How long does a campaign really need to be for voters to get the message?

[Clarkie1]

Poll question: How long does a campaign really need to be for voters to get the message?

Putting all other considerations aside ($, media, etc.) in our dysfunctional poliitical process, how long do you think a campaign needs to last for voters to get to know the candidates in a primary campaign and be equipped to make an informed decision when they vote?

[More Than A Feeling]

1. People have their own time tables for caring.

Plus, the longer the campaign season, the more chances there are for everything we need to know about the candidate to come out.

[EST]

2. Given that voters don't exercise their franchise from logic,

study or intelligent evaluation, merely from emotional reaction and subsequent justification, more than one day is too much and an eternity is not enough.

[MH1]

5. Exactly!

I chose 1 month because I do believe that for people who take it seriously, know where to get factual info, and are so inclined, they can and will do it in a few days of real effort. Because people have lots of different stuff to deal with in their lives, they need a window of time, but not so long as to inordinately drive up campaign costs and let the marketing take over (which is what we have now).

The problem with my reasoning is that most people don't know how to get factual information or don't have the tools/opportunity. That is where a real effort towards civic education and empowerment is needed, imo.

[EST]

7. We mostly agree.

However, there is a basic problem, below the surface, that prevents even civic education from taking hold.

. The problem that prevents voters from making intelligent choices also permeates the information and the delivery of that information needed to have a clear understanding that would support those choices.
. This problem is embedded in the very foundation of human intellect and the thinking we do.
. We make choices and trust those choices, perhaps as a result of evolutionary survival struggles, by an immediate emotional evaluation-"I just don't like/am suspicious of him/her," and then spend the remainder of the time finding reasons and sources that reinforce the essential rightness of those immediate emotional choices. This leads us to selectively cherry pick bits and pieces that we want to remember and use as tools while discarding the points that serve to reduce confidence in our original choices.
. There certainly are people, a rarefied minority, who, through experience or their own evolutionary history, are aware that their immediate reactions are not to be trusted and often even seek out contrary information to aid in evaluating those reactions.

The second limitation on efficient and intelligent choice making comes from what we do when we think.
. How we think we think, when we are thinking, bears no relationship to the actual process. Being the heroes (just ask us!) of our own private universe is a universal conceit and we each think if the other fellow would run his life the way we want him to, his life would work.
. We also see the process of thinking as though we were each a towering intellect when all we really do is execute a series of pattern recognition circles.
We spin stuff around and around until we find a recognizable pattern and then proclaim, "NOW, I understand it!"

. The problem with that, of course, is that we look for specific patterns, rather than seeing what's actually there.

It could be said, perhaps, that, even though the outcome of the grand experiment is a life and death matter, it all just isn't important enough to apply enough rigor to the examination thereof to thorough appreciate the complex interweaving of the results of choices.

I apologize for my windiness, but in a thread discussing election complexity and time, I hope it is not considered hi-jacking.

[MH1]

8. I would disagree with one statement you make:

There certainly are people, a rarefied minority, who, through experience or their own evolutionary history, are aware that their immediate reactions are not to be trusted and often even seek out contrary information to aid in evaluating those reactions.

I think this can be affected by education and practice. (Maybe you were including those in "experience.")

In my case, I had a high school economics class (it was elective) and the teacher spent some time on how advertising is used to manipulate people. I'd say that is one of the most useful lessons I got out of any of my education. But, I didn't really apply it right away. I'm not sure when the "a-ha!" moment came, but at some point I "got it" about advertising for consumer products. It didn't take trying to make a rational decision in very many idiotic political campaigns for me to realize that the same thing was going on.

I guess in my eternal optimism, I'd like to think that people could be taught about this like I was in high school. Maybe we really need to get to the kids - maybe it's too late for most adults. But I sure hope not. At any rate, there are adults who are "lifelong learners" and that group should be teachable. I really do think it would be a worthwhile effort. But frankly, I think it is undermined by the current ridiculous "perpetual campaign", that probably turns off a lot of thinking people to the political process altogether.

[sandnsea]

3. This is about accumulating tons of cash

and saturating the air waves in the big primary states so that the personal retail politics won't matter. Voters getting to know a candidate was not supposed to be a part of this particular Democratic primary. Bitching about people trying to stop the money machine seems counter-productive if one wants a real primary season.

[MADem]

4. There are a zillion variables. There is no one 'good' answer

Questions that affect the response include:

1. Is the candidate a known quantity--a public figure (AHNULD, e.g.) or an incumbent? Or is the individual an unknown, a newcomer?

2. Are the issues easy ones, like feeding hungry babies, which favor shorter timeframes, or esoteric ones, where the issues are so complex and far-removed from daily life (even if they impact it, indirectly) that there must be a long education process to persuade people to care?

3. While you discount MONEY and MEDIA in your query, they can't be pushed aside. They are essential to introducing the candidates to the electorate. Name recognition is a function of the two. If the media does not 'say your name' then you do not exist. If you have no money to buy media time, to pay a staff to disseminate your message, to travel and get your viewpoints out there, then your message has no weight.

4. Media, too, plays a role in the entire DEBATE process. If there are four dozen debates leading up to an election, each on a specific, in-depth topic, then there's more opportunity to see how a candidate not only thinks, but responds on his or her feet. If there are only a few 'catch-all' debates, those are more beauty contests with a bit of luck, good or bad, a few good quotes, and a few 'gotchas' deciding the results than anything else.

[ProudDad]

6. One Month!

The truth is that most of the folks don't even pay any real attention until after they've received their ballot literature or until they're in the voting booth, whichever comes last...

If we had PUBLIC financing of elections and force the media to give back OUR OWN GOD DAMN AIRTIME for extensive debates on the ISSUES we wouldn't need more than a month to find out what the candidates are REALLY about. Couple this with a BAN on paid political advertising on OUR OWN GOD DAMN AIRWAVES.

We should have election day voter registration and Instant run-off voting (since we can't get proportional representation without Constitutional Amendment).

And election day MUST BE A NATIONAL PAID HOLIDAY...

Then we might arrive at a democracy in reality instead of the fantasy of a "democracy" the corporations have bought and paid for for our 'amusement' and their aggrandizement.