Suchergebnisse

Rex S. Matthews writes to Catherine May to express his concerns over the legalities of leasing Indian Reservation land, which he refers to as legal "no-man's land." He also laments the ineffectual measures of the Indian Bureau of Affairs. May responds with her shared concern, and includes a detailed letter regarding the problem penned by a commissioner from the Bureau of Indian Affairs (commissioner's name not legible).

Emotions and voters' feelings in political contexts are not typically the focal point of voting behavior research. Political science has traditionally emphasized the rational component of voting behavior. Classic scholars posited that voters functioned like rational actors, who were motivated to maximize personal utility and benefit to make a political decision. Only after the discipline's Behavioral Revolution was scholars' attention captured by the effect of emotions on voting behavior. Little attention, however, was given to how emotions influenced voters' choices. Most research focused on how candidates' personalities facilitated specific emotional contexts in which voters responded. Analyzing survey data from the American National Elections Studies (ANES) for the Presidential elections of 2004 and 2008, this study seeks to understand differences in the ANES emotional indicators from each election. Drawing on the conventional wisdom that suggests emotions influence attitude formation and perceptions of reality, this dissertation accounts for changes in the national political mood between 2004 and 2008. Additionally, this project examines the special case of how emotions mattered among women and African-American voting blocks in the 2008 Presidential campaign. The unique political context 2008 furnishes three unique variables of interest; the first American presidential campaign to feature a Black man as a front-runner nominee, second, women made inroads showcased by Hillary Clinton's competitive Democratic Primary, and the Republican Party nominated its first woman vice presidential candidate. The scope of this research focused on the voter's personal emotional reactions to a presidential candidate by addressing this question; do voters' feelings toward a candidate influence his or her attitudes about campaign issues? This project builds upon the theory of Affective Intelligence by applying of the transfer-of-affect thesis to argue that voters' emotional responses to candidates are interpreted as salient ...

Two candidates competing for election may raise some issues for debate during the electoral campaign, while avoiding others. We present a model in which the decision to introduce an issue, or to reply to the opponent's position on one that she raised, may change the further list of topics that end up being discussed. Candidates' strategic decisions are driven by their appraisal of their expected vote share at the end of the campaign. Real phenomena observed during campaigns, like the convergence of the parties to address the same issues, or else their diverging choice on which ones to treat, or the relevance of issue ownership can be explained within our stark basic model. Most importantly, our analysis is based on a novel concept of equilibrium that avoids the (often arbitrary) use of predetermined protocols. This allows us to endogenously predict not only the list of topics that will be touched upon by each candidate, but also the order in which they will be addressed.

A discussion of the use of TV debates between pol'al candidates, outlining the 'emerging conventions of campaign TV,' the impact of specific types of programs, .& the means which should be employed to allow TV debates. Both parties have increasingly made use of the spot announcement, reserved their longer telecasts (TC's) for appearances by their presidential & vice-presidential candidates, reduced the mean/average length of party TC's, & attempted to make their TC's visually interesting & entertaining, as well as introducing audience participation & conflict. The debates have had a greater capacity to attract & hold audiences than other types of pol'al TC's, thus countering 'the well-known tendency of voters to expose themselves selectively to partisan propaganda.' The law requiring equal time for all candidates should not be revoked, but should either be amended to exempt pol'al debates, as news interviews & newscasts are now exempted, or to make the equal time provisions applicable only to the major party candidates. I. Taviss.