The Selling of the President 1968

Another Look at the Nixon Humphrey struggle in presidential politics. This has a great deal to say about the depth to which Richard Nixon was in the pockets of the American commercial interests, and how to present such a flawed man as a saviour of the american way of life. It is a profoundly discouraging book for a progressive.

Deja vu all over again.
Amazing that after 50 years and the disaster that was Nixon that we still buy the packaged politicians image. To wit--45.

A great and primary-source laden account of how Richard Nixon's 1968 campaign used advertising. The specific descriptions of ads and the transcripts of shoots are especially enlightening. Also includes application of media theory. Not much has changed in campaigning, really.

"Wondering if a presidential candidate could be advertised and sold like a car or a can of peas, Joe McGinnis informally joined the Nixon forces at the very early stages of the campaign". Thus began McGinnis' account of Richard Nixon's 1968 campaign, the first in American political history to use the advertising techniques of Madison Avenue. Brightly and clearly told, the book illuminates the point in time which may define the downward turn of campaigning in America.

An excellent report on how presidential politics changed due to mass media and specifically how someone like Richard Nixon could be repacked and rebranded into a marketable presidential product,

Rarely does a book of journalism (covering the 1968 Nixon campaign) become more relevant over time. The Selling of the President covers the dawn of modern marketing in Presidential campaigns; the techniques, the subterfuges, the bypassing of reporters via carefully scripted commericals and staged events. Well worth reading for anyone interested in American politics.

I was reminded of this book recently when it was mentioned in a recent Times Book Review article on campaign books. Read it years ago and it was terrific. Unlike the standard campaign book invented by Theodore White (I devoured all of those books) McGinnis focused on how candidates were marketed. I suspect it would be equally valid today.