mass media and political debates. Those receiving public assistance had come
to be seen not as citizens entitled to help in coping with economic misfortune,
but as a drain on taxes. During the 1990s, these and other conservative ideas
would be embraced almost as fully by President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, as by
Reagan and the Republicans.
The Election of 1988
The 1988 election seemed to show politics sinking to new lows. Television adver-
tisements and media exposés now dominated political campaigns. The race for
the Democratic nomination had hardly begun before the front- runner, Senator
Gary Hart of Colorado, withdrew after a newspaper reported that he had spent
the night at his Washington town house with a woman other than his wife.
Both parties ran negative campaigns. Democrats ridiculed the Republican vice-
presidential nominee, Senator Dan Quayle of Indiana, for factual and linguistic
mistakes. Republicans spread unfounded rumors that Michael Dukakis’s wife
had burned an American flag during the 1960s. The low point of the campaign
came in a Republican television ad depicting the threatening image of Wil-
lie Horton, a black murderer and rapist who had been furloughed from prison
during Dukakis’s term as governor of Massachusetts. Rarely in the modern era
had a major party appealed so blatantly to racial fears.
Although he did not match Reagan’s landslide victory of 1984, Bush
achieved a substantial majority, winning 54 percent of the popular vote. Dem-
ocratic success in retaining control of Congress suggested that an electoral
base existed for a comeback. But this would occur only if the party fashioned
a new appeal to replace traditional liberalism, which had been eclipsed by the
triumph of conservatism.
CHAPTER REVIEW
REVIEW QUESTIONS
- Why were social issues associated with the sexual revolution so contested by all sides?
- What were continuing challenges to the cohesiveness of the Democratic (New Deal) coali-
tion? What were the consequences of those divisions? - What were the main features of Nixon’s policy of “realism” in dealing with China and the
Soviet Union? - Describe the basic events and the larger significance of the Watergate scandal.
How did the Reagan presidency affect American aims at home and abroad?CHAPTER REVIEW ★^1069