Presidential Campaigning (Go someone else ya bustards!)

[The Hanged Man]

I live in Missori these days and we are "blessed" with being a key state in the election. Here is what goes on in Missouri.

1) One candidate comes to the state
2) They tie up traffic and screw up everyone's schedules
3) They speak to a carefully selected crowd who already was going to vote for them gaining no new votes whatsoever
4) They leave town tieing up traffic and screwing up everything again
5) During the entire visit the candidate never speaks to anyone who is undecided
6) Candidate leaves town with news spin saying visit was best thing ever
7) The other candidate is forced to respond and comes to the same place doing the exact same thing

What is the point of only speaking to people who were going to vote for you anyways and would vote for you even if you killed an entire Orphanage with an Axe?  At one point Bush tied up rush hour traffic for two hours in St Louis just to speak to a few hundred people who would all lick the gum off the soles of his shoes and would swear it tasted like Cognac.  They should make Bush and Kerry go have phony meetings with supporters at 3 am or 2pm instead of screwning up the day for normal people.

[Morfiend]

Well, thats not as bad as the Chaney campaign stop in New Mexico, where he made every one who attened the rally sign a form guaranteeing they would support Bush/Chaney in 2004.

Basically, the stops are so they can broadcast the candidates with a bunch of screaming supporters in the background.

[schmoo]

http://www.mlive.com/news/sanews/index.ssf?/base/news-12/1091802209309820.xml">Family booted from Bush speech over T-shirts

 "We don't accept any pro-choice, non-Republican paraphernalia."

[/url]

[Arcadian Del Sol]

"I was probably voting for Kerry before. Now I'm 100 percent sure. Maybe I'll start campaigning for him. Maybe I'll start fund-raising."

She's full of shit. They didn't remove a 'family' - they removed about 11 people who were part of a local, self-aggrandized 'movement' who planned to 'smuggle' some anti-Republican signs and shirts inside, and then break them out and create a ruckus. This happens at almost EVERY campaign rally, and has been going on for almost 100 years. Officially not news.

[personman]

It's their privilege to surround themselves with just the people agree with them.  Makes perfect sense to people that believe conviction outweighs compromise.  Moderates have always been an endangered species regarding public politics.  These days they seem downright extinct.

To date AFAIK the dems haven't limited attendees.  Kerry is regularly harangued by people clapping flipflop sandals; sophomoric yet funny.

[HaemishM]

What is the point of only speaking to people who were going to vote for you anyways and would vote for you even if you killed an entire Orphanage with an Axe?  

Stumping, as I think it's called, is no longer about campaigning to the country. It's about getting your face on the news and a nice, digestible soundbite out there. The candidates don't NEED to go anywhere to campaign, honestly. It's just a zombie-fied practice that I think most candidates believe to be sacrosanct. They are going through the motions like the zombies in Dawn of the Dead who go back to the mall even though they are (un)dead. The idea of putting only hardcore supporters is to make sure they always get a ROUSING round of applause to whatever carefully orchestrated, over-analyzed bit of nonesense they want on the news that night. I find it particularly funny how the news media agencies just LAP THIS SHIT UP, either not realizing or not caring just how much their purpose is being perverted for the benefit of these cynical bastards.

[daveNYC]

I find it particularly funny how the news media agencies just LAP THIS SHIT UP, either not realizing or not caring just how much their purpose is being perverted for the benefit of these cynical bastards.

If they don't do it, somebody else will.  Or at least that's what they tell themselves so that they can sleep at night.

[ArtificialKid]

Good questions, I'm not sure why they don't travel the country in actual steam-powered trains, giving nontelevised speeches through megaphones anymore.

[HaemishM]

Wow, way to miss the point, Sparky.

[ArtificialKid]

"Not exploiting media services or screening attendees would be as stupid as using a megaphone" is my point.

[HaemishM]

How about not traveling around the country in gigantic money-wasting caravans when all you're really trying to do is get the media moths to listen to your 5-second soundbite? Don't clog up traffic in Bumfuck, Iowa when the only people who actually need to hear your message will see it on TV anyway?

National, big-name campaigns could be run from a TV studio in Fargo, for fuck's sake, yet both parties and our entire political system are hell-bent on pissing away millions of dollars just to talk to a television camera.

[daveNYC]

If you get out and give speaches you give the appearance of being 'a man of the people' and being 'in touch' and all that crap.  That's why Davenport got two presidential candidates and three bank robberies.