Political Communication: How Candidates and Elections Are Sold to Us with discussants Joe Tuman, Art Torres, and Ron Nehring. Jerry Lubenow moderates.
Critics assert that U.S. political campaigns have become a wasteland of rhetoric, with cynical ploys replacing civic devotion. In this environment, it is often hard for the voter to tell what the candidate actually stands for and how that candidate may act once in office. As a result, many voters have become turned off to the elections process- The Commonwealth Club of California
Bio
Gerald C. Lubenow
Jerry Lubenow consults on a wide variety of projects for Center on Politics and the Publications Division at the Institute of Governmental Studies. He received his B.A. from Harvard and did graduate work in journalism at the University of Wisconsin. He joined Newsweek as a correspondent in 1965 and served as bureau chief in San Francisco and London from 1969 to 1989. He covered the presidential campaigns of George Wallace, Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Jerry Brown, and Ronald Reagan.
Lubenow received the Gavel Award of the American Bar Association and two Page One Awards from the Newspaper Guild of New York, one for National Reporting and another for News Feature Writing. He is the Editor of California Votes: The 1990 Governor's Race, California Votes: the 1994 Governor's Race, and California Votes: the 1998 Governor's Race.
Ron Nehring
Ron Nehring was elected Chairman of the California Republican Party in February 2007. Since his days as President of his College Republican club almost twenty years ago, Ron Nehring has worked hard to advance Republican ideas and candidates. He managed campaigns for Republican candidates in his home state of New York before moving to Washington DC and working for some of the brightest minds in the Republican Party.
In July 2001, Ron Nehring was unanimously elected Chairman of the Republican Party of San Diego County, one of the largest counties in America. He was re-elected by acclamation three times (2002, 2004, 2006), serving a total of 5 1/2 years as Chairman.
Art Torres
Senator Art Torres (Ret.) was elected Chairman of the California Democratic Party in 1996. He was appointed to finish the term vacated by Bill Press in 1995. He ran unopposed in 2001 and was elected by unanimous approval of the body. Senator Torres is widely credited for helping return the CDP to a position of national prominence and power.
Senator Torres served twenty years in the California State Legislature, eight as an Assembly member and twelve as a State Senator. As Chairman of the Insurance Committee, he fostered a balance between industry and consumer concerns. During his legislative tenure he was also Chairman of the Assembly Health Committee, Senate Joint Committee on Science and Technology and Senate Committee on the Entertainment Industry.
Joe Tuman
Joseph S. Tuman is Professor of Political and Legal Communications in the Department of Communication Studies at San Francisco State University, where he has taught and researched for twenty years.
Having published extensively in the field of political and legal communications, his work includes books such as the critically acclaimed Communicating Terror: The Rhetorical Dimensions of Terrorism (Sage Publications, 2003), and Freedom of Speech in the Marketplace of Ideas (St. Martin's Press, 1997, co-authored with Doug Fraleigh), as well as a large number of articles published in national and international scholarly journals. His newest book is Political Communications in American Campaigns (Sage).