drawing voting districts is also a major issue. Our current electoral system is corrupt and unethical because of gerrymandering, the breaking down of the voter rights act, and voter ID laws.

Machine politicians were an influential factor to urban cities during the wave of immigration. During this era, immigrants were unfamiliar with the urban lifestyle and assimilation was strenuous. It is apparent that Machine politicians helped impoverished immigrants gain a sense of cohesion within a community. For instance, Machine politicians sponsored local events such as picnics, youth clubs, baseball teams, and choirs for immigrants to divert from pubs. This local party organization became an essential institution for the community. Likewise, Machine politicians represented working class Americans, mainly consisting of lower-class immigrants. These groups were supported politically by the machines, which served their interests and helped

Reelection is known to be the major goal on the mind of any congress member and many will go to major lengths in hopes of winning a seat in congress or just maintaining it. Today in age Congress is known for being more polarized that 's it 's ever been in the past 20 years and the number of safe seat district diminishes every election. There are many things to take into account when running for a district seat, such as committee assignments, what topics a candidate should emphasize and which they should avoid, as well as how to go about the campaign and their opponent.

John H. Aldrich also explains the case for weak and weakening parties Elections make incumbents, the holder of an office or post, responsible to

Candidates for the House of Representatives, both incumbents and challengers, work hard to raise public awareness of their intentions of running for Congress. Trying to inform voters of themselves is important for candidates to potentially increase their opportunity of election. However, incumbent candidates may differ from challengers based on the level of knowledge voters have on each. Such as, if voters are capable of recalling the name of the House candidate, whether it be the incumbent or the challenger, can demonstrate the voter’s knowledge. Furthermore, voter’s capability to recall a name may be affected by how much they care about who wins the election for the House from their congressional district.

In the book The Gamble, John Sides and Lynn Vavreck write that a successful campaign takes advantage of the fundamentals, “national conditions that set the stage for the campaign,” (2). These fundamentals are conditions that the candidate has no control over, like the economy, their opponent, obstacles or opportunities, and how the candidate reacts to them affect their ability to be elected (Sides and Vavreck 2). It is upon these fundamentals that a campaign is built. They inform political stances and future decisions of the campaign, which makes them an important foundation. Though these fundamentals are key to the survival of a campaign, equally if not more so, as Professor David Parker has stated, unless the candidate has name recognition the campaign is a lost cause (Parker, 2016).

Unexpectedly, the front-runner in the Republican presidential race is the one guy that no one expected to be a serious candidate. Donald Trump has leaped ahead of the rest of the Republican field, making friends and enemies alike. Since his controversial announcement speech, polling has put him squarely in the two of popular GOP candidates along with presumed leader Jeb Bush. As startling as this is to many, it is even more alarming to those parts of the GOP who are trying to broaden their appeal and reach out to minorities. Already, many political operatives are doing damage control in the wake of Mr. Trump 's path and others are trying to tie his racist statements into the fabric of the Republican party itself.

George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, and Franklin Roosevelt are consistently ranked high in rankings of presidential success, yet most political scholars would agree that presidential success is one of the most difficult topics to define. The same issues that make the topic of presidential success interesting and open to debate also make it difficult to determine.

“The media's the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that's power. Because they control the minds of the masses” (Malcolm X). In 1797, there was no cameras, television, radio, telephones, or social media. There was not any entertainment value on campaigns the media could potentially exploit, but how could the American citizens formulate opinions on presidential candidates? How did they come to understand about their policies or stances on certain issues? Candidates would write to columns in newspaper or use printing presses to release booklets with their policies and other issues they had to address. They would talk to the public at meetings or conventions. Journalists would write down what they said and wrote a news article about it. They did not mask themselves with over exaggerated personas or make outrageous statements just to gather media attention because there was not the

The data obtained for this project has been gathered from the American National Election Studies, better known for short as “ANES.” Before continuing it is best to give some background information of the American National Election Studies, and why they are a reliable source for information. From the ANES website, they explain, “The mission of the American National Election Studies is to inform explanations of election outcomes by providing data that support rich hypothesis testing, maximize methodological excellence, measure many variables, and promote comparisons across people, contexts, and time” (ANES). ANES is a reliable source for data because it is used by many other social scientists. Many experiments conducted by other researchers have relied solely on the data from the American National Election Studies. The data source that is being used throughout this paper, are results from the American National Election Studies data file for 2012 (ANES, 2012). The ANES is an academic survey and a reputable source, which allows for investigation into how variables such as income, race and education has an impact on party identification.

Incumbents start with a substantial advantage in terms of name recognition and a track record.

I really enjoyed reading your discussion post about your perspective when regarding being vindictive in politics. You make an intriguing suggestion about how slinging mud in American politics all started with former president Bill Clinton. His counter parts started talking about his scandal that involved Monica Lewinsky. Could you imagine social media during this ordeal. The memes would have been ridiculous. However, I digress! With the current presidential debate between Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Senator Hillary Clinton, have had their fair share of mud slinging. In my humble opinion, I find these debates to be hysterical and intriguing. It seems as if, both parties have made this voting year a bit personal.

In this research, I will investigate the conditions in which members of Congress seek out a position on a prestige committee. This research focuses on House members specifically since their constituency representation is more specialized, making it easier to determine which members have transitioned from local to national issues to those who have not.

Reform agendas presented by the candidates result in vibrant democratic politics, which requires the conscious participation of citizens. It provides a chance for citizens to engage in political activity with others. Political campaigns enable the citizens to contribute to the nomination process thus choosing the best candidate in their party. American politics involves candidates who mostly make unambiguous statements thus conveying their message to the citizens effectively. This means that the citizens have a solid basis on which to make decisions during the nominations and the elections. Distortions in communication due to misstatements are reduced by the accuracy and lack of ambiguity in information communicated the candidates (Schmidt, Shelley, & Bardes, 2009). The campaigns are effective since they result in the election of candidate with the most promising policies and reforms. The focus of the campaigns is national and social issues, which results in election and nomination of candidates that are nationalistic and with ideologies that are acceptable by most of the citizens.