posted
Howard Dean had a rally here at ASU today. Although I don't support any one candidate (from any party) at this time, I thought I would go see what he had to say. After all, if he wins the Democratic nomination, I'll have to decide whether to vote for him in the general election. Unfortunately, I had a physics test at another part of campus about half an hour after the rally started. More unfortunately, Dean was so late that he had not arrived by the time I had to leave.
The part of the rally I did catch consisted of playing rock music over the speakers and having a bunch of student leaders tell us how great Dean was, how he was going to win the presidency because of college students, how we were all going to make a difference. It's a nice thought, but Dean might not even win the nomination, let alone the presidency. At any rate, all that I saw today was some emotional appeals. I didn't hear anything about Dean's views, platform, or ideas. If you went to the rally without knowing anything about Dean, you'd have no idea what party he belongs to, let alone what his ideology is. I talked to a guy who stayed for the whole thing, and all he could tell me about what Dean said was that it was "awesome." Which makes me wonder whether Dean said anything of substance at all, or if this guy just doesn't have a good memory.
I've never been to a campaign rally before, and I'm asking this question with no sarcasm at all: Is the point of rallies to inform or to whip up supporters into a frenzy? If I want solid information on a candidate's positions and what he plans to do if he gets into office, do I have to go to his website? Watch a debate?
I'm trying to be an informed voter. I'm not going to vote for a candidate just because a) he's not Bush or b) he has a lot of grassroots support. Those are the two reasons I've heard Dean supporters give. I wish I could have heard Dean himself explain why I should vote for him. Maybe he would have had a good answer.
Posts: 3546 | Registered: Jul 2002
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If it’s billed as a “rally,” then it’s most likely mainly about motivating supporters. There will be events that are more about stating positions, but they’ll be advertised as “speech,” “panel discussion,” "interveiw," "debate," or something along those lines.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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I've covered rallies time and time again for newspapers. And no matter what level (local, state, national) of politics, rallies are generally style over substance. Supporters "rally" around their candidate and people in the audience who came to learn more often get caught up in the excitement and find themselves supporting a candidate, but not really knowing why.
Your best bets for finding information on a candidate are by getting as close to the source as possible. The websites are generally a good starting point, but remember they are professionally written to put the candidate in the best light possible. The plans are there, but little is heard from the opposing side.
I'd honestly ditch most television news, short of some of the Sunday morning news programs where respected journalists can go one on one with the candidates. The only exceptions to this are (IMHO) 60 Minutes and regular news coverage on CNN.
60 Minutes has a strong reputation and track record, politically they are beholding to no one or one particular mindset. Sure, to many folks, they look like a bunch of old geezers (esp. Mr. Rooney) but the journalists on the show have more than earned their chops. Their producers, as well, have earned their way and they don't like curtailing the hard-nosed style that set the show apart in its early years. Of course, the questions are always filtered through whoever asks them, so you might not always find them asking what you would. But that happens everywhere. Journalists are only human.
Unless you're over at CNN. There, and this is why I generally trust them, the NEWS has taken on its own identity. CNN used to run the world's news, now the news runs them. So many irons in fires all over the world, so many viewers, so much impact that CNN hasn't had the time to think for itself. It simply doesn't have the time and energy to develop some framework to hang its stories on like Fox's decidedly Conservative or MSNBC's mostly Liberal leanings. CNN is simply too busy putting out the news to add spin doctoring to its duties. And that means, more often than not, what you get is quality stuff. Not always, but mostly.
Print media is where you're going to find the best information, but read a lot. Find the newspapers and magazines that you trust. There are a lot that don't really strive to be "fair and balanced" anymore out there, but there are still a number that stake their claim on reporting what has happened. It's called the truth and some still strive to spread it.
The nice thing about print journalism is that you can always refer back to it. You can re-read something if you question it later. It's hard to do that with TV or, Heaven forbid, Talk Radio.
Avoid Talk Radio like the plague. No one survives in talk radio by being a true moderate. And no moderate, well thought out caller is ever allowed on the air. The two worst sins of radio broadcasting are dead air (silence) and being boring.
The Internet? Dive deeply and carry a big shaker of salt.
Posts: 2848 | Registered: Feb 2003
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