William G. Mayer

Emmett H. Buell

Enduring Controversies in Presidential Nominating Politics retraces the more than two hundred-year history of presidential elections in the United States to provide a primer on how the process has evolved from the days of the founders, through the heyday of nominating conventions, to today's overwhelming interest in early primaries. Original essays by the editors introduce, critique, and occasionally even refute a wide variety of historical readings including Alexander Hamilton's defense of election procedures, excerpts of individual states' nominations of candidates in 1824, an overview of the impact television has had on nominating conventions, and calls for a national rotating primary scheme in 2004. As a whole, the collection reveals the common threads that run through the history of the nominating process, and points out that today's litany of complaints is not at all new.

Enduring Controversies in Presidential Nominating Politics

The Uses and Misuses of Politics is a detailed examination of the politics of George W. Bush’s presidency, focusing on the work—and the mistakes—of presidential political advisor Karl Rove. In his role as political advisor Karl Rove stands apart from his numerous counterparts in modern American politics in three major ways. The first measure of Rove’s distinctiveness is the totality of his direction over Bush’s political career. Simply put, George W. Bush never won an election, of any kind, in which Rove was not the dominant, even sole campaign strategist A second important difference between Karl Rove and other major presidential campaign strategists was the role that Rove played in helping formulate policy after Bush became president. In fact, Rove became the first presidential aide to both provide political advice to a sitting president while at the same time controlling the policy levers inside the White House, especially as an advocate for his own agenda in the areas of domestic policy. Finally, Karl Rove is noteworthy for the scope of his ambitions: his goal for the Bush presidency was to create a durable Republican majority that would dominate American politics for the next several decades. Even though theories of party systems and realignments have received serious challenges, Karl Rove was a believer; providing a key insight into how he approached his work with the Bush presidency. Where previous realignments were the result of historical accidents and recognized only after the fact, Karl Rove believed he could engineer the next one. In The Uses and Misuses of Politics William G. Mayer analyzes Karl Rove’s performance as presidential advisor: the roles he played, the advice he gave, and how the Republican Party fared with Rove as its principal strategist. By offering the reader a comprehensive assessment, Mayer provides valuable insight into the larger, enduring, and critical questions: What is the proper role of politics in the contemporary presidency? When does politics enhance a nation’s long-term welfare, and what does it detract from it? And what positive contributions can political advisors make to a modern-day president?

Karl Rove and the Bush Presidency

The Uses and Misuses of Politics

Discusses the presidential election process with eight chapters that cover such topics as how television covers the nomination process, the origins of the presidential selection process, and nomination finance in the post-Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act era.

The Making of the Presidential Candidates 2008

Andrew E. Busch

The Elephant in the Room brings together a distinguished group of right-leaning pundits and political scientists, from ardent supporters of Trump and Trumpism to prominent leaders of the never Trump movement. Taken together, this lively debate lays out the contours of a debate that will rage among Republican conservatives in the years ahead.

Donald Trump and the Future of the Republican Party

The Elephant in the Room

William G.. Mayer

The dynamics of public opinion in America over the last three decades

How and why American Public Opinion Changed Between 1960 and 1988

The Changing American Mind

The "swing voter" occupies a cherished place in American political lore. Candidates court swing voters, consultants target them, and pundits speculate constantly on which way they will lean. But nobody has adequately defined them as a group. What exactly is a swing voter? No one really seems to know. T he Swing Voter in American Politics fills this conceptual gap. The book brings political scientists and pollsters together to answer four basic questions: What is a swing voter? How can analysts use survey data to identify swing voters? How do swing voters differ—if at all—from the rest of the electorate? And what role do swing voters play in determining the outcomes of contemporary elections? Drawing on a wide range of sources, including American National Election Studies Data, Gallup polls, Pew Center surveys, and the National Annenberg Election Survey, the contributors track swing voters across six decades and in national and local elections. The result is an unprecedented picture of this key political group, just in time for the 2008 campaigns. Contributors include James E. Campbell (University of Buffalo), April Clark (Pew Research Center for the People & the Press), Adam Clymer (Annenberg Public Policy Center, University of Pennsylvania), Michael Dimock (Pew Research Center for the People & the Press), Juliana Menasce Horowitz (Pew Research Center for the People & the Press), Jeffrey M. Jones (Gallup Organization), Daron R. Shaw (University of Texas–Austin), Jeffrey M. Stonecash (Syracuse University), Ken Winneg (Annenberg Public Policy Center, University of Pennsylvania).

William G. Mayer

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