Bob Garfield Quotes

Downplaying their faults is pretty much the point of campaigns. But we do count on them living with the constant terror of public rejection.

Odious campaigns are a national tradition, and so is complaining about them.

I don't think people in Hawaii like negative ads, whether it's done by an independent group or whether it's done by the campaign itself.

I think sometimes negative campaigning, like so much, is in the eye of the beholder, and I don't think we'll ever get rid of it.

A lot of television stuff is mean-spirited, and I think that's how political advertising got so mean-spirited, to where people are throwing things at the television set every time we have an election.

Mr. Gingrich's injunction represents the worst of American political discourse, which reached a low during the dispiriting presidential campaign of 1988. Then, more than ever before, negative argument displaced reasoned discussion about how a nation might best be governed. The sound bite reigned. Attack commercials flourished. The signs this year aren't any better. Evidence that negative campaigning can come back to sink the sender has had little impact. The races for governor in California and Texas have already seen the same slash and burn. No doubt the proceedings will grow more rabid still as November nears. Negative discourse serves democracy poorly. The temptation to avoid serious debate is already great. It increases as the stakes soar and slander becomes a rewarding, easy option. The issues of the day go untended. The whole affair takes on the character of the gladiator's art. The GOPAC glossary may herald a descent into even lower levels of discourse. It comes blessed by a politician of some influence—the Republican whip in the House—and it is intended for candidates on the state level, many of them presumably running for the first time. Even though Mr. Gingrich himself may not have seen the list before it was mailed, this is a disturbing document. The nakedness of the GOPAC offering also makes it useful. There must be limits to the negative politics that voters will bear; the bald appeal to invective will certainly probe those limits. For now, it should be said that some adjectives in the glossary aptly describe the glossary itself: shallow, sensationalist, and, yes, shame(ful).

Anyone who thinks that negative campaigning is a modern invention has never read the nineteenth century press

I'm not the inventor of negative campaigning, but I'm an ardent practitioner.

The First Law of Politics: Never say anything in a national campaign that anyone might remember.

People really don’t care if politicians attack each other with untrue stories. They figure if you don’t want to get hurt, you shouldn’t have filed for office. They figure whatever happens to us, our lives will be better than theirs.

Let's remember that Bruce Rauner has every interest in getting stories out there that hurt Democrats.

Attack politics costs us dearly in terms of insight into the candidates. In a presidential campaign, the focus is so tight that the politicians are afraid to say anything that hasn't been scripted.

Politics move, as fast as Twitter, and for everyone to think that in four years America was going to be perfect is ridiculous.

What we Americans go through to pick a president is not only crazy and unnecessary but genuinely abusive. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent in a craven, cynical effort to stir up hatred and anger on both sides.

I understand why the Tories will be gunning for Alastair Campbell because they fear his campaigning skills.

I said during the course of the campaign I didn't like it and I don't like the idea of having an opponent's picture on your ads and it would be nice to see candidates sign a pledge like that.

I ran two campaigns for governor in a state that's 2-1 Democrat where I did not mention my opponent in print, radio, or television. I don't know if any other politician at a gubernatorial, congressional, or a senatorial level can make the claim.

Because of President Obama's failed record on nearly every issue from the economy to the deficit to Medicare, the Obama campaign has become increasingly dirty, despicable, and desperate.

There's so much mudslinging going on, and people get so turned off by that. It seems like neither party is aware of that. They're too concerned with blasting each other.

I've never, in my whole 30 years in office, run a negative ad.

The degree to which campaigns have become dominated by marketing is breaking the spirit of democracy, and we're all just so sick of it, across party lines.

Politicians are fond of criticizing others.

The paradox of American democracy has been that its slogan of equal opportunity has meant, often, equal opportunity to get power over your fellows.

Candidates who went into an election with negatives higher than 30 or 40 points just inevitably lost.... Drive up the opposition's negatives.

I no longer wish to take part in this circus of populism ...