When you commit to writing a book, you find out the experience is lonely. Fortunately, I had an excellent support team that made the experience a bit less isolating. I want to thank Dr. Melissa Hernandez-Katz, who convinced me my voice was important enough to write a book. Dr. Helen McCourt whose “Go, Janet!” texts made me smile and motivated me to keep moving forward.

I remember entering my elementary school library to visit my mom working the polls in the 1980 presidential election. Ronald Reagan ran against incumbent President Jimmy Carter. My mom and my neighbor discussed how they were not allowed to eat peanuts because that could be perceived as an endorsement for President Carter, a former peanut farmer. I still remember a classmate stating Reagan would...

In March 2008, three presidential candidates dominated the American political primaries. Of the three, Barack Obama connected to voters using new media more successfully than Hillary Clinton or John McCain. Online fundraising is one way to measure if a political candidate’s message is compelling. Using new media1~1. “New media,” according to the Oxford Dictionary, is any new mass communications. resources, Obama raised nearly $750 million in campaign contributions, which exceeded John McCain’s by more than 30...

Aristotle, in his work Politics, explains, “Man is more of a political animal . . . Endowed with the gift of speech.”1~1. Aristotle, “Rhetoric,” in The Basic Works of Aristotle, ed. Richard...

The beginning of Barack Obama’s influence on running a multimedia presidential campaign started when the then-senator announced his run for the presidency in February 2007 at the Old State Capitol in Springfield,...

“Rhetoric” is a word that news media haphazardly uses in political coverage during campaign season. More often than not, when political pundits discuss the rhetoric that a candidate uses, the candidate is perceived as negatively persuading the electorate. Most people, if asked their perceptions of the term “rhetoric,” might describe rhetoric as deceptive, manipulative, and...

Presidential elections are one of the oldest American...

In April 2015, Hillary Clinton announced her second run for the presidency, and she made her announcement via social media:

In The Art of the Deal, Donald Trump says, “Sometimes it pays to be a little wild.”1~1. Donald Trump and Tony Schwartz, The Art of the Deal (New York: Ballantine Books: 1987), 5. Trump published The...

This book’s central thesis is as media evolved, so has presidential campaign rhetoric. U.S. presidential candidates adapted their rhetorical performances for new media. Some presidential candidates failed at using media to persuade, like Al Smith and Hillary Clinton. In contrast, other presidential candidates revolutionized the presidential media campaign, as did Franklin D. Roosevelt and...

Dr. Janet Johnson is a lecturer at the University of Texas at Dallas. She brings over twenty years of experience in media and strategic communications. Her research passion is media in the political process, especially how social media is changing political rhetoric. Through her research, she seeks to provide professional communicators with a deeper understanding of how effective and...

This series encourages focused work examining the role and function of communication in the realm of politics including campaigns and elections, media, and political institutions.