Jamieson lets readers in on the dirty side of democracy

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	• Dirty Politics: Deception, Distraction, and Democracy Kathleen Hall Jamieson Oxford University Press, USA, 1993 - 352 pages average customer review:based on 3 reviews view larger image
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Jamieson lets readers in on the dirty side of democracy

Campaigning strategy has become the first and foremost informational tool citizens use to evaluate the political arena of today's democratic society. The problem that arises through this medium is that what the public see's, hears, and witnesses is not always factual. Campaign analyst Kathleen Hall Jamieson, presents a book in which this such topic is addressed. Arguing for fair, accurate, contextual, comparative, and engaged campaign discourse; Jamieson explains to her readers the proper way in which to objectively evaluate bias political paraphernalia. She provides insight in how to listen, read and watch political campaigns without becoming what she calls a "Pack Rat." According to Jamieson, "What is shown is not necessarily what is seen. What is said is not always what is heard."(Page 9) By reading this book carefully, one becomes familiar with how to evaluate a politician's agenda and how to successfully walk away with the `facts'. Jamieson sets her book up in four themes. First she talks about attack in political campaigning, past and present. She then goes on to discuss news broad cast and advertisement, continuing with news coverage of campaigning. She finalizes her thoughts by discussing the norms of discourse. By carefully calling to attention the usage of political sloganeering, manipulative television representation, and false `facts' to create a political figure; Jamieson exposes it all in Dirty Politics.

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Engaging Arguments

As a professor of communication, I have enthusiastically used Kathleen Hall Jamieson's Dirty Politics as a text that makes sense of so much of what we see in nationally televised politics. Students invariably come away from reading Jamieson with a much deeper apprecation for politics--and what ails it. The strength of this text is in the attention to detail; specifically, Jamieson grounds her study in focus group research. And in those instances where she doesn't utilize such research, her readings of various televisual advertising is usually nuanced and insightful. The one drawback to the text, one that Jamieson would perhaps actually endorse, is its elitism; that is, only certain sorts of elites watch the Lehrer News Hour (to which she contributes frequently), and have the educational skills to do the hard work of argument, engagement and debate that she so heartily endorses. Politics isn't a spectator sport; in this text, Jamieson encourages us to get up off the couch and actually engage--and thereby hold candidates accountable for the discourse of Democracy.

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Americans in recent years have become thoroughly disenchanted with our political campaigns, especially with campaign advertising and speeches. Each year, as November approaches, we are bombarded with visceral appeals that bypass substance, that drape candidates in the American flag but tell us nothing about what they'll do if elected, that flood us with images of PT-109 or Willie Horton, while significant issues--such as Kennedy's Addison's Disease or the looming S&L catastrophe--are left unexamined. And the press--the supposed safeguard of democracy--focuses on campaign strategy over campaign substance, leaving us to decide where the truth lies.
In Dirty Politics, campaign analyst Kathleen Hall Jamieson provides an eye-opening look at political ads and speeches, showing us how to read, listen to, and watch political campaigns. Jamieson provides a sophisticated (and often humorous) analysis of advertising technique, describing how television ads use soft focus, slow motion, lyrical or patriotic music (Reagan used "I'm Proud to be an American") to place a candidate in a positive light, or quick cuts, black and white, videotape, and ominous music (for instance, the theme from "Jaws") to portray the opposition. She shows how ads sometimes mimic news spots to add authenticity (Edwin Edwards, in his race against David Duke, actually used former NBC correspondent Peter Hackis, who would begin an ad saying "This is Peter Hackis in Baton Rouge"). And Jamieson points out that consultants create inflammatory ads hoping that the major networks will pick them up and run them as news, giving the ad millions of dollars of free air time. The most striking example would be the Willie Horton ad, which the press aired repeatedly (as an example of negative advertising) long after the ad had ceased running. (In fact, it never ran on the major networks as an ad, only as news.)
From a colorful, compact history of negative campaigning from Eisenhower to the present, to an in-depth commentary on the Willie Horton ads, to an up-to-the-minute analysis of the Duke-Edwards campaign in Louisiana, Dirty Politics is both a fascinating look at underhanded campaigning as well as a compelling argument for fair, accurate, and substantive campaigns. It is a book that all voters should read before they vote again.

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