Why Candidates Refuse to Discuss Real Issues
This from Richard Kimball the founder of Project Vote Smart which gathers the voting records and opinions of candidates for almost all levels of government. The reasons that candidates give for their reluctance seems to justify a move towards public financing of campaigns along with a requirement to declare positions on issues relevant to the voters and perhaps some mandated debates to “out” the candidates for the few of us who would like to know that they think.
The Project conducted a ten-year study of every candidate for state legislature, governor, congress and the presidency to track their decreasing willingness to provide citizens with specific positions on the voter’s concerns. Or in other words: Issues that their pollster did not stamp SAFE!
Using key leaders of both parties from the Project’s Board and over 100 major daily newspapers we bombarded each candidate with requests for information on issues. The percentage of candidates willing to provide information dropped from a high of 72% in 1996 to a low of 48% in 2006.
You can watch your favorite candidates performance on this years test on this web site. Just look at the Political Courage Test. Three things became apparent over the course of the test:
1. The percentage of democrats and republicans agreeing to answer questions never varied more than a few percentage points.
2. The more money a candidate raised, the more ability they had to control their campaign message the less likely they were to provide citizens with issue position specifics.
3. The basic reason a candidate would refuse to provide such information was to avoid opposition research.Here is tiny sample of the reasons they will not provide this basic information every citizen has a right to:
* “Our campaign only filled out issue questionnaires if they came with a campaign donation.” – NC Democrat
* “My consultant asked me why I would want to provide the Project with issues positions that my opponent would see.” – WA Democrat
* “Americans aren’t asking for more information from candidates, they’re asking for less. They don’t want to be troubled.” WA Republican Chairman
* “It is not our job to educate. It is our job to win!” – AZ Democratic National Committee
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7 Responses to “Why Candidates Refuse to Discuss Real Issues”
Excellent points on RealPolitik, the Game as She is Really Played.
Ouch!!!
Why would candidates discuss real issues in any more depth and clarity than they need to? One only has to look at political blogs to see that even those who consider themselves well informed are spending much, much more time talking about the horserace aspect of the campaign than they are to actual discussions of issues. Why not start asking specific questions in the blog posts- let supporters of each candidate explain where they think their candidate stands on the issues? It would be interested to see if people even understand the positions that they think they're supporting.
So much for the “Straight Talk Express”:
McCain Gets the Boot From Project Vote Smart
Rudi, I guess I can see holding him to a higher standard in that regard, but in fairness I'd assume he didn't want to unilaterally commit to filling out the presidential questionnaire when his opponents didn't do so. At least we have McCain's responses to the '04 version for his last Senate race- and I don't think either of the Dems responded to that.
CS – I really do like McCain, but he's been on the groups board as a replacement for Barry Goldwater. While all three candidates ignored the questionnaire, McCain's being a board member sets a higher standard for him in comparison to the Demonocrats. I'm bothered by Obama's ignoring of PVS.
Yep, I was agreeing with you on that. Generally I tend to apply the same standard to all, and to some extent they should all be open to that same criticism- but his membership on their board and then not filling it out sends a message that he thinks it's a good idea as long as it's not politically inconvenient for him. Personally I'd think he'd gain more by just doing it- and then scoring points by showing that the others weren't willing to do so. As I mentioned, his answers to the '04 questionnaire are right there anyway, so it's not like he'd be forced to be more specific on issues than he already has revealed with past answers.