ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that expressions of dismay over the conduct of presidential campaigns speak to and of American's continuing anxiety about the wisdom, health, and vitality of the experiment with electoral democracy. Appraisals of the conduct of presidential campaigns are often coupled with a resigned acknowledgement that whatever else they are, unscrupulous politics in the form of mudslinging advertisements and heavily stage crafted appearances are "effective." Direct assessments of the public's beliefs about the power of mediated messages also come from recent research on the third-person effect. In a campaign context the same discrepancy between perceptions of media influence on the self and on others appears. First Amendment and other abstract values of free expression notwithstanding, the history of mass media in the United States is replete with demands from various interest groups that certain types of media content be regulated.
