 POLITICAL PROCESS MATTERS
Mark Newman, a physicist at the University of Michigan, has provided a reconfiguration of the 2008 Presidential Election Map under a variety of lenses. Click through the slideshow hosted by Scientific American.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=electoral-results-maps |
| 1. How does each portrayal provide a different view for how successful Obama’s campaign was? |
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| 2. Which map do you feel portrays the most information about the election? Which map do you think is least useful? |
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| 3. How would the election results differ if we used county level returns to calculate presidential votes instead of using the Electoral College? |
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 POLITICS IS EVERYWHERE
Look through the exit polls from the 2008 presidential election, and compare them to exit polls from previous presidential elections, using the slider bar on the left hand side of the page.
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| 4. How does Obama’s support base differ from Clinton’s in 1996? |
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| 5. How does McCain’s support base differ from Bush’s in 2004? |
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| 6. Why do you think the presidential candidate’s support bases have changed over time? |
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 POLITICS IS CONFLICTUAL
Watch this SlateV clip of negative presidential campaign ads from the past several decades.
Damned Spot: History of Negativity
Produced by SlateV
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| 7. How do you feel about campaigns using negative ads? |
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| 8. Do you think any of the negative ads from the 2008 presidential election were effective? How so? |
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| 9. Should negative campaign ads be regulated? |
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