No Way to Pick a President

November 1, 1999
A syndicated columnist for the Baltimore Sun since 1981, Witcover (The Year the Dream Died, etc.) began covering presidential elections in 1952. His critique of the state of American presidential campaigns touches all the familiar maladies: soft money, the triumph of the sound bite and the visual image over sustained argument, "gotcha" journalism and, above all, the rise of a class of professional political handlers that strips presidential politics of meaningful ideological content. Happily for readers, Witcover brings to the table more knowledge of how politics works today and how it worked in the past than the average dyspeptic citizen or pundit. The story he tells is full of irony as well as mendacity: he provides an excellent explanation of how the primary system, originally intended as a reform to empower ordinary people, has in fact made the nomination process more beholden to big money. Among the many reforms Witcover advocates is abolition of the electoral college. His most radical suggestion, borrowed from John Deardorff (one of many professionals whose effects on the system Witcover laments, but whose insight he rightly values), is to ban paid TV advertising after the conventions, the rationale being that the candidates are well known by then and the only purpose ads serve is to smear an opponent. Witcover, citing public apathy in a time of prosperity, is not optimistic that meaningful reform will occur anytime soon. In an ideal world, his sophisticated analysis and creative proposals would be enough to make a dent in that apathy.