The 2008 Presidential Campaign: The Best Reality TV Show Ever?
As you probably know, the 2008 Presidential Election cycle has kicked into full gear, nearly two years before the next President will be sworn in. You’re already paying attention to how much Giuliani has opened up his lead over McCain; wondering if Rommey can make nice with the Christian Conservatives; waiting for Obama’s charisma bubble to burst; taking odds on when Bill Clinton might embarass his wife; mourning the death of the “Vilsack / Aflac” running joke on The Daily Show.
What you might not know is how much everybody else is paying attention to it, as well. On Sunday, George Stephanopoulos reported on an ABC poll that said that nearly two-thirds of the nation is already paying attention to the race.
That’s a pretty amazing number, all things considered, and while the cynic in me might just mark it down to Bush fatigue: that number is pretty close to his disapproval ratings and perhaps by paying attention to the next President, we can pretend that he still isn’t in office. But I think it’s something else.
I think that we, as a country, have now conflated news and entertainment so much, we are looking at the 2008 Presidential Campaign as the biggest and best Reality TV show ever. I don’t think this is such a bad thing, either. And that’s coming from someone who hates Reality TV.
For one thing, we get pretty invested in our Reality TV shows: Tim Goodman didn’t start calling American Idol the “Death Star” of TV programming because it was something that people ignored. On the contrary, love it or loathe it, Idol is the single biggest thing we have going in our post-millennial pop-culture, and you can’t really ignore it.
I say that if we can have Idol-level national conversation about our next election — where the results will actually affect people’s lives — that’s a good thing. This is the first time in most of our lifetimes where there is a totally wide-open race in both major parties, with no absolute slam-dunk candidate and front-loaded primaries, so it’s good that people pay attention to what’s going on now, because we’re going to be making our choices sooner than usual.
Technorati Tags: Reality TV, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Rudolph Giuliani, Mitt Romney, John McCain, Daily Show, American Idol, Tim Goodman
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6 Comment(s) so far
1. The Weekly ‘Loper - March 11, 2007 | Medialoper wrote on March 11th, 2007 at 5:50 pm
[...] The 2008 Presidential Campaign: The Best Reality TV Show Ever? - Possibly, though probably not. [...]
2. Amy wrote on March 12th, 2007 at 9:44 am
The Recent election 2008 polls show that this 2008 election will be the toughest season of Amazing Race ever. Only the strongest will become the ultimate Survivor.
3. ak0412 wrote on April 25th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
I was wondering if any one knows if the details of this reality show have been released. If so, could some one please let me know how I can be directed to viewing them. I would like to know where to send the video and application also.
4. Life : American President- the ‘reality’ tv show i want to see wrote on August 28th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
[...] apparently i’m not the only one with this sort of idea. Posted by sabrina on Tuesday, August 28, 2007, at 10:20:22, and filed under things [...]
5. Who Will Get Joe Strummer’s Vote? | Medialoper wrote on October 16th, 2008 at 8:59 am
[...] a year and a half before Entertainment Weekly said the same thing on their cover) I asked if this campaign was going to be the best reality TV show ever, and I think that it has ended up that [...]
6. What Will I Obsess About Tomorrow? | Medialoper wrote on November 4th, 2008 at 10:32 am
[...] possible that after two nonstop years of this — 20 full months after I first wondered if this election was going to be the best reality series ever — that anybody who would possibly be reading this wouldn’t know the election was [...]