Who's old enough to remember? Is this a new trend in politics?

[Chika]

Okay, so who's old enough to remember when Jimmy Carter was elected president? I have a question for you because I'm really getting bothered by this whole "The world is going to come to a horrible end if [*that other candidate*] is elected!!" panicky rhetoric that comes around every four years.

 

Is this phenomenon new to this century? Is it something that solely came up starting in 2000 and both times since then? Or does it go back further? Back in the day when Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford were duking it out, did both sides send doom-and-gloom, life-as-we-know-it-will-end messages out there (or did the voters)?

 

I'm just feeling right now like this is a new trend in politics, but maybe I'm whacked in thinking that. Perhaps the internet fuels it (in fact, of course it does -- now you can send 33 messages a day about how awful Candidate X is to everyone in your address book!). I'm just tired of reading it all -- BOTH ways.

 

[*Off to :chillpill:*]

[asta]

It happens every four years.

 

Except when Reagan was up for his second term, for some reason.

 

 

asta

[JWSJ]

Except when Reagan was up for his second term, for some reason.

 

Reagan was up against Mondale. Mondale only won his home state.

 

There was no contest.

[Veronica in VA]

I'm old enough to remember the Carter and Ford election - of course I was young then ;). After hearing my parents talk I was so worried the day after that election. I remember sitting in the classroom expecting some terrible, undefined thing to happen any moment. So I don't think the doom and gloom projections are new.

 

Veronica

[Academy of Jedi Arts]

Well, I'm not old enough to remember "Daisy Girl" but there is nothing new about this.

[laylamcb]

Yes, Chika, the DOWNSIDE of a free and independent media* is that they have to find some way to get us to watch/listen--and that means hype. And that's always been the case (think Roosevelt reminding voters not to "change horses in the middle of the stream" or disaster would ensure, think Daisy Girl, think Carter v. Reagan, etc.). And that will continue to be the case. But I think that you're correct that the electorate is more polarized than I EVER remember, and that fuels a great deal of the doomsdaying in the media and in the campaigns.

 

* Please do not misunderstand me: I'm fully in support of freedom of the press. FULLY. But I'm also fully in favor of us exercising OUR freedom to tune out their hype-speak and making reasoned, rational decisions. :001_smile:

[hsmamainva]

I'm sure it's been there in many elections, but we have the internet now and I think that really, really makes it more prevalent.

 

In the "old days", you had politicians and reporters discussing the elections and maybe a few town hall meetings, but you didn't have every Tom, Dick, and Harry posting their own views via blogs and then having that taken as 'fact' by both sides of the political aisle.

 

I think that's contributed to a great deal of the fear.

[Jane in NC]

My perception may be skewed from the Ford/Carter era because I was in college and did not own a television set. Carter made a great deal out of the "Misery Index" at the time (high unemployment and inflation--remember Ford's WIN campaign to "Whip Inflation Now"?) but whether this was negative campaigning or a statement of just the facts, I don't remember.

 

In 1980 Nancy Reagan was in a series of ads that were considered negative at the time. Trying to remember them, I found a site with archived political ads. Maybe a viewing will help you determine if things are any worse today than yesterday.

[Guest Virginia Dawn]

I was in high school. I didn't pay attention to politics and my parents didn't discuss it much. A church friend of mine tried to convince me that Jimmy Carter was the "antichrist."

 

There was a lot of that kind of talk about the end of times. A substitute History teacher I had actually preached about the World Bank being "The Beast" of Revelation.

 

 

ETA: It appears that I have flubbed here. The Christian Coalition didn't start till 1987, but I was in High School in the late 70's, early 80's. The move The Day After was also later than I remembered.

 

So what is it I'm remembering? There was some kind of fundamental Christian organization or group promoting "end times" literature and discussion around then.

Edited October 23, 2008 by Virginia Dawn

[hsmamainva]

I believe that may also have been around the time when that movie about a nuclear holocaust came out. I can't remember the name of it.

 

Was that the TV movie thing, "The Day After"? I think it came out around the same time and, boy, did that freak out a lot of people!!!!! I remember that!!

[Jane in NC]

Was that the TV movie thing, "The Day After"? I think it came out around the same time and, boy, did that freak out a lot of people!!!!! I remember that!!

 

No, "The Day After" came out when Reagan was president, not during the Ford administration. Nuclear proliferation was a hot topic back then.

[Guest Virginia Dawn]

You're probably right. The whole thing is a jumble in my mind. I wasn't the least bit interested in politics till my 30's

 

I grew up during the time when we still had school drills for nuclear attacks and warnings about how the Russians would try to brainwash us into betraying our parents.

[Jane in NC]

I grew up during the time when we still had school drills for nuclear attacks and warnings about how the Russians would try to brainwash us into betraying our parents.

 

I remember all too well... My son saw part of the documentary "Atomic Cafe" recently. It seemed like science fiction to him, but I said that "duck and cover" was a real drill.

[JFSinIL]

I remember when Nixon resigned, too.

[lynn]

Okay, so who's old enough to remember when Jimmy Carter was elected president? I have a question for you because I'm really getting bothered by this whole "The world is going to come to a horrible end if [*that other candidate*] is elected!!" panicky rhetoric that comes around every four years.

 

Is this phenomenon new to this century? Is it something that solely came up starting in 2000 and both times since then? Or does it go back further? Back in the day when Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford were duking it out, did both sides send doom-and-gloom, life-as-we-know-it-will-end messages out there (or did the voters)?

 

I'm just feeling right now like this is a new trend in politics, but maybe I'm whacked in thinking that. Perhaps the internet fuels it (in fact, of course it does -- now you can send 33 messages a day about how awful Candidate X is to everyone in your address book!). I'm just tired of reading it all -- BOTH ways.

 

[*Off to :chillpill:*]

 

I am tired of it all also. I never paid attention to elections before. Never had to but when someone talks about taking my money and "spreading" the wealth........now that gots my attention. I stopped reading everything that gets sent to me.

[Guest Virginia Dawn]

I was very curious and did a little research. It looks like this trend started after Hal Lindsey published The Late Great Planet Earth in 1970. It tried to equate modern happenings with prophecies in Revelation and became a best seller. A movie was made in 1979 with Orson Welles narrating.

 

I've never read the book or seen the movie, but apparently it has had a great and lasting impact on certain parts of our American culture. I might just go read the book to become more culturally literate. :-)

[seanda]

I think we can go back a lot further than modern elections and find that this has always been the case. I recently went to the Abraham Lincoln museum and they have a section dedicated to the election. The political cartoons were vicious. The commentaries predicted the end of the good life.... and every awful thing you can imagine. Dirty politics and gloom and doom politics are nothing new. They were not new when Lincoln was running so they are not new now.

[Remudamom]

Well now Chika, I remember when Lincoln was elected, and the world did come to an end!

 

**inserting wild Rebel Yell at this point**

[Dawn E]

I posted this article a while back, but I think it is relevant to this discussion. It actually made me feel a lot better, oddly enough.

 

Stuck in the Muck

 

As I said last time, there really is nothing new under the sun.

[Guest Virginia Dawn]

Thanks for posting that. It was good for quite a few chuckles. :-)

[Gretchen in NJ]

Yes. I was young, but I do remember sitting in gas lines. I remember only being able to buy gas on odd and even days during Carter's presidency. Our country surrived. It was hard times, but we were able to get through it.

[Robin Hood]

There is nothing new under the sun. I was around but don't remember much. I was in my own world. There has always been some sort of doomsday message for differences of all sorts through the years. I have enjoyed reading all kinds of history the last couple of years and this is really nothing new. Reading history has made me less afraid when the fear rhetoric starts. It has also made me more resilient as I read both sides and I am hardly bothered anymore.

[Tullia]

I'm old enough to remember 1964's "In your heart you know he might" play on Goldwater's campaign slogan. My father says it was the same for his generation, and that his father told him similar stories about the WWI generation.

 

My recipe for surviving presidential elections with sanity intact is to do research. Don't pay as much attention to what the candidates (or their friends and opponents) are saying as much as what they have done and how they've voted in the past. It's the best predictor I've found of how candidates will govern. I don't take campaigns as seriously as I once did either. The office of president is important, but IMO it's way over-hyped.

 

Do your research, vote your conscience, and live your life according to your principles. The aggregate of that process is what makes the country what it is. Politicians have a way of overestimating their importance. Giving politicians too much credit is like feeding trolls; it only encourages mischief.

 

When I was a grad student in my early 20's a friend who had returned to college in her early 40's told me, after first swearing me to secrecy, that she'd voted for Ronald Reagan. I was shocked because she was and is in no way a conservative. When I got over my surprise I asked why. Her answer was simple; she'd lived in California during his days as governor and found that his style of governance was far more pragmatic than his campaign rhetoric. She predicted that he'd do the same as president. I've found her observations on Reagan to be generally true of later presidents as well.

 

I think it was James Carville who in explaining something Bill Clinton had said in his first campaign which upset folks on the left that Clinton wasn't serious...what he'd said was nothing more than campaign rhetoric; more specifically "boob bait for the bubbas".

[Stacy in NJ]

I don't remember this, but going back even further - have you ever seen the Lyndon Johnson T.V. ad aired against Barry Goldwater? The little girl picking flowers in a meadow, then a mushroom cloud letting us know the consequences of the election?

 

It's always been this way. Even in Greece it was this way.

[Storm Bay]

I remember when Nixon resigned, too.

 

Yes. I was visiting my liberal aunt & uncle who were living in Anchorage, Alaska. We sat & ate pie while he gave his speech. I was just a child, mind you, and not into politics yet. I spent six weeks up there that summer, and remember watching Johnny Carson with them while it was still light outside. (okay, that last piece was unnecessary trivia.)

[Spy Car]

It happens every four years.

 

Except when Reagan was up for his second term, for some reason.

 

 

asta

 

I was living in Berkeley at the time, and believe me when I tell you, folks there felt otherwise :001_smile:

 

Bill

[Storm Bay]

I do remember Canadian politics back in the 1970s being this way, at least in BC. Each party happy to get the dirt out on each other, while trying to hide their own. Make the other look bad seems to be the way, doesn't it?

[Spy Car]

There were no atomic weapons then (obviously) but if you read about what went on in the contests between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, you will see none of this is new.

 

Bill

Edited October 23, 2008 by Spy Car

[Storm Bay]

There were no atomic weapons then (obviously) but if you read about what went on in the contests between Jon Adams and Thomas Jefferson, you will see none of this is new.

 

Bill

 

Thanks for the reminder. My dd's studied this in American History this year, but I didn't do the extra reading on it. Apparently it was downright nasty.

[CLHCO]

I recently watched something on the TV about the election of 1800 between Jefferson and Adams. They were every bit as over dramatic as we are, though I'm not sure it was an accurate portrayal. It was for kids and was meant to point to parallels for today's election.

 

People on Jefferson's side were burning Adams in effigy and claiming he was going to declare himself king, he was secretly building an army and was going to force one religion on everyone, creating a theocracy of control. People on Adam's side were terrified that he was going to come and take their Bibles away so they better lock them up.

 

It truth, I think there was more drama in the past in some ways. People were in small communities, usually of a like mind. It was very hard to get reason through when there were clumps of people letting their imaginations run wild.

[HappyatHome]

Okay, so who's old enough to remember when Jimmy Carter was elected president? I have a question for you because I'm really getting bothered by this whole "The world is going to come to a horrible end if [*that other candidate*] is elected!!" panicky rhetoric that comes around every four years.

 

Is this phenomenon new to this century? Is it something that solely came up starting in 2000 and both times since then? Or does it go back further? Back in the day when Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford were duking it out, did both sides send doom-and-gloom, life-as-we-know-it-will-end messages out there (or did the voters)?

 

I'm just feeling right now like this is a new trend in politics, but maybe I'm whacked in thinking that. Perhaps the internet fuels it (in fact, of course it does -- now you can send 33 messages a day about how awful Candidate X is to everyone in your address book!). I'm just tired of reading it all -- BOTH ways.

 

[*Off to :chillpill:*]

 

Dd and I were just reading about the election when Andrew Jackson became President. There was a lot of fear about what would happen if he did because he was not one of the educated elite. I take comfort that this gloom and doom is not a new thing.

[Jenny in Atl]

Yes, Chika, the DOWNSIDE of a free and independent media* is that they have to find some way to get us to watch/listen--and that means hype. And that's always been the case (think Roosevelt reminding voters not to "change horses in the middle of the stream" or disaster would ensure, think Daisy Girl, think Carter v. Reagan, etc.). And that will continue to be the case. But I think that you're correct that the electorate is more polarized than I EVER remember, and that fuels a great deal of the doomsdaying in the media and in the campaigns.

 

* Please do not misunderstand me: I'm fully in support of freedom of the press. FULLY. But I'm also fully in favor of us exercising OUR freedom to tune out their hype-speak and making reasoned, rational decisions. :001_smile:

 

The problem is I don't think we have free and independent media in the US. Most (TV/Mags/Newspapers) are owned by big corporations, some verging on monopolies. The internet, to some extent, has provided a forum for more independent coverage of the world, but often it's hard to gage how reliable the sources are. Compared to the rest of the world, our news is still much better, but I worry that this may not always been the case in years to come.

[KarenNC]

I recently watched something on the TV about the election of 1800 between Jefferson and Adams. They were every bit as over dramatic as we are, though I'm not sure it was an accurate portrayal. It was for kids and was meant to point to parallels for today's election.

 

People on Jefferson's side were burning Adams in effigy and claiming he was going to declare himself king, he was secretly building an army and was going to force one religion on everyone, creating a theocracy of control. People on Adam's side were terrified that he was going to come and take their Bibles away so they better lock them up.

 

It truth, I think there was more drama in the past in some ways. People were in small communities, usually of a like mind. It was very hard to get reason through when there were clumps of people letting their imaginations run wild.

 

We just watched the first of this year's Electronic Field Trip series from Colonial Williamsburg on this very topic last week (the election of 1800). People were saying Jefferson would actually burn all the bibles if elected, etc. Very interesting (and familiar :)).

 

Btw, the Homeschool Buyer's Co-op has reopened the sale on these--$50 for the series of 7 rather than $500---and you can still see this one, The Will of the People, in archived form for the rest of the year. We're doing SOTW 3 this year and it's a great resource, as there is a lot of additional material available around each one. I'm really looking forward to the science in colonial times one in January.

[Ellie]

I didn't listen to talk radio when Carter was elected, and there was no Internet, so I don't really know if people were saying the same things back then. I just knew that he would be dreadful, and I was right.:D

[Night Elf]

My DH and I were talking about this very thing. There's a woman at my work who says her family truly believes that if Obama is elected president, that judgement day is on hand.

 

My DH told me that when John F. Kennedy was running, there was fearmongering that America would become subservient to the Pope because JFK was Catholic.

 

When Franklin Roosevelt was president, some people thought the New Deal would lead to total governmental control of everyone.

 

In the election of 1796, the supporters of John Adams called Thomas Jefferson an atheist among other things and claimed that if he were elected, he'd have all the churches burned.

 

I don't even want to write out what John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson were called in the 1828 election. Mercy me!!

 

So yeah, this kind of thing has been around for a while. :)

[hsmamainva]

My DH and I were talking about this very thing. There's a woman at my work who says her family truly believes that if Obama is elected president, that judgement day is on hand.

 

My DH told me that when John F. Kennedy was running, there was fearmongering that America would become subservient to the Pope because JFK was Catholic.

 

When Franklin Roosevelt was president, some people thought the New Deal would lead to total governmental control of everyone.

 

In the election of 1796, the supporters of John Adams called Thomas Jefferson an atheist among other things and claimed that if he were elected, he'd have all the churches burned.

 

I don't even want to write out what John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson were called in the 1828 election. Mercy me!!

 

So yeah, this kind of thing has been around for a while. :)

 

Excellent post, Night Elf!!!!! :thumbup:

 

Another reason for studying history, btw! (For whoever had that thread going on the board!)

[Spy Car]

Back in the day when Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford were duking it out, did both sides send doom-and-gloom, life-as-we-know-it-will-end messages out there (or did the voters)?

 

 

I didn't listen to talk radio when Carter was elected, and there was no Internet, so I don't really know if people were saying the same things back then. I just knew that he would be dreadful, and I was right.:D

 

The Ford-Carter (or Carter-Ford) election of 1976 was the most "civil" election in my memory (which stretches back to the 64 race).

 

The country was pretty devastated by Watergate, and Ford did take a hit for pardoning Nixon, but most people understood Gerald Ford was a very decent man. And Carter, while he didn't prove to be a great president, was a Southern centrist, and being "born-again" lead to initial goodwill from many Southern conservatives, and was also seen to be a decent man.

 

Ford (despite the long odds of a post-Watergate Republican winning in 76) might well have prevailed, except for a slip during one of the debates when he said there was no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe, and everyone went, huh?

 

But over-all this as a pretty "positive" campaign.

 

Bill

Edited October 23, 2008 by Spy Car

[Janna]

 

So what is it I'm remembering? There was some kind of fundamental Christian organization or group promoting "end times" literature and discussion around then.

 

I remember around that time there was literature being passed around to churches called "88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988". FREAKED me out. I remember proselytizing like never before to my classmates. As you can well imagine, that pretty much made my one of the most unpopular kids in my school! Yeah, pretty much walked around with a target on my back and an "L" on my forehead for the next 4 years, LOL.

[Cricket]

I was living in Berkeley at the time, and believe me when I tell you, folks there felt otherwise :001_smile:

 

Bill

 

My faculty advisor in college made a comment once about how she remembered being scared when Reagan was re-elected. She said that she and her friends were so worried he would lead us into a nuclear war. She really thought it was the end of the world. I was very surprised by that. My parents thought Reagan was great and I couldn't imagine anyone actually believing Reagan would start a nuclear war. But, yeah, there were a few people who were worried!

[MyThreeSons]

That was my senior year of high school and I was taking Government, so we followed the election pretty closely.

 

I remember hearing someone threaten to move to Canada if Carter were elected President.

 

I do think the ugliness has gotten worse as the years go on. Not just between the candidates, but especially the way citizens talk to and refer to those of differing political persuasion.

[Storm Bay]

:iagree:

The problem is I don't think we have free and independent media in the US. Most (TV/Mags/Newspapers) are owned by big corporations, some verging on monopolies. The internet, to some extent, has provided a forum for more independent coverage of the world, but often it's hard to gage how reliable the sources are. Compared to the rest of the world, our news is still much better, but I worry that this may not always been the case in years to come.

 

:iagree: In theory, we have freedom of the press, but in practise it doesn't happen.