ELECTILE DYSFUNCTION: INSIDE THE BUSINESS OF AMERICAN CAMPAIGNS tells the story of how bad government happens to good people. Using interviews with noted luminaries such as campaign consultant Joe Trippi, Senator Arlen Specter, 2008 presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, former Governor Christine Todd Whitman, actor Elliott Gould, Clinton advisor Sidney Blumenthal, White House correspondent Helen Thomas, Senator John Kerry and Senator John McCain, the documentary explores the marketing of American political candidates. With the right sales approach, using highly proven techniques and experienced teams of operatives, even the most inept of aspirants has a legitimate chance of winning or keeping office.

Between a candidate’s ambition to hold or win office and the voters’ yearning for leadership that represents their hopes and ideals comes the political campaign. What is pitched as a vision for leadership is really an advertising campaign created by consultants who craft a contender’s image through speeches, spin, advertising, media relations and strategy. These highly paid wizards of manipulation will work hard to focus the public’s attention on superficial reasons to vote for their candidate and away from the real implications of their policy proposals.

The speeches that candidates deliver are carefully crafted long sales pitches that are designed to hit the audience’s hot buttons in order to engage them. Comedian, and occasional political speech writer, Bruce Vilanch describes how the same speech wouldn’t fit two different politicians, just as “you wouldn’t put Raquel Welch in the same dress as Janet Reno - they are both equally as tall but you just wouldn’t put them in the same dress.”

When new facts emerge in the course of a campaign, the spinmeisters go to work. The meaning of any news story is up for debate and the job of the campaign is to make sure the public interprets those stories in the way that’s most advantageous to their candidate.

In the heat of an upcoming election, people who promote the campaign’s point of view appear regularly and in all sorts of venues, from churches to television programs to your front door. These surrogates can deliver messages the candidate can’t deliver him or herself in ways and/or with credibility that the campaign, itself, can’t. Sree Sreenivasan, Professor of New Media at Columbia University highlights how the harshest attacks against their opponent campaigns are often made through surrogates in order to keep a candidate from appearing tawdry.

The press, meanwhile, tries to build their audience by wasting ink telling them which candidate is ahead in the polls and not where they stand on the issues. Television devotes minimal time to covering politics, while the stations reap extortionate rates for their commercials. The print media, under the crunch of deadlines and declining circulation, write stories on the conflicts instead of the substance of the candidates’ proposals.

Former New York Times editor Gene Roberts says that readers prefer horserace coverage to real issues with political candidates and that newspapers have become the victim of corporations and consolidation.

Syndicated sex columnist Dan Savage points out that the press is too afraid of being accused of bias to take a position on the truth of charges and counter charges from either side.

Many of the problems with finding political coverage on television can be traced to the 1980’s emphasis on deregulation of television stations. Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich says the airwaves “are supposed to reflect the public interest, convenience and necessity” but the TV networks are no longer concerned about that due to deregulation.

With the large amount of TV viewers receiving poor, if any, coverage of races, advertising becomes the primary way that most voters get information about the candidates.

Campaign consultant Mark Moskowitz says that repetition of these ads on TV is the key to changing a voter’s allegiance. And while most people say that negative advertising turns them off to a candidate, it’s the negative messages that are memorable and effective tools to reach a campaign’s goals. Campaign consultant Neil Oxman talks about how negative advertising is used to suppress the vote.

When candidates have a hidden agenda or serve a special interest that would be unpopular if revealed to the voters, they sometimes resort to the BIG LIE. The Big Lie is a cover story, entirely fictitious, that can seem plausible and can appeal to an interest the voter actually has.

Throughout, the film tracks the most watched senate race in the country – between the highly conservative Republican incumbent, Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum and Democratic challenger Bob Casey, Jr. to illustrate the dynamics of a well-run competitive race.

Includes scenes from the campaign trail featuring Senator Barack Obama, Senator John Edwards, Representative Nancy Pelosi and Former Vice President Al Gore.