Technology has made it possible for candidates to speak directly to the American people in the comfort of their living rooms or in front of their computer monitors.
It involves locating potential supporters by sending information and a request for money to a high list of people.
Media gets people attention
Political ads typically addresses issues, while media coverage is where candidates went and how big the crowds were.
8 things that must be done to organize an effective campaign
get a campaign manager
get a fund-raiser manager
hire media and campaign consultants
assemble a campaign staff
plan the logistics
get a research staff and policy advisors
hire a pollster
get a good press secretary
FEC match up to 250$ of public financing
PAC (political action committees); funding vehicles created by the 1974 campaign finance reforms. Corporations, union, or some other interest group can create a PAC and register it with the Federal Election Commission, which will meticulously monitor the PAC expenditures.
Campaigns rarely convert people.
Selective Perception is the phenomenon that people often pay most attention to things they already agree with and interpret them according to their own predisposition.
DEFINITIONS:
Nomination: the official endorsement of a candidate for office by a political party. Generally, success in the nomination game requires money, momentum and media attention.
Campaign Strategy: The master game plan candidates lay out to guide their electoral campaign.
National Party Convention: The supreme power within each of the parties. The convention meets every four year to nominate the party’s potential presidential and vice-presidential candidates and to write the party’s platform.
Caucus(state party)” A meeting of all state party leaders for selecting delegates to the national party convention. Caucuses are usually organized as a pyramid.
Presidential Primaries: Elections in which voters in a state vote for a candidate (or delegates pledge to him or her). Most delegates to the national conventions are chosen this way.
Super delegates: National party leaders who automatically get a delegate slot at the Democratic national party convention.
Frontloading: The recent tendency of states to hold primaries early in the calendar in order to capitalize on media attention.
National Primary: A proposal by critics of the caucuses and presidential primaries, which who would replace these electoral methods with a nationwide primary held early in the election year.
Regional Primaries: A proposal by critics of the causes and presidential primaries to replace these electoral methods with a series of primaries held in each geographic region.
Party platform: A political Party’s statement of its goals and policies for the next four years. The platform is drafted prior to the party convention by a committee whose members are chosen in rough proportion to each candidate’s strength. It is the nest formal statement of a party’s beliefs.
Direct mail: A high tech method of raising money for a political cause or candidate. I involves sending information and requests for money to people whose name appear on lists of those who have supported similar views in the past.
Federal Election Campaign Act: A law passed in 1974 for reforming campaign finances. The act created the Federal Election Commission, provided public financing for presidential primaries and general elections, limited presidential campaign spending, required disclosure and attempt to limit contributions.
Federal Election Commission: A sic-member bipartisan agency created by the Federal Election Campaign act of 1974. The EFC admitters the campaign finance laws and enforces compliance with their requirements.
Soft money: Political contribution earn marked for party-building expenses at the grass-roots level or for generic party advertising. Unlike money that goes to the campaign of a particular candidate, such party donations are not subject to contribution limits.
