The greatest force impacting media and democracy is the explosion of information now circulated via more sources than ever before. Super stations are buying up small competitors. Media powerhouses owning several media formats the American public hears only what the media giants want us to.

The media is one of the most powerful and dangerous forces behind the growth of Big Government. For far too long the media has been biased on issues, certain political candidates and the two-party system. It varies from state to state or from one locale to the other, but overall the media has failed to give equal coverage to all candidates because it takes sides and advocates its own agenda. Raising ad prices during a campaign easily eliminates any candidate or group that has less available funding. This exclusionary bias infringes upon the people’s right to make a fair assessment of all the candidates and cast an educated vote in an election.

There is an ever-increasing segment of the population that considers itself neither Democrat nor Republican and many people are tired of having to vote in the two-party system. When I polled people about why they do not vote, the common reply I hear is that people do not feel like either of the candidates is a good choice. So, the second question I asked in my poll is, “Why not vote for an independent candidate?” The common response is, “I didn’t know there was another person running.” Some independent candidates have excellent ideas and abilities to implement them, but media costs are so exorbitant that not every candidate can afford to advertise in the mainstream media. We are responsible as voters to do our own research but many people don’t have the time to turn over every rock to find the alternate candidate. This discourages worthy candidates from even attempting to run for office. I was recently told that I was wasting my vote should I cast it for someone who couldn’t win. Whatever happened to the beloved underdog? America loves a winner, but the winner isn’t always the most capable candidate, and vice versa.

While working with a local political campaign this past year it became apparent that our city newspaper had predetermined which candidate it would support. The editor refused to send a reporter to take to the press the story of a local independent councilperson. However, some of the large party candidates received free coverage on the evening news and through interviews initiated and published by local the newspaper. People tend to vote for the candidate that has the most public exposure and we all know that means media dollars. Without publicity and financial backing from political parties a candidate doesn’t stand a chance even though he or she may be the best contender. It is true that the candidate who spends the most money usually wins the election. This was particularly true in the local council election mentioned above where a young woman ran against a good ol’ boy calling himself a Republican, and a Democrat candidate who supported higher taxes. Even realizing that she probably wouldn’t win the election, I chose to help my friend with her campaign because she is making a point and bucking the system. I admire her tenacity and belief that she could have an affect on democracy. When the votes were tallied and the expenditures were accounted for, the number of votes was in almost exact proportion to the amount of money spent on each campaign.

In the 2008 Presidential Election, the media can better serve democracy by returning to true journalism, and by being more open-minded and less influenced by issue advocacy and dollar signs. When biases are put away, true freedom of speech and freedom of press will return and a true democracy will exist.
About the Author:

The importance of active civic participation is obvious for the future of a nation and a healthy democracy. In 2004 Presidential election, the republican candidate George Walker Bush won against John Kerry the democrat one. 50.8 percent of the voting ballots were devoted to Bush and 48.3 percent were devoted to Kerry. Also, Ralph Nader won less than 0.4 percent of the votes.
Bush and Kerry had close competitions and at the end Bush was chosen to be the president of the United States. Americans voting behaviors is the subject of this article. The first part of this article discusses people’s behaviors generally and the second part will be devoted to youth voting, specifically.

Different theories and models described Americans voting behaviors in 2004 presidential election. Following you will read about some reasons and models explaining Americans voting behaviors.

1. Party identification model indicates party identification alongside with socialization. Americans are democrats, republicans or independent and party identifications are important in voting behaviors based on race, gender, education and income. In 2004 election men voted more for republicans and women voted for democrats. African Americans and other minorities also supported democrats. Those with less income voted for democrats as well. People who were less educated voted for republicans. These were based on party identifications, but there were people who voted for a certain candidate rather than the certain party.

2. Issue model which focuses on certain issues which effect on voting behaviors of people. Issues are different either domestic or universal. War, economy, health care, terrorism, security, moral values were important on people’s decisions. Statistics indicate the most important elements as war in Iraq, terrorism and homeland security, jobs and unemployment, health care, federal budget and taxes. These were important issues in Americans decision making process.

3. Moral issues and voters’ decision Making process in the 2004 Presidential election were important. For example:” President Bush’s victory, the approval of every anti-gay marriage amendment on statewide ballots and an emphasis on ‘moral values’ among voters showed the power of churchgoing Americans in this election and threw the nation’s religious divide into stark relief.” Associated Press, November 4, 2004

4. Economic conditions, influence consumer confidence, also they influence both political evaluations and votes. But there is little sense of the origins of consumer confidence itself. Consumers are those who vote. Nation’s level of consumer confidence responds to objective economic conditions. Candidates who pay more attention to economic conditions can take measures to satisfy the voters. Politics is important for understanding consumer sentiment beyond what is known from economic conditions. It demonstrates a direct effect of political evaluations of the president’s management of the economy, the party of the president, extraordinary political events, and monetary policy; it also affects media coverage of the economy and consumer sentiment, after controlling for economic conditions. When news is positive, citizens give favorable evaluations; this happens naturally, it causes more positive sentiment. Understanding the political economy needs an emphasis on the causal effect of politics as well as economics. All these create different behaviors by the participants in the Presidential election as it happened in 2004.

5. Impact of personality must be considered in cognitive, behavioral, and affective political processes, too. One to talk about is the effects of the need to evaluate that is a personality trait and reflects a person’s proclivity to create and hold attitudes; people high in that are likely to make attitudes toward all sorts of objects and events. The data from the 1998 National Election Survey Pilot and the 2000 National Election Survey was shown to predict a variety of important attitude-relevant cognitive, behavioral, and affective political processes beyond holding attitudes, it could predict how many evaluative beliefs about candidates one held, the likelihood that a person would use party identification and issue stances to determine candidate preferences. It is important to know that the extent to which a person took part in political activism , the likelihood he voted or intended to vote would change and another thing, the extent to which a person used the news media for gathering information, and the intensity of emotional reactions that felt toward political candidates were effective as well. So the need to evaluate seems to play a significant role in shaping important political behavior, emotion, and cognition.

6. The effect of a subtle reminder of death on voting intentions for the 2004 U.S. presidential election has been considered. It is on the basis of terror management theory which was hypothesized that a mortality salience induction would increase support for President George W. Bush and decrease support for Senator John Kerry. It was late September 2004 and after a mortality salience or control induction; registered voters were asked which candidate they had intended to vote for. According the predictions, Senator John Kerry could receive substantially more votes than George Bush in the control condition, but Bush was favored over Kerry following a reminder of death, suggesting that President Bush’s re-election may have been facilitated by non-conscious concerns about mortality in the aftermath of September 11, 2001.

7. New studies express a powerful empirical relationship between political discussion and political knowledge. And, there has been no clear discussion or demonstration of how political discussion translates into increased political knowledge. A study proposed three explanations on this matter; first, exposure, second anticipatory elaboration that creates links between work on uses, gratifications and news information processing, and third discussion-generated elaboration that focuses on how discussion itself can influence information processing. Some data from 2000 and a local community survey during the 1996 presidential election were used to test these three. The results suggest that the direct relationship between discussion and knowledge may be mediated through motivations and information processing behaviors. They also support the anticipatory elaboration and discussion-generated elaboration explanations while posing questions on the exposure explanation.

8. There was a model by the name of Jobs Model which was well done in 2004.It could predict the Presidential election well. The model was based on data available in August 2004 and its error was only 1.3 percentage points predicting the incumbent share of the two-party popular vote (Lewis-Beck and Tien 2004). On the other hand the median forecast from seven teams of statistical modelers was off 2.6 percentage points (Campbell 2004, 734). It is believed that the Jobs Model was more correct since it broadened measurement of economic performance that is a conceptual variable lying at the core of most of these efforts. It argues that the changing nature of the American economy required attention to a hitherto neglected variable which is job creation.

9. It is the early years of new millennium in politics so the machinery of the “old politics” that was centered on a party-orientation is being replaced by computers of the “new politics” which is centered on an image manufacturing-orientation. It goes with highly integrated marketing strategy that is driven by a candidate’s inner circle of advisors who now control the money and message of both the party and candidate organization. It leads to a very easy transition from election to governing and it happens that the top advisors during the campaign become top advisors to the winners and the key architects of the party administration. All of the developed marketing techniques and means that have been used in politics over the past several years are becoming more sharply focused on one central theme, and that is to produce a winning image for the leader and his/her party.

Youth voting

There are reports that in 1971, 18- to 20- year olds gained the right to vote, and 50 percent of young adults aged 18 to 24 voted in the 1972 presidential election. But voting among young adults has dropped significantly, causing concern among lawmakers and other policy makers.
“The percentage of youth ages 18 to 24 who reported voting and registering to vote was higher in the 2004 presidential election year than in 1996 or 2000 (42 percent reported voting in 2004, compared with 32 percent in both 1996 and 2000).”But, the percentage was lower than when 18- to 20- year olds first gained the right to vote in 1972. Fifty-nine percent of youth had registered to vote in 1972, and only 52 percent registered to vote in 2004. In 1972, 50 percent of youth voted, compared with 42 percent in 2004.

The reasons for declines in voting express that many youth feel uninformed about politics and the electoral process. A study found that one third of high school seniors lack a basic understanding of how the American government operates.

Another report by the National Association of Secretaries of State also got that youth believe that government and elections are not relevant to things about which they care. It has been suggested that this belief elaborates why many prefer to engage in community service, which is actually developing more and more.

Differences by the type of elections, ages, gender, race/ethnicity of voters:

There are differences by type of elections, too.

Fewer youth vote in non-presidential election years, comparing presidential election years. For example seventeen percent of youth voted in the 2002, non-presidential election year, whereas 42 percent voted in the 2004 presidential election year.

Females are more likely than males to report both registering to vote and voting. It is not a lot different, anyhow. In the 2004 election, 55 percent of females aged 18 to 24 registered to vote, compared with 48 percent of males the same age. That was similar to 45 percent of females who actually voted according the reports, compared with 39 percent of males.

Young Hispanics are the least likely to report registering to vote and actually voting in both presidential and non-presidential election years. In 2004, 44 percent of black youth and 43 of white youth reported voting, comparing 20 percent of Hispanic youth. Of course Hispanics may be of any race.

References:

http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/voting/cps2004.html

http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=296252

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.0022-3506.2004.00288.x

http://www.emeraldinsight.com/Insight/viewContentItem.do?contentId=853745&contentType=Article
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Democracy as a System

During the last two centuries, political democracy has been the center of attraction by its practitioners for the main purpose of establishing a legitimate system to maintain property rights and capitalism. The U.S. Constitution was framed with this main purpose in mind. Big government began with the ” Founding Fathers, who deliberately set up a strong central government to protect the interests of the bondholders, the slave owners, the land speculators, the manufacturers. For the next two hundred years, the American government continued to serve the interests of the wealthy and powerful, offering millions of acres of free land to the railroads, setting high tariffs to protect manufacturers, giving tax breaks to oil corporations, and using its armed forces to suppress strikes and rebellions.” [1]

It was not until after the Second World War that attention was given to the reality of the situation. Since then monopoly capitalism, having its roots in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, has established its firm grip on the American economy and through that, on the economy of many developing countries. Similar developments, though in a less dramatic manner, were followed by other industrialized countries of Western Europe and Japan.

The 1960s and early 1970s uprisings in the United States was the first organized reaction against the monopoly capitalist group and the government which protected its interests. The movement brought significant transformation in the operation of the system such as passage of four civil rights acts, education, anti-poverty, medicaid and medicare legislation, but failed in achieving its main purpose of changing the system for two reasons. First, since it took a violent form, it legitimized forceful and brutal state action to suppress it. Second, more importantly, while the primary aim was to undo the existing “establishment,” there was no other suitable alternative envisioned to replace it. Some had suggested socialism as a substitute, but it received no support. First, for lack of social education, socialism was not properly understood and because of capitalist propaganda it was considered as another evil system. Second, socialism as practiced by some Western European countries was not what the theory intended to be. It was just another form of capitalism, maybe not as bad.

Consequently, the hold of monopoly capitalism on the economies of the United States and other industrialized countries continued to increase. However, the movement and this technological monopolistic capitalism have attracted the attention of different scientists and philosophers to the erosion of individual rights, liberties and widening class stratification. By 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King “had come to believe that our economic system was fundamentally unjust and needed radical transformation. He spoke of ‘the evils of capitalism’ and asked for ‘a radical redistribution of economic and political power.’” [2] This illness comes from the fact that is nearly never talked about: that the United States is a class society, in which 1% of the population owns some 33% of the wealth, with an underclass of about 40 million people living in poverty. [3] Claim of the U.S. being a democratic society appears nonsense. The U.S. Constitution gives the citizens power to rule themselves, but the capitalist system does not offer opportunity for such power to be properly and effectively used.

This essay attempt to introduce in brief a philosophy of the future society in which all power to rule are returned to the people. As all trends indicate, all advanced societies are moving to reach such end and sooner or later will attain it. This is a description of a complete democratic system never presented before. It has been labeled “technological democracy,” and is looked upon as a system by itself, embracing not only the political components of society but also its economic and social parts as well, all put together as a system. The important aspect of this theory is that all its components are interdependent; If any of them is missing, democracy is defective to that extent and a true democracy is not present.

In the United States, for example, as it has been presented in the previous essays, there is no economic democracy when it is controlled by a small economic elite, and social democracy is substantially missing when there is racism, sexism, lack of appropriate educational opportunities, lack of health care, housing, transportation, adequate old age benefits, etc. Thus, there is very little meaningful democracy in the United States, if any. The same applies maybe to a lesser degree to other industrialized nations which have a semi-socialist-capitalistic operation. The dominant fact is that no substantive or procedural democracy can materialize in any society without economic democracy.

Technological Democracy and its components

Technological society is distinguished from all previous societies by the very presence of high technology affecting every aspect of life from home, transportation, work, business, government to leisure and recreation. Technological democratic society is yet sharply distinguished from technological society by an essential and important component which is the principle of equality of opportunity. In simple description, there are three basic components forming the organic structure of technological democratic society: Individual, technology, and equality of opportunity. No one of these can provide for democracy without full employment of the other two. Definition of each component, for this purpose, is also different from the usual dictionary meaning of these terms.

People is a collection of individuals. An individual is necessary to operate the system. But he is a special kind of individual. He is well aware of the other two components. He knows all about the essence of technology and its proper role in democratic society. He is also deeply committed to the principle of equality of opportunity and its application. This required span of knowledge makes him a high quality human being that the world has never before encountered in masses. He is self-conscious, eager to learn, well informed of social and technological norms and democratic principles. His knowledge is not limited to the normative aspects of life but he knows how to employ, apply, and operate all these norms in practical aspects of life. Without these qualifications, no person can fully and meaningfully participate in materializing technological democracy and fully, or at least substantially, enjoy its fruits. It is obvious that to achieve this goal the society needs a special and appropriate kind of educational system.

Technology, as a second component of technological democracy, is mostly a self-operating system which facilitates and substantially helps in materializing the contribution of the other two components. One of the essential requirements for a democratic process is freedom of information. This can be only possible to a full extent through high-technology information-communication system, labeled here as the “Technodem” standing for “technological democracy.” There is no need to mention the overwhelming importance and influence of electronic technology at the present time on the political electoral process and in operation of economy.

The Technodem is a centralized yet highly dispersed self-operating information-communication system free of abuse or manipulation. Among its many functions to help people in their daily life, is the supervision of all business and governmental functions, particularly checking the employee wage system and competence, holding elections and helping communities in many ways in carrying out their daily functions. Compared to this system and its role in materializing democracy, the present electronic technology, despite its phenomenal advancements, appears primitive. There is no need for additional advancement in electronic technology to form the Technodem, it is a matter of putting proper pieces of the existing technology together and expand them. It is more a managerial and administrative matter. The system is totally neutral and impartial in rendering its services since no human hand is involved in its operation. Thus, in a technological democracy a true democracy without high-technology is unthinkable even impossible. It is for this reason that technology constitutes an indispensable component of technological democratic system.

The third and the most important component of technological democratic society is the principle of equality of opportunity under which the society operates. The simple meaning of the term is that every individual must have equal opportunity of access to social, economic, and political means in society. But its application is not as simple as its definition. In fact, it is quite complex and requires particular attention to the meaning of the term in each occasion. In the following essays, as we try to illustrate its application in certain major areas of function, we will gain increasing knowledge of its nature, its meaning and a better understanding of it.

The principle does not intend to provide for a society of equals in its absolute sense. It leads toward an equitable society where each person is equal to another with the same level of knowledge, capability, and experience. Its proper application eliminates social stratification and moves the society toward an equitable class structure. Equality of opportunity, as the highest and essential principle of technological democracy, is permanent and universally controls any human authority whatever. All other principles of societal life concerned with freedom, liberty, pursuit of happiness and other human rights are derived from and the consequence of this principle’s proper application. These ideas are to be obeyed only when they are consistent with principle of equality of opportunity to which they are always subordinate. Under its protection, each individual has a right to preserve his life, liberty and property during the full span of his life. It is not only the source of a broad spectrum of liberties for the individual, but a liberator of operation of communities and the society as a whole. It is the source of happiness for all. Its utility, in every direction of application, is always supportive of what is just, moral and good. Equality of opportunity is per se neither equality nor freedom but it provides grounds for both, equality based on knowledge and experience, freedom so broad that it cannot be fully expressed, but possible to enjoy.

In a technological democratic society, the public functions are brought to their minimum. The structure and functions of the government are substantially reduced particularly at the national and state levels. A mass of these functions are discarded and a substantial amount of the rest is performed by the Technodem in a democratic, reliable, and unabused manner; a good part is transferred to local, state and national social organizations, and to the production institutions where individuals are employed. The old concept of “the best government is the least,” takes place. For the first time also the government by the people, for the people and of the people is materialized.

In the following essays, for the lack of space, we will illustrate only three important aspects of application of the principle of equality of opportunity in the areas of education, employment, ownership of property and the Technodem. This is a quite complex, but highly pragmatic, theory of democracy and cannot be easily understood. Its full understanding is necessary for proper evaluation and justification. Full description and explanation of the theory are found in the materials referred to below. [4]

References:

1. Howard Zinn, The People’s History of the United States, New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1999, p. 637

2. Ibid., p.631

3. Ibid., p. 612

4. Reza Rezazadeh, Technological Democracy: A Humanistic Philosophy of the Future Society,1990, pp.245+.
—————-, Technodemocratic Economic Theory: From Capitalism and Socialism to Democracy, 1992, pp.254+ .

—————-, Passage to a Just Society: Secrets of Democratic Life, Leisure and Happiness, 2002, pp.287, simplified presentation for general public.

To access these materials visit http://www.democracywhere.com
About the Author:

1.) The Country is Desperate In all matters, both domestic and foreign, citizens of the U.S. are grasping at straws. People want change, but beyond this they have no real idea of what they truly want. The same people who handed our current President two terms are also the ones who handed Mr. Bush one of the lowest approval ratings in the history of U.S. Presidency.

Was there anything so spectacular and heroic in the President’s first term which demanded the gift of a second term? The Country has fallen into deep desperation, and anyone who runs for President at this stage of our history, and wins, will inherit even deeper desperation and failure. For the first Black President of the United States of America, that’s just the type of precedent we can’t afford to set.

2.) The Biden Echo Senator Biden’s comments, which essentially stated that: as a Black man in America seeking the democratic nomination for President, Barack Obama is “One of the good ones”. Surely Biden meant no harm, (as his own Weasel Words would indicate) but a back-handed compliment is a back-hand nonetheless.

It would be ridiculous to assume or believe that Senator Biden’s sentiments are exclusive to him. Yes, it’s fantastic that Senator Barack Obama is an intelligent, “articulate,” Black man, learned and probably equipped for prestigious and important governmental leadership positions. But the Biden Echo will resonate silently, softly, and secretly as long as white America pretends to be progressive, while offering tainted accolades to their pick from the best of the worst of a people.

3.) Just Another Black Man The next President, whoever he or she may be, will no doubt find themselves forced sharing responsibility of the Bush administration debacles.

The current domestic and foreign fiascoes can’t and won’t be solved in 4 or 8 years. The President succeeding Mr. Bush can only hope to BEGIN to clean up the mess that has been created nationally and worldwide.

The next President will be no messiah, no matter how strongly we wish, hope, and pray.

If Barack Obama is elected as the next President of the U.S.A. he will be a scapegoat at best, and at worst the sole generator of renewed belief within white America that no matter how intelligent, “articulate,” educated, and charismatic he may be, he’s still just another… Black man.
About the Author:

Senator Hillary Clinton is struggling to keep her democratic nomination alive today though she was the overwhelming favorite just three months back – in December 2007.

The reason for this is simple: Senator Clinton’s almost-perfect certitude in December 2007 that she would prevail. That certitude was reasonable by most objective measures. Senator Clinton did not come to that conclusion lightly. She came to that conclusion after evaluating her competition — Senator Barack Obama (lack of national exposure and party network) and former Vice-Presidential Candidate John Edwards (has been there already and not succeeded, not a fresh face, a bit too populist) — and after assessing her own strengths (experience, knowledge, party network.)

Objectively, any external consultant would have agreed with Senator Clinton’s assessment of the political landscape as it appeared in December 2007.

As anticipated, John Edwards put up a spirited fight, and then suspended his campaign. But Senator Barack Obama’s surprising and resilient strength is just that — most surprising.

However, in public life, every now and then a candidate who is in almost-complete sync with the public mood emerges, and he/she captures the imagination (e.g, Reagan in 1980 after failing to connect in 1968, and almost succeeding in 1976.) Usually, there are many institutional speed bumps to such a sweep (e.g., Gary Hart in 1984.)

That’s what we find with Senator Obama’s success this time — he has captured the broad sweep of imagination of at least the Democratic Party voters, and he is running into many speed bumps but none of them has (yet) derailed him.

Senator Hillary Clinton, nor any one including Senator Obama, could have anticipated this. Nor could any poll have captured this — it is like asking consumers about wine-coolers when they have no idea what it is.

That is the stuff of public mood and public life. There is a season for things, and quite often we don’t control those flows. Senator Obama himself acknowledges and understands this (“fierece urgency of now” quoting Dr. King) — he may not match the public sentiment in the next season, he does now.

In spite of Senator Barack Obama’s surprising strength, Senator Clinton could have still, probably, won the Democratic Party nomination but her well-placed confidence and certitude led to two tactical misjudgments that are now costing her so dearly.

The two misjudgments are: (i) not competing in party caucuses vigorously (among the pledged delegates from the primaries, Senator Clinton trails only by about 20 pledged delegates but when you factor the caucus results, Senator Clinton trails by over 150 pledged delegates); and (ii) not doing enough due diligence about the Democratic Party rules, and absorbing and internalizing those rules for proper strategy execution [e.g., believing that victory in big states should provide the numbers (not so because of proportional representation rules), not absorbing the Texas dual system.]

That’s the way life is sometimes. Timing (and some may call it luck or providence) is such a determinant in life. Just as Bill Clinton was wise (or lucky) in taking a pass at the 1988 Presidential elections and equally wise (or lucky) in joining the fray in 1992, Senator Hillary Clinton’s time may have been 2004 or it may be 2012 or 2016.

It appears from all conventional metrics that the mood of the electorate favors the Democratic nominee in fall but who really knows? No poll can measure this.
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