Thursday, August 21, 2008

Campaign Strategies - Peter Sebesta

Thursday, August 21th, 2008

The 2008 primaries have been very interesting. In both the Republican and Democratic Primaries, the early front runners have been defeated. Sen. McCain defeated Governor Giuliani and Sen. Obama defeated Sen. Hillary. In regards to Texas, Hillary did very well, but Sen. Obama's campaign and appeal to African American voters and the youth vote allowed him to virtually tie Senator Clinton for Texas after all was said and done with the Primary and Caucus. In addition to the exciting primaries, all three categories that determine elections are in play for 2008. These three categories are: Partisan, Issues, and Character. In the partisan area, Democrats have seen registration gains around the country. An unpopular war and concerns about a declining economy are major issues to be addressed. In addition, both presumptive nominees have very compelling background stories to show their character to the American Public. Today Ph.D. Michael Genovese spoke on the two different approaches of campaign strategy. The first strategy is the most commonly used. The candidate first establishes their base (composed of their party) and then work towards the middle to reach the swing/undecided voters. The Second more recent strategy is to first establish the base, then to excite, motivate, and expand the base. This second strategy was utilized by President George W. Bush. The Bush campaign noticed that the number of undecided voters had decrease from the assumed one third of voters to just 7% of voters! The other 26.3% of "undecided" voters tended to vote the same way each election. This worked very well for George Bush, he energized his base and they came out in greater numbers on election day.

This evening was one of the best nights I have had here. A small group of students (Including Matt and April) and I went downtown and hung out at a hookah lounge. It was quite an experience to discuss politics with other politically motivated students who are in similar places in their life. Although there was much expected disagreement, no one was opposed to considering the other's perspective and respect their opinions. We talked of several main issues, but there was one idea put out that has caught my attention. We were talking about the corruption that exist in corporations, and my friend Jacob of Oklahoma University had a proposal. He proposed the idea that the CEOs of corporations should have a salary limit that is a certain percent of the lowest wage paid to other employees. If the CEO wanted to continue to make outrageous amounts of money, they would have to raise the wages of the lowest employees. I really liked this idea. I hope to be able to get time away again with the other students just to "talk politics".

1 comment:

Geezer said...

Talking politics is fine, but DOING politics is more fun and more important.