"Personal Narratives" and other burning issues

[Bikewer]

So, listening to the pundits pundit (if that's what they do...) over the last few months, I can't help but think that whoever said, "The Democrats never understood that elections are not about issues." was perhaps dead right.

Listening to Talk Of The Nation today, they were discussing Mrs. Palin with a variety of female voters. The burning issues seemed to be whether they could "relate" to the candidate. Only one caller said, "why are we not talking about the issues?"

Along similar lines, a round-table discussion on another show involved why the voters liked a candidate's "personal narrative"; their "story". Whether this story was compelling, and whether the voter could relate to it....

I would like not to think that the average voter in this country is dead stupid, and that we chose our leaders on something other than gut reactions and "personal narratives" or similar fuzzy notions.
I got awfully tired of folks describing Bush as "someone you could sit down and have a beer with" or similar homey nonsense.
Is this how the leader of the world's most powerful nation comes to power?

[Oliver]

Unfortunately, yes. Plus buying into the usual party propaganda of the others being bad.
And I also would like to think that the average Voter is wiser than that - or at least his
Media. Or at least the Best Political Team in Television.

Did you ever notice that "political news" in the US is all about the Candidates in
US elections? There is nothing else. Virtually nothing else happens on this planet
if Obama's Pastor or McCain's running mate made a boo-boo.

But if the MS-Media isn't just serving "intellectual" Sensationalism fast-food to an already
dumb audience, what the heck is wrong with the majority of Americans?

[Not even mentioning the flag weaving BS where more Flags = More Patriotic]

[Oliver]

Since this is a topic I'm very interested in, let me state my assumption:

I see several reasons why there is so less focus on the issues:

a. Time

While in Parliamentary systems the election process is done within about
1 or 2 Months, focusing on the elections over 1,5 years is a lot of time to
come up with the stupidest topics.

b. Presidential Elections

To let the electorate pick the head of the state seems to be a failure in
the first place. It literally cries for bringing up the most irrelevant topics
about the Candidates thanks to focusing on a person rather than the
parties whole program.

c. 2 Party dominance

There is a long history to complain about the opposing party if you don't
have a third or more option. While third parties are ignored by the fair
and Balanced Media anyway.

d. Media

The MS-Media doesn't seem to care much about the Issues since their
interest is to make money by attracting as much viewers as possible.
So they're obviously giving a [fill in the blank] about the seriousness
of elections - and the law does not restrict the Media to a fair&balanced
coverage of all Parties running.

e. Education

If you grew up in a country with above circumstances, you're used to
see those things as a given reality. You have to study another countries
election to get a different point of view to ones own election.