The Rise of the Campaign Documentary

Worth Clicking: Blasts from the past wound Romney

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March 15, 2011

The Rise of the Campaign Documentary

Erin McPike: "Until recently, a campaign book, usually ghost-written, was enough of an introduction for a serious presidential candidate. Then along came documentary filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi and her unlikely hit, Journeys with George -- and just like that, a gauzy documentary became part of a winning candidate's formula."

"And so it is that several 2012 GOP contenders have documentarians hot on their trail this year, including marginal frontrunner Mitt Romney, and his fellow Mormon, Utah governor-turned-ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman."

Of course, the most famous of these documentaries was probably The War Room, which followed Bill Clinton's successful presidential campaign in 1992. And then there's the granddaddy of them all: Primary, on the 1960 John F. Kennedy campaign.

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Taegan D. Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country, including the Washington Post, USA Today, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer and Christian Science Monitor.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

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March 15, 2011