Because of this I think that this sort of micro-haggling can happen. Instead of offering a broad plan that is ideologically consistent, and then trying to convince the population to go along with that - politicians can turn the knobs of the different constituencies by holding out the carrot that matters to that group of people.

I think voters vote for ideals rather than as a business proposition, and there are polls that back that up. The idea that 47% of the electorate is 'bought' was pretty thoroughly slammed in the media the last couple months.

While I agree that voters vote more based on ideals - I know I do - if there are enough 'business propositions' that go against you, that is most likely going to be an affront to your ideals. If your job relies on corn subsidies, you more than likely agree with the idea of crop subsides, and therefore will vote for the candidate that supports your "ideals".

There are forces counteracting that, you know.

And he was a great candidate facing a pretty mediocre one as an incumbent in a growing economy. It was a perfect storm of circumstance, not a unique moment.

"Dear Candidate, you will have to see people in that part of the country, not because you care, but because our data has shown that a similar visit before was statistically significant enough to matter."

On top of that, this data-driven approach actively undermines any connection by reducing it to a functional one. There isn't even the pretence anymore that the candidate cares for the given group due to intrinsic values or some sort of connection other than statistics.

When has a candidate ever campaigned in a place for any other reason other than an attempt to snag votes? The advent of computer-driven data didn't suddenly steal the innocence out of campaigning.

While I can appreciate there is value to having figureheads around, it's hard for me to look at a system approaching direct democracy and feel that it is worse.

Statistics reflect groups already present or in the process of development, which formed due to previous work (be it a former presidency or the opposition thereof). Giving statistics free reign does not approach direct democracy, because it merely manifests what was already there, or -- if you want to be more dystopian -- they will create through their own precriptions what they define (→ theory effect).

The whole point of holding elections is to find a compromise that works for the majority -- if not most -- of the people, and for that you need a program that then creates groups. If you however campaign solely based on the already existant groups, you will cement the already existing groups (and schisms) without the chance to actually initialise any new group formation processes.

I don't understand direct democracy as a system where the candidate serves merely as an empty canvas on which every individual voter (or group of voters) can project their preconceived opinions without even having to engage in any form of idea-led political discourse.

"Merely manifesting what was already there" is exactly the point of democracy: the majority rules as opposed to some superior-minded entity. Your argument seems to be that representative democracy is better than direct democracy because compromise wouldn't exist without representatives or people wouldn't factionize without them. I find those claims dubious, but we're all entitled to our opinion.

What I think lies beneath your argument is a form of the old classical AI versus statistic AI debate. The classical side asserts that there's not much scientific value in statistical techniques because they don't increase our understanding. The statistical side emphasizes pragmatics and has the best results. Interestingly, even if your side were right, it's going to be (and is already, evidently) steamrolled by the other side simply because they have the results. It doesn't seem impossible to me that there could be something valuable about sharing values with candidates, but the candidate that employed the statistical method better won. As long as that remains the case--in other words, until voters vote based on actual values rather than statistically determined hot-button issues--it's a moot point.

Winning requires all kinds. Sketch out the broad vision, and then do the little data-driven things that can give you a bunch of tiny little edges on the margin. But if it's not close to begin with, no amount of small edges are gonna help you.

A good analogy would be having good architecture and good code quality in a project -- you need both, but no amount of code quality can save a bad architecture.

That doesn't sound completely right to me. Romney's stint at Bain was expected to cost him the presidency (and maybe did) because of the unpopular things he did while there: Fired people and outsourced jobs while making a couple hundred million for himself in the process. Of the many things he's flop-flopped and waffled on, that record isn't one of them. If running for president in a down economy with that around your neck isn't standing behind something unpopular, what is?

Not being able to change his past at Bain, not that he didn't try, isn't a sign of backbone, it's just how 'the past' works.

You clearly have an issue in mind when Obama did this?

> Not being able to change his past at Bain, not that he didn't try, isn't a sign of backbone, it's just how 'the past' works.

By running with this past (it's very much an option not to run), he implicitly ran on a non-flop-floppable platform of "I'm willing to do stuff that's unpopular and will hurt".

* Coming out in support of gay marriage, which has always lost in state ballots.

* Going after Osama bin Laden, on a 50/50 chance, inside a foreign nation who would have every right to shoot down our invading helicopters.

* The auto bailout, which was not popular at the time. It's amazing how easily people forget stuff like this.

1. Gay marriage and the auto bailout are or have been unpopular, but not among Obama's core voting groups. Yes, standing behind those positions will piss off lots of people, but not people who were going to vote for him anyway. The ACA falls under this category as well, in that it wasn't terribly popular, but many on the left didn't like it because it didn't go far enough. No way were they going to vote for Romney because Obama hadn't gone far enough with the ACA.

2. Obama didn't come out in favor of gay marriage until Biden forced his hand, and there's no way he would have. But Biden forced his hand and it turned out well for him in the end.

Obama is just as calculating and concerned about keeping his base happy as any other national politician.

The amount of $$$ spent against "Obamacare" before and after its passing easily numbers in the hundreds of millions of dollars. "Obamacare" is/was considered a defamatory label. The president's Chieff of Staff essentially begged the president not to go through with it. 0.00000000000000000 Republicans ever went on board with it. The whole law wasn't even to go into effect until 2014. Presidents for how many decades have tried and failed to deliver health reform?

There was absolutely no short-term (or even near long-term) political gain to be found in pursuing the law. And if the law didn't pass, the president would be in a much weaker political position.

Even by passing it, the president knew the process would kill any remaining political capital he had left and also hand the House of Representatives to Republicans. That much was not rocket science.

What is amazing is that he chose to pursue it anyway. It's even more amazing that the law passed given all the political and entrenched forces against it.

So, to be clear, the ACA was emphatically not popular in any way. I still remember all the anti-Obamacare ads that showed up on Youtube videos. The law was villified to kingdom come and it would be a tragedy if that fact is forgetten.

1. They protect jobs, but often at a much higher cost than is justified. Admittedly, I don't know the numbers here, but I recall something about the ban on foreign tires protecting US jobs at a cost of $900,000 per job saved.

2. They introduce moral hazard. See our repeated pattern of bank bailouts for examples. If the auto bailout did cause this problem, we won't know about it until much later.

A defining feature of capitalism is competition, which means economic winners and losers. If we protect companies from the need to restructure, even for a noble purpose, we may cause more problems down the road. The auto industry wouldn't have ceased to exist if two companies had gone through bankruptcy. Other automakers and manufacturers would have bought those assets and run them more efficiently. And those other companies are exactly the type you want to be doing this, since they didn't need a bailout in the first place, right?

I don't think the moral hazard argument holds for the auto industry like it does for banks, and the auto industry is strategically critical to have around and in good health. But there are valid arguments that disagree.

The difference is that now, campaigns have access to unprecedented amounts of audience data. But make no mistake, it was all dog and pony back then, too.

No, the contemporary approach is based on a series of tools, such as focus groups, which are a very new phenomenon in politics. The first national campaign where these figured prominently was 1992, I believe. (With e.g. "soccer moms" among the archetypal mini-groups.) Their sophistication increased by leaps and bounds up to the level described in this article. And they are quite game-changing for the nature of politics.

1. His constituents were terrified of the Soviet space program dropping something nasty on their heads, and didn't want to be behind the curve in that arena. 2. His assassination effectively canonized the program. (I think he'd argue my terming that an "advantage.") Cutting it after his death would have been political suicide. Where space exploration often has the same inherent challenge as nuclear power–specifically that the length of any serious endeavor will span several presidents, congresses, senates, to say nothing of economic cycles, (see CxP)–the Apollo program, despite being 2.2% of all federal outlays, had broad support.

There were numerous other factors, but I think those two played a big part in its success.

Perhaps we've already seen it misused on Romney's part: depending on where in the country he was speaking (say, southwest vs. rustbelt) he would take a different tone on the topic of immigration. In the age of instant news, flipflopping like that in the name of "targeting" your audience can have major consequences.

Winning an election through careful attention to the polls simply means you're tailoring your messaging and policies to the opinions of the demographcs that matter most to victor. How is that not "democratic?".

If your complaint is that some demographics matter more than others, then address your criticism to the electoral college, not the strategy picked by the winning candidate.