i watched the debate on wednesday night in pennsylvania and i must admit that it was fairly unimpressive. perhaps because i’m so inundated with this primary process, the candidates have simply become parodies of themselves. i know what obama is going to say before he opens his mouth, and i know that hillary is going to attack him for it. since then, he’s been commenting that the debate did not get into the issues for 45 minutes, going on to chastise the debate process for focusing away from the issues with a desire to create controversy. however when they begin to discuss the issues, they only talk about issues that they agree upon. so what’s the point?

if we have nothing more to debate and you have no real issues on which to separate yourself from each other, then clearly you must separate yourself on character and an appeal to the affective component of the american people. that’s why you campaign. not because you’re looking to share your ideas, but instead to get people to rally and be emotionally drawn. obama should know that more than anyone. furthermore, in florida, where campaigning was prohibited as well as media ads, obama managed to run ads through an “oversight” in national television time purchasing, and he still lost. i think that this is indicative of obama’s need to to reach voters on an emotional level thereby bringing them over to his side (hillary as well, i would simply argue that more people had some affective response to her at baseline). alternatively, some would claim that “clinton” has name recognition whereas obama was less known… really? really? it seems since he announced his bid for presidency,  obama is one of the most popular names in american culture (granted, a manipulation over time):

research question: during this campaign season (january - denver), has barak obama been mentioned more times than hillary clinton; a content analysis of the names “hillary clinton”, “clinton”, “barak obama”, and “obama” across major news media (i suppose the easiest would be major print media). or a primetime section of major cable media from say 7-11pm over sample weeks from now until the primaries. i understand that news networks make a concerted effort to balance their time, but biases exist, and often they manifest on this subtle level

just a thought for everyone with all that free time.