Haley Clark Final Paper

Haley Clark

Professor Williams

Digital Media

26 March 2014

Every Tweet Counts: Presidential Elections Go Digital

            The ever-changing 21st century media landscape is reshaping the way Americans interact with each other; this includes relationships between politicians and their constituents. In order to be elected to US high office, presidential need to use social networking campaigns to engage prospective voters. Media mobilization is essential to any successful political campaign, as evidenced by the political fortunes of Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Howard Dean; each used the available technology of their time to build electoral support. Today, social media provide new methods for politicians to communicate to large audiences, ultimately leaving an impact on their poll outcomes. The recent 2008 and 2012 US presidential elections demonstrate an increase in the importance of effective social media campaigning in politics, with Barack Obama and his campaign staff at the forefront. 

Digitally altered photograph pairing of US voting suffragists in 1920.

           
The goal of any presidential campaign is to gain voter confidence and support. In order to achieve this, candidates face the task of communicating to the public. Politicians present not only their platforms, but establish an empathetic narrative for Americans to recognize.“By associating themselves with characteristics found in fictional forms," explained by author Richard Campbell, "presidential candidates can conceal many of their contradictions,” (Campbell 79). A wealthy representative can present himself as a rugged, traditional, rancher from Oklahoma; this fashions a working-class illusion that voters can identify. Through media story-telling environment, candidates are able to package themselves and their stories to the nation. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, an early expert in this art form, embraced new technology and effectively communicated with Americans by developing positive, intimate relationships with the public. Radio proved a fairly new form of mass communication in the early 1930’s;  Roosevelt recognized its potential to convey ideas to listeners. Through this medium, Roosevelt became, not just a leader, but a familiar voice- a personal confidante to each person sitting in the living room listening to him. Roosevelt’s fireside chats unified a nation in the midst of The Great Depression and World War II’s beginning. In his 1941 fireside address, Roosevelt discusses America’s declaration of war on Japan, “we will know that the vast majority of the members of the human race are on our side. Many of them are fighting with us. All of them are praying for us. But, in representing our cause, we represent theirs as well our hope and their hope for liberty under God,” (Radio Address to the Nation, Roosevelt). Through carefully calculated persuasive techniques, like group dynamics, a calming demeanor, and great appeals to pathos, FDR’s speeches and delivery advanced his political agenda and amassed the support of the electorate for four terms, the most in US history. “The quality of his being one with the people," Secretary of Labor Francis Perkins explained, "of having no artificial or natural barriers between him and them, made it possible for him to be a leader without ever being or thinking of being a dictator,” (Perkins). Roosevelt embraced a new form of media, a hands-on style that allowed him to leave a distinct impression on US voters.

The similarities between Roosevelt and Obama transcend decades.

     
      John F. Kennedy, a young and charismatic senator from Massachusetts, used the new medium of television to capture America's attentions and secure his place as President of the United States. In the 1960 presidential election, Kennedy faced off against Republican candidate Richard Nixon. Vice President Nixon was more experienced compared to the young senator, however, Kennedy was conscience of television’s ability to transcend a message and a face. Nixon, recently hospitalized after a knee injury, appeared pale and underweight during the televised debates. The debates CBS producer Don Hewitt argued  “the TV makeup that Nixon turned down would have helped create a better appearance alongside that of his tanned opponent,” (Campbell 233). In an interesting phenomenon, radio listeners believed Nixon bested Kennedy in the debate, however, it could not be denied the majority of the population believed the “great debates” cemented Kennedy’s place as the election front runner; this speaks to the powers of the visual effect. Television's application served as a decisive moment in JFK’S career as well as the operations of US politics. “The difference was telling; Kennedy came across as a leader who intended to deal with the nation's greatest problems,” explained by historian Robert Dallek, author of The Unfinished Life “Nixon registered with voters as someone trying to gain an advantage over an adversary.”(Dallek 117) The Kennedy-Nixon debates remodeled the process of presidential elections. In today's world, political parties consider which candidates look better on TV, will voters respond to the attractiveness of the candidate? More so than radio, television connects the nominee with the private citizen. Television heightened John F. Kennedy’s appeal to voters and aided in his election as 35th president of the United States. 

The public clamours for Kennedy and Pattinson's attention.

            Howard Dean, in his 2004 presidential election campaign, laid the groundwork for digital media in presidential campaigns, and, in doing so, transformed the workings of US politics forever. Dean and his team were the first to recognize the Internet's value and its capacity to organize voters online. Although it did not lead to victory, the strategy laid the foundation for politicians to follow. The online design led by campaign manager Joe Trippi established Dean as a web sensation. Websites and blogs allowed voters to be more informed as well as feel more connected. “I think there’s a sense of community that forms around the blog,” said Trippi in a Lawrence Lessig interview, “that’s really what the net is about. It’s about building a community. There may be zillions of communities within the net, but you know, your own community builds around that blog.” (Trippi) Meetup.com proved vital to Dean’s Internet success. Meetup enabled the organization of supporters in various US cities. Like-minded people who agreed with Dean’s politics joined together to spread support for the candidate.The Dean campaign revolutionized fundraising. In the beginnings of his 2004 campaign, the majority of contributions came from small donations online. Dean started what Barack Obama perfected, capitalizing on the Internet's power to organize people and raise money.

Obama's campaign adopted digital strategies from the Dean team.

                
            By 2008, the Bush administration left US voters calling for improvements in Washington, and throughout the nation. Candidate Barack Obama, a little- known Illinois senator, presented himself as that agent of change. Obama’s team set forth a partnership with digital media to connect and organize his proponents. Obama's team created accounts in social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace. Obama’s number of likes, supporters, and wall posts significantly outnumbered opponent Senator John McCain’s. McCain’s 18,700 Facebook friends didn’t compare to Obama’s 567,000. In regards to Twitter, Obama had 121,314 followers in 2008, where McCain only maintained 4,911; a 2470% lead by Obama. McCain’s MySpace friends amounted to only 219,463, Obama’s came to 844,781 friends. Not only did Barack Obama surpass McCain as a social media presence, but he also engaged online communities by tweeting and posting on each site. Information on Obama was readily available online, his policies and messages to the public established an unstoppable grassroots campaign. Influential tools of the Obama web campaign included the Neighbor-to-Neighbor program and Mybo.com, both allowed advocates of Barack Obama to connect with undecided voters and sway the vote. Obama’s team also designed an elaborate website and propaganda crusade. Hope posters, the “Yes We Can” chant, and extensive use of the logo strengthened Obama’s story arc as the great reformer. In 2008, Obama proved the first Democrat candidate to reject public funding for the general election, using unlimited private funding. Small contributions from constituents online left a large impact on the donation process. This method of fundraising remained the first ever seen in an US presidential election and ultimately proved very advantageous for candidate Obama.

        
Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign employed different platforms for support

              
         Compared to his opponent, John McCain proved technologically ignorant; as a candidate of the pre-baby boomer generation, McCain’s lack of digital knowledge highlighted a generational gap between the two candidates. In an interview with Politico correspondent Mike Allen, McCain discussed his tribulations with the computer, “I’m an illiterate who has to rely on my wife for all of the assistance that I can get,” McCain admitted. (McCain) Unfortunately for McCain, Obama’s web presence could not be beat by traditional forms of campaigning. Obama’s online presentation proved larger, sophisticated, and interactive. The landscape of presidential elections moved to a new frontier: the Internet.

Many consider the computer to be the new wild west.

               Four years later the 2012 election emerged with new issues, candidates, and technologies. Since 2008, digital media and social technology underwent a golden age of sorts. The number of Americans who used social networking increased, social media in political campaigns became the rule not the exception. Unlike McCain, Republican candidate Mitt Romney was aware of technology’s advantages in the race for president, creating Twitter and Facebook profiles. However, the Romney team still could not compete with Obama’s impressive digital organization. The Obama campaign developed an even more effective web campaign to reintroduce the candidate to the public and solidify victory in the 2012 presidential election. 

Politicians recognize Twitter as the new site for political conversation

         Campaign manager, Jim Messina, called Obama’s 2012 operations, “the most data-driven campaign ever.” Obama’s team proved digital experts, phenoms of the data age. Not only was Obama’s organization reaching out to Americans online, they analyzed and collected information to best predict a voter’s political favoring. In a New York Times article, Larry Grisolano, head of AKPD media consulting firm said “the campaign literally knew every single wavering voter in the country that it needed to persuade to vote for Obama, by name, address, race, sex and income.”  By tracking a person’s Facebook friend group and listed likes, the team could reach voters in swing states and ultimately gain support for Obama. In 2008 Twitter was just starting out, by 2012 it became the battleground for political conversation. It allowed voters to judge a political performance without findings from professional commentators, and permitted direct participation in the political process. Obama ended with the most online traffic, followers, friends and mentions on social media. In the 2012 campaign, Obama broke fundraising records with a count of $1 billion dollars raised. Much of it was due to online small dollar fundraising through online networking. Time magazine calculated that “Obama team raised about $690 million digitally in 2012, up from about $500 million in 2008.” (Scherer)

 Mitt Romney and Barack Obama square off in the televised debates for president.

         
                In 2012, Obama faced the task of maintaining the enthusiasm of  his first run for presidential office. Starting off early and effectively, Obama and his digital powerhouse team successfully established a greater presence online, and analyzed the cyber applications of Americans; this made them one step ahead of the Romney campaign. Mitt Romney’s campaign never took radical measures in digital innovation and were left behind in all aspects of social media. “In the end, Obama won out by understanding the underlying psychological social needs that are met by social network sites and leveraging them to help spread the word,” concluded by Media psychologist Pamela Ruteledge. The Barack Obama campaign employed 21st century technologies to build a constituency and win the 2012 presidential election.

One can argue that a tweet can make a large impact on the vote.

       “Communication technologies and literacies possess a power that has, on many occasions, proven mightier than physical weaponry,” explained by media critic Howard Rheingold, “the potential to amplify, leverage, transform, and shift political power by enabling people to persuade and inform the thoughts and beliefs of others.” (Rheingold) Barack Obama and his team certainly harnessed the power of communication technology and in doing so redesigned national presidential elections. The 2008 and 2012 political campaigns represented a deep personalization of US politics. Voters are no longer informed through mass communication technologies alone. Through social media, information is delivered in a personal format. Obama’s understanding of digital technology can be likened to Kennedy’s relationship with the television, or Roosevelt and the radio. These campaign innovators recognized the possibilities of new technology and it’s contributions to their journey for political greatness.

Bibliography

·    Campbell, Richard , Christopher Martin, and Bettina Fabos. Media & Culture Mass Communication in a Digital Age . Ninth Edition ed. Boston, MA: Bedford/ St. Martin's, 2012. Print.

      Campbell, Richard, and Joli Jensen. Media in society: a brief introduction. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2013. Print.

      Dallek, Robert. An unfinished life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963. Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 2003. Print.

·     Frame, Gregory1. "Seeing Obama, Projecting Kennedy: The Presence Of JFK In Images Of Barack Obama." Comparative American Studies 10.2/3 (2012): 163-176. Humanities Source. Web. 8 Feb. 2014.

      "Frances Perkins." BrainyQuote.com. Xplore Inc, 2014. 21 March 2014. http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/f/frances_perkins.html

·     Kuhn, Raymond. "The Media And The 2012 Presidential Election." Modern & Contemporary France 21.1 (2013): 1-16. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 Feb. 2014

      Obama campaign Web site, "Campaign Ad: Still" Politico, "John McCain goes online" by Mike Allen, July 13, 2008

      Opensecrets RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Mar. 2014. http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/summary.php?cycle=2008&cid=N00009638Lesen.

Rheingold, Howard. "Howard Rheingold." Howard Rheingold Social Media Comments. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Mar. 2014. <http://rheingold.com/social-media/>. 

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        Ruteledge, Pamela. "How Obama Won the Social Media Battle in the 2012 Presidential Campaign." Pamela Rutledge Media Psychology Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Mar. 2014. <http://mprcenter.org/blog/2013/01/how-obama-won-the-social-media-battle-in-the-2012-presidential-campaign/>.
   
      Rutenberg, Jim. "Data You Can Believe In." The New York Times. The New York Times, 22 June 2013. Web. 21 Mar. 2014.

      Scherer, Michael. "Time.com." Swampland Exclusive Obamas 2012 Digital Fundraising Outperformed 2008 Comments. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Mar. 2014. http://swampland.time.com/2012/11/15/exclusive-obamas-2012-digital-fundraising-outperformed-2008/.

     Trippi, Joe. Interview by Lawrence Lessig. Personal interview. 19 Sept. 2003.

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