ABSTRACT
There are other challenges facing candidates and campaigns: an increasingly disinterested and distant public; local and national television news reporting that gives little attention to campaigns and issues; greater pressure to mount expensive media buys to offset the loss of free media opportunities; a shifting television culture that highlights the sensational, turns news into tabloid fodder, and cheapens public discourse. Thrown into this mix comes the next wave of communication, online, unfettered, and capable of transforming our whole system of communication.
