The Permanent Campaign Essay Research Paper The

?The Permanent Campaign? Essay, Research Paper

?The Permanent Campaign? was written by Norman J. Ornstein and Amy S. Mitchell.

This article appeared first in The World & I, in January 1997.

Norman Ornstein is regarded as one of our nation?s foremost experts on Congress.

Mr. Ornstein received a Ph.D.. from the University of Michigan, he writes for the New

York Times, USA Today, Washington Post, and he has a regular column in Roll Call

newspaper called ?Congress Inside Out?. Mr. Ornstein is also an election analyst for

CBS and appears frequently on television shows including the Today Show, Nightline

and the Mac Neil/Lehre News Hour where he has been a consultant and contributor for

fifteen years.

Mr. Ornstein is a Resident Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute for Public

Policy Research and is also an advisor and member of the Free TV for Straight Talk

coalition. The coalition is a group of 80 leaders from the worlds of politics, corporations,

broadcast journalism, the entertainment industry and public interest groups. They

support giving political candidates free air time on TV to promote their political views

without the media?s input. He has authored or co-authored recent books such as How We

Can Get Out of It, Debt and Taxes: How America Got Into Its Budget Mess, and

Intensive Care: How Congress Shapes Health Policy.

Amy Mitchell is a journalist whom graduated from Georgetown University, she

has written may articles concerning government and the media and was a congressional

associate at the American Enterprise Institute for four years. She is now the staff director

of the Committee of Concerned Journalists. The CCJ is an organization of editors,

producers, reporters, and producers whom are concerned with the future of the media.

They believe that right now is a crucial moment in American journalism and it is time to

sit down and talk about the core principles and function of journalism.

The Article ?The Permanent Campaign? takes a look at the way the American

political system has evolved over the years. When George Washington was president he

did not campaign any before he was put in office. When he was in office he only made a

few public appearances and when he did he didn?t speak a word. During Washington?s

era political campaigning was considered undignified.

Now the whole philosophy has changed. Before the 1992 election was even over

the Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report ran a story on the possible Republican

hopefuls for the 1996 campaign. We have gone from a country who denounced

campaigning to one in which candidates start campaigning for seats that haven?t even

been decided in the current elections.

Andrew Jackson changed everything in the election of 1824 when he decided he

would give his personal opinion on the issues. He received the most popular votes and

the most electoral votes but the House of Representatives cheated him out of a legitiment

victory when they elected John Quincy Adams president. Jackson ran again the next

term and won the election and changed the presidency forever. After Jackson?s success

future candidates for president now have to find a way of responding to the people and

still try to accommodate their political parties? tradition of silence.

By the 1880?s the trend was to bring the issues and candidates to the people.

Soon candidates began to travel by train and do ?whistle-stop tours? where they would go

from town to town and make speeches. In 1892 Grover Cleveland gave his nomination

speech in Madison Square Garden in front of a huge crowd. Traditionally these speeches

were given only to the party leaders. This effort to bring the candidates closer to the

voters had dramatic effects on the way elections were being conducted, many states

started having primary elections to judge the parties? candidates popularity.

After the riot at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968 reforms

were finally made and now candidates would be chosen directly by the voters in the

primaries instead of the party officials just using the elections as a poll to the popularity

of the candidates, then making their own decision as to who to choose as the candidate.

After the advent of the television the political system changed once again. The

people could now here and see the candidates every day, even live. This took great skill

by the candidates and their staff to figure out ways to use the media to their advantage.

The radio was also becoming a great way to talk to large numbers of people. With all of

the media exposure that a candidate receives these days every candidate by 1980 had a

full time media strategist on had to control spin. Ronald Reagan is a great example of a

candidate who used the media to his advantage. Reagan always seemed to feel at home

in front of the camera and he controlled the involvement he had with the media for his

advantage.

Political polling was introduced in the 1920?s and it would also prove to change

the way candidates campaigned. In recent elections George Bush made his pollster,

Robert Tetter, the chairman of his re-election committee. Teeter?s polls showed that