Dirty Politics or Tower Stories

Dirty Politics: Deception, Distraction, and Democracy

Author: Kathleen Hall Jamieson

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.

Table of Contents:

	Introduction	3
I	Attack Campaigning
1	The Role of Drama and Data in Political Decisions	15
2	Tactics of Attack	43
3	Patriotism and Prejudice: Visceral Responses and Stereotypes That Foil Argument	64
4	Countering Attacks: Pitting the Propositional Against the Primal	102
II	Ads and the News
5	Power of Ads to Shape News	123
6	Adbites, Ad Stories, and Newsads	136
III	News Coverage of the Campaign
7	The News Media as Sounding Board	163
8	Solutions or Strategy?	189
IV	Accountability, Engagement, and Democracy
9	Argument, Engagement, and Accountability in Political Discourse	203
10	The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly: 1960-1988 and Beyond	237
	Appendix I	267
	Appendix II	281
	Notes	289
	Bibliography	310
	Index	329

Look this: Generation Rx or Herbs Demystified

Tower Stories: An Oral History of 9/11

Author: Damon DiMarco

Including follow-up interviews which track contributors' lives since 9/11, as well as never-before-published photographs, this expanded second edition of a literary time capsule preserves a monumental tragedy in American history through the voices of the people who were in Lower Manhattan and elsewhere in New York at the time of the attack. The diverse stories chronicled here include a small group of people who made it safely down from the 89th floor of Tower 1, a paramedic who set up a triage area 200 yards from the base of the towers before they collapsed, and ordinary citizens trying to get on with their lives in the days following the tragic event. Voices represented include police, firefighters, paramedics, reporters, volunteers, eyewitnesses, the bereaved of 9/11, World Trade Center structural engineers, political experts, political dissidents, and children who witnessed the events.

William F. Buckley

This volume defends the understanding, as also the horror, of that day. We are indebted to Mr. DiMarco for the effort and for the editorial acuity.

Publishers Weekly

The only widely available oral history of 9/11 from the perspective of New Yorkers, this monumental work (originally released by Revolution in 2004) has been updated for the sixth anniversary of the national tragedy. In the weeks following the World Trade Center attack, DiMarco, in the tradition of Studs Terkel, wandered Manhattan collecting the stories of Gothamites who survived the collapse of the towers, as well as those who came to help or simply bore witness-whether from elsewhere in the city, across the country or overseas. Two major themes emerge, the first concerning the heroism of common decency: Florence Engoran, five months' pregnant on the day of the attack, was helped down 55 flights of stairs by near strangers, "two men [who] promised that they were gonna stay with me the whole time down, which they did." In the same vein, Jan Demczur relates how he used his window washing tools to save himself and an elevator full of people, and Dr. Walter Gerasimowicz tells of the men who aided him when he was forced to evacuate without his crutches. The rigors of loss and mourning make a second theme: Patrick Charles Welsh, whose wife perished on flight 93, says, "I was so devastated by this unheard cry of souls . . . This moan of humanity going straight up to heaven." Though a good idea, the scholarly essays that close the book, concerning the U.S.-Middle East relations, feel off-puttingly distant compared to the stories that precede them. DiMarco's contribution to the memory of that horrific day is enormous; the testimonies collected here form an amazing, one-of-a-kind account. Photos. (Sept.)

Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information

Margaret Heilbrun - Library Journal

Most oral histories are compiled by a person classified as editor. That DiMarco (theater arts, Drew Univ.) is labeled as author, as for his Heart of War: Soldiers' Voices from the Front Lines of Iraq, causes unnecessary confusion. (The Library of Congress CIP rightly clarifies that he is the editor.) Although the book's value as primary source documentation of a transforming catastrophe is diminished by its lack of an index, the material it offers is unique, a multitude of firsthand experiences preserved as few other 9/11 books have done. This second edition is expanded with many more photographs and with updates about a number of the witnesses interviewed. Recommended for all publicand undergraduate libraries.

See also September 11, 2001,a new entry in the "One Day in History" series to be reviewed, in LJ9/15/07.