POLS 125 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Opinion Poll
20 Mar 2020
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Trump capitalizes on people"s dislike of congress with us versus them rhetoric. Most incumbents get reelected, with the rate of reelection in the house around 90: despite disliking congress, people like their own member. Candidates centered elections allows candidates to escape accountability for what the party and congress do overall. Congresspeople face three goals: (1) getting elected (2) achieving influence (3) making good public policy: when congress writes its own rules and procedures they"re going to put their need to get reelected first. Throughout most of us history congressional elections were party centered: since wwii, campaigns have become candidate centered. Centered around images that are largely independent of the party (1) personal narratives dominate over party labels. President is elected every four years by the electoral college. House is elected in its entirety every two years by votes within each district.
