American Politics Commons^™

A Comparative Case Study Of Georgia Delegations At The 2012 National Party Conventions, Carolyn S. Carlson, Jeff R. Dewitt, Kerwin Swint

Georgia Journal of Public Policy

From August 26 to September 8, nine political science students and four supervising faculty traveled from Kennesaw State University to the 2012 Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention as part of special topics course on a course titled “Party Conventions Field Study”. While in Tampa and Charlotte, the students and faculty immersed themselves in a “real world” educational environment and in doing so gained extraordinary first-hand exposure to a fundamental, yet not well understood, part of the American political process. Students directly engaged with convention proceedings and participants, primarily the Georgia state party delegations, and implemented pre-approved research …

A Functional Analysis Of 2008 Presidential Primary Tv Spots, William L. Benoit, Leslie Rill

Speaker & Gavel

The 2008 presidential campaign was unusual for a number of reasons. For the first time since 1952, neither the President nor the Vice President contended for the Oval Office. This meant highly contested primaries in both major political parties. As the Democratic primary ground toward the end, the leading candidates were an African-American–Barack Obama–and a woman–Hillary Clinton. More money was raised and spent on the primary campaign than ever before. This means that the campaign messages in this election deserve scholarly attention. This study applies Benoit’s Functional Theory and Petrocik’s Issue Ownership Theory to primary campaign ads from both major …

When Water Works: A Case Study Of Campaign Tears And The 2008 Presidential Election, Ryan Neville-Shepard

Speaker & Gavel

Since the fall of Senator Ed Muskie in the 1972 Democratic primary there has been an unwritten rule that political candidates should avoid crying. However, four presidential candidates cried in ten separate incidents during the 2008 election cycle, with only three episodes receiving negative attention. Addressing this inconsistency in the “Muskie rule,” in this essay I argue the effect of crying on a political candidate’s image is not well understood. As such, this essay develops and applies a framework for comprehending when crying will likely trigger a public relations crisis, and when it might actually benefit a candidate.

A Functional Analysis Of 2008 General Election Presidential Tv Spots, William L. Benoit, Mark Glantz

Speaker & Gavel

This study performed content analysis on the general election TV spots from Democratic nominee Barack Obama and Republican nominee John McCain in the 2008 presidential campaign. There was no significant difference in function by incumbency, which is not surprising given that neither major party candidates was the sitting president or vice president. Unlike ads from previous years, these ads contained more attacks (65%) than acclaims (34%; and like earlier campaigns few defenses: 1%). These ads stressed policy (58%) more than character (42%). The Democratic candidate, as in previous elections, discussed policy more, and character less, than the Republican candidate. Both …

A Functional Analysis Of 2008 And 2012 Presidential Candidacy Announcement Speeches, William L. Benoit, Mark Glantz

Speaker & Gavel

This study investigates messages in the surfacing phase of the presidential campaign, through a content analysis of presidential candidacy announcement speeches from the 2008 and 2012 elections. This study applied the Functional Theory of Political Campaign Discourse to nine Democratic announcement speeches from 2008, 11 Republican announcement addresses from 2008, and 12 Republican announcement speeches from 2012. This work extends previous research on announcement speeches from 1960-2004 (Benoit, Henson, Whalen, & Pier, 2007). Overall, announcements from 2008 and 2012 used acclaims (75%) more than attacks (25%) or defenses (0.5%). The same announcements discussed policy more than character (58% to 42%); …

Obama Transforming: Using Functional Theory To Identify Transformational Leadership, Kristina Drumheller, Greg G. Armfield

Speaker & Gavel

The 2008 presidential campaign convention speeches broke records as viewers flocked to the speeches by Obama, Palin, and McCain in numbers that rivaled American Idol ratings. Adapting functional theory (Benoit, 2007) to include transformational leadership characteristics (Bass & Avolio, 1990), President Obama‘s 2008 nomination acceptance speech was used test the adapting of functional theory for analyzing leadership claims. Secondary data were used as evidentiary support of Obama‘s efforts to make changes once in the White House. Results are discussed and framed within functional theory and transfor-mational leadership.

Newspaper Coverage Of The 2008 General Election Presidential Campaigns, William L. Benoit, Jayne R. Goode, Mark Glantz

Speaker & Gavel

News coverage of political campaigns is very important to the political campaign process. Some voters pay little attention to debates or other sources of information about the candidates and their policies. The news is one important source of this information. Newspapers can also supplement and reinforce the information possessed by voters who do attend to campaign messages. This study content analyzed news coverage of the 2008 general election presidential campaign (New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today). Horse race coverage was most common topic (45%), followed by themes about character (32%), and policy (23%). The tone of newspaper coverage was …

A Functional Analysis Of 2008 And 2012 Presidential Nomination Acceptance Addresses, William L. Benoit

Speaker & Gavel

This study investigates the presidential candidates’ nomination acceptance ad-dresses in 2008 and 2012. This study applied Benoit’s (2007) Functional Theory of Political Campaign Discourse to the four Acceptances (one from McCain, two from Obama, and one from Romney). Traditionally the conventions kick off the general election campaign and the nominees’ acceptance addresses are high-lights of these events. This work extends previous research on acceptance ad-dresses speeches from 1952-2004. The speeches in 2008 and 2012 used acclaims (73%) more than attacks (27%) or defenses (0.5%). Incumbents acclaimed more, and attacked less, than challengers, particularly when they discussed their records in office …

Survival Strategies In Solidly Partisan States An Analysis Of Centrist Appeals In 2012 U.S. Senate Debates, Matthew L. Spialek, Stevie M. Munz

Speaker & Gavel

With the growing number of centrist senators diminishing on Capitol Hill, the next few election cycles will be crucial to the survival of this moderate group of lawmakers. Campaign debate scholars should investigate how vulnerable incumbents construct a centrist issue agenda and image to connect with voters in states ideologically incongruent with the incumbents’ parties. In doing so, debate scholars will also fill the lack of lower-level debate research. Utilizing both quantitative and qualitative methods, this analysis examined the debate appeals of Sens. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Scott Brown (R-MA). Findings suggest McCaskill’s issue agenda was congruent with a centrist …

News Coverage Of The 2008 Presidential Primaries, William L. Benoit, Corey Davis, Mark Glantz, Jayne R. Goode, Leslie Rill, Anji Phillips

Speaker & Gavel

President George W. Bush was completing his second (and final) term in office and Vice President Dick Cheney decided not to run for president. Thus, the 2008 American presidential primary is the first “open” campaign (with no sitting president or vice president competing) since 1952 with highly competitive primaries for both major political parties. This study uses content analysis to investigate news coverage (national newspapers, network television news, and local newspapers) of the 2008 American presidential primary campaign. Most themes in the news concerned the horse race (66%) with somewhat more emphasis on the candidates’ character (18%) than their policy …

Bully Or Dupe?: Governor Chris Christie’S Image Repair On The Bridge Lane Closure Scandal, William L. Benoit

Speaker & Gavel

In 2013, two lanes leading to the George Washington Bridge – the busiest in the nation – in Fort Lee, NJ, were closed. In January of 2014, it emerged that Christie’s Deputy Chief of Staff Kelley instigated this problem. Governor Christie was accused of retaliating against Fort Lee’s Mayor Mark Sokolich, who had not endorsed Christie’s re-election bid. Christie fired Kelley, held a press conference, and apologized to Sokolich and the people of Fort Lee. Christie’s primary strategies were mortification and corrective action, but he also used denial, differentiation, minimization, and defeasibility to deal with this situation. Minimization was interesting …

Foreign Policy Rhetoric In The 1992 Presidential Campaign: Bill Clinton’S Exceptionalist Jeremiad, Jason A. Edwards

Speaker & Gavel

This essay examines presidential candidate Bill Clinton’s rhetoric regarding America’s role in the world during the 1992 presidential campaign. Despite the fact that foreign policy was George H.W. Bush’s strength during the campaign, candidate Clinton was able to develop a coherent vision for America’s role in the world that he carried into his presidency. I argue he did so by fusing together the American exceptionalist missions of exemplar and intervention. In doing so, Clinton altered a tension embedded in debates over U.S. foreign policy rhetoric. To further differentiate his candidacy from President Bush, Clinton encased this discourse within a secular …

Forces For Global Good: American Strategic Planning In The 21st Century, Jarrod Crockett

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.

Understanding Transitional Justice And Its Two Major Dilemmas, Jared Bell

Journal of Interdisciplinary Conflict Science

Transitional justice is an ever growing field and greatly intersects with conflict science and peace studies. With the horrific crimes committed during World War II and the latter half of the 20^th century societies now more than ever before are devising processes, mechanisms, and policies to move past gross human rights violations or communal violence. However, these mechanisms much like anything else are not perfect and come with a variety of dilemmas. In particular two main dilemmas plague transitional justice which this paper aims to deal with: Getting to Truth and Reality versus Expectation. Within the context of …

Explaining The Revolution: Vernacular Discourse And The Tipping Point In America’S 2006 Midterm Election, Ryan Michael Shepard

Communication and Theater Association of Minnesota Journal

The 2006 midterm election marked perhaps the first time that the American public held the Bush administration accountable for its controversial actions. Various explanations have been offered for the backlash, ranging from public concern about the war to disgust over sex scandals involving prominent conservatives. In this essay, through analysis of vernacular discourse appearing in letters to the editor from USA Today, I argue that the election results stemmed from Bush’s weakening credibility – in respect to the dimensions of honesty, competence, and moderation – which limited the effectiveness of his rhetoric that was so powerful since September 11th.

The Triad Of Evil And The Bush Incumbency: Convergence, Competition, And Cooperation, Meryl J. Irwin Carlson

Communication and Theater Association of Minnesota Journal

In this essay, I analyze discourses circulating during the 2004 re-election campaign of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney as a means to explore the interactions of three tropes of “evil” as identified by James P. McDaniel (2003). In the months between September 11, 2001 and November 2, 2004, the tropes of “Evil-in-itself,” “Evil-for-itself,” and “Evil-for-others” converged, combined, and competed in the culmination of criticism leveled at the Bush-Cheney campaign regarding the screening of entrants into events and rallies. Integral to this interaction is the articulation of American democracy with capitalism, as theorized by Kenneth Burke (1969). Ultimately, I argue …

Private Military Contractors, Security Forces, And Mercenaries, Naomi Pearson

The Partisan

No abstract provided.

Touched By Fire: Readings In Time Of War (1991), Shaun O’Connell

New England Journal of Public Policy

In "Touched by Fire: Readings in Times of War," Shaun O'Connell draws us into the eerie atmosphere that pulled this country into itself in the late fall and early winter, when thoughts of war provoked hard questions and when, for a time, doubt became the stuff of eloquence.

The works discussed in this article include: Pledging Allegiance: The Last Campaign of the Cold War, by Sidney Blumenthal; Millie's Book, as dictated to Barbara Bush; An American Life, by Ronald Reagan; The Civil War: An Illustrated History, by Geoffrey C. Ward with Ric Burns and Ken Burns; …

Exploring The C-Span Archives: Advancing The Research Agenda, Robert X. Browning

The Year in C-SPAN Archives Research

Exploring the C-SPAN Archives is a collection of path-breaking research studies that use video drawn from the C-SPAN Archives. The book, based on the papers presented at a November 2014 conference, includes chapters that explore issues in presidential debates, minority representation, the presentation of the first ladies, stem research, and innovative ways to analyze video.

The book is divided into five parts: Part 1 consists of an overview of and common scholarship using the C-SPAN Archives and how this research advances the conversation after previously published studies. Featured are the ways in which the collection is indexed and tips on …

Justice, Democratic Inclusion, And Empowered Governance In Richmond’S Development Policy, Rand Irons

VA Engage Journal

After surviving a car crash, a fish fry owner finds her store in disrepair and smelling of rotting fish. Without access to resources to clean her store, she sets up shop on the sidewalk to make ends meet. On the same block, a florist sells fake flowers because he lacks the capital to purchase refrigerators to sell real flowers. These small businesses located on the same block in Northside Richmond, VA are a microcosm of the inequalities present in this city. As gentrification accelerates, many minority businesses and residents lack the resources to respond. This research gathered evidence on the …

Pope Benedict Xvi, (President?) Ron Brown, And Workers' Rights, David L. Gregory

Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development

No abstract provided.

Female Gubernatorial Candidates In Purple States: A Case Study Of New Mexico And Arizona, Brittany Klug

Scholarly Undergraduate Research Journal at Clark (SURJ)

This research serves to determine how the political ideology of Republican female candidates, in conjunction with political and cultural factors, affects the outcome of gubernatorial elections. An analysis of two 2010 gubernatorial races, taking place in New Mexico and Arizona, will use a case study approach to test the hypothesis that no single aspect of a candidate will ultimately decide the outcome of an election. This paper will also use an alternative ideol- ogy score to compare candidates, in addition to examining the history of female politicians. The findings support the hypothesis that one factor does not unilaterally determine an …

The Liberal As An Enemy Of Queer Justice, Craig Schamel

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

Abstract

Liberalism as a historical mode of the political is the context in which the movement and ensuing struggle for queer justice emerged in most Western countries. The terminology, practices, tendencies, beliefs, ethics, laws, and patterns of political and social life which have been determined by this mode of the political, it is argued, are inimical to queer justice and render its achievement impossible. Liberalism as a mode of the political is approached from below, from knowledge gained in practical experience in queer groups which considered themselves revolutionary at least to some degree, and from the effects on such groups …

Book Review: Native America And The Question Of Genocide, Amy Fagin

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

No abstract provided.

Avoiding The Escalation Of Homelessness Through Public Policy, Peter Goldstein

Scholarly Horizons: University of Minnesota, Morris Undergraduate Journal

This paper examines public policies related to homelessness in America.

Do Demographics Trump Party Loyalty?: A Study Of Legislative Representation, Catherine Soliman

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.

Wealthy, But Unequal: The Anomaly Of Inequality In The United States, Joseph Puleo

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.

The Sweep Of The Modern Gender Gap: Is Britain Next?, Maxine Lopes

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.

The Power Of Ideas In Politics: Social Constructivism And Obama’S Foreign Policy In Iraq, Courtney Kayser

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.

The Aftermath: 9/11 And The War On Privacy, Rights And Humanity, Omid Irani

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.