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Since the days of FDR, all politicians have made decisions based on how close the media pays attention to their lives and its effect on votes.
On May 31,2008, presidential candidate hopeful Senator Barack Obama announced that he has left his church. This move to leave the Trinity Church of Chicago, in Illinois came after months of criticism and scrutiny from political advisors and the public. Earlier in the year Obama’s pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright Jr., caused controversy when he made statements in regards to the government’s role in the September 11 attacks and the government’s treatment towards blacks. And recently a visiting pastor, Reverend Michael Pfleger revived the controversy about Obama’s ties to the church.The reverend mocked Obama’s rival Senator Hilary Clinton, during his visit to Trinity Church. Senator Obama has condemned the statements made by both Reverend Wright and Pfleger, but scrutiny is still prevalent. According to the Daily News New York, exit polls taken from several recent primaries have shown that the reverend’s statements have “turned off some voters.” For over forty decades politicians have been forced to live under a microscope. Ever since the first televised debate between Senator John F. Kennedy from Massachusetts and then Vice President Richard Nixon on September 26, 1960, candidates for any election have had to perfect their daily living, rather than their policies. Even before the ‘Great Debates’ some politicians understood that public image plays a vital role on how people feel and vote. President Franklin D. Roosevelt suffered from polio and was restrained to a wheelchair for his entire presidency, but whenever Roosevelt took pictures he would be pictured standing. Roosevelt would be hoisted under the armpit by the individuals on either side him, giving the image of him hugging who ever is holding him up. The careers of many politicians’ lives have been destroyed by the media. In 1974 the Washington POst published a series of articles about the Watergate Break-in that revealed that President Nixon had sent men in to do espionage on the Democratic Convention held at the Watergate Hotel in Washington D.C. President Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974 before he could get impeached. In 1995 to 1996 President Clinton faced impeachment for deceiving the American public. Monica Lewinsky got famous for being the twenty- two year old intern who had an inappropriate relationship with President Clinton in 1995. Clinton had admitted that he had an “inappropriate relationship” with Ms. Lewinsky, after several months of denying that he had any relations with her. It was out of this scandal that Clinton uttered one of his famous quotes “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.” March 12, 2008 New York governor Elliot Spitzer had to leave his office because an article written two days prior revealed that he had repeatedly solicited a prostitute. The article was a based on a report by the federal government who had a wiretap and a person informed on the investigation. On June 2, 2008, former President Clinton condenmed the media for the biased press coverage of his wife's(Hilary's) campaign. But in this marathon for the Democratic presidential candidacy every aspect of Senator Obama’s and Clinton’s life and campaign is being scrutinized by the media.
The copyright of the article Media's Effects on Politics in US Elections is owned by Andrew Woolford. Permission to republish Media's Effects on Politics in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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