Greta Van Susteren Quotes
No candidate dares to look for a new campaign model that could really enhance the democratic process. Instead we are left with the current one which makes our candidates look like hucksters.
Van Susteren, Greta. "Campaign Models." GretaWire, Fox News, 2012.
Also used in his Message to Congress, May 25, 1967
This is a fascinating quotation because it illustrates how political attitudes have changed since then. Stevenson meant this to be an insult to and even a charge against the men who ran the Eisenhower administration and campaign but not the President personally. And that was the way that it was taken. Republicans were insulted and thought this was a scurrilous charge by a candidate who was down in the polls but wanted to throw “red meat” to his base. However, when we read the statement today, it doesn’t seem at all like an insult. As a matter of fact, there are few politicians today, of either party, who would not agree with the views that Stevenson accuses the Republican strategists of having. Arguably, the Democrats were historically very slow to arrive at he place the Republicans had achieved. But in 1956 it was almost unethical to use shows and advertising techniques to manipulate public opinion. Politicians had been doing it since the beginning of our Republic but it used to be something a little dirty—something to which no one wanted to public admit believing. Today, politicians of both parties are often criticized by their base and the pundits for not believing sufficiently in the importance of image manipulation and advertising. Today, virtually no politicians have any moral scruples about using the techniques, doing so overtly and being proud of their staffs for being good at it.
Greta Conway Van Susteren is an American commentator, lawyer, and former television news anchor for CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. She hosted Fox News's On the Record w/ Greta Van Susteren for 14 years (2002–2016) before departing for MSNBC, where she hosted For the Record with Greta for roughly six months in 2017. A former criminal defense and civil trial lawyer, she appeared as a legal analyst on CNN co-hosting Burden of Proof with Roger Cossack from 1994 to 2002, playing defense attorney to Cossack's prosecutor. In 2016, she was listed as the 94th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes, up from 99th in 2015.
