ABSTRACT
Mass campaign media—wholesale politics—were far more important in the recall election than they typically are in statewide campaigns in California. The media are important in any election; they perform the vital role of connecting the voters, issues, and candidates. Tension between the news media and candidate campaigns is inevitable in elections. Each seeks to control the other. Candidates and their consultants seek to manipulate the media to their advantage, with staged events and canned comments. Schwarzenegger’s campaign was particularly successful at going around the mainstream media and directly to the voters, thanks in part to the role played by the nontraditional media of talk radio and the Internet as well as the presence of the entertainment media. The traditional news media covered the race in traditional ways, albeit scrambling to keep up with the campaigns and the TV crews.
