Sound Bites of the 1908 Presidential Candidates

roncosmos writes "Science News has up a feature on the first use of sound recording in a presidential campaign. In 1908, for the first time, presidential candidates recorded their voices on wax cylinders. Their voices could be brought into the home for 35 cents, equivalent to about $8 now. In that pre-radio era, this was the only way, short of hearing a speech at a whistle stop, that you could hear the candidates. The story includes audio recordings from the 1908 candidates, William Jennings Bryan and William Howard Taft. Bryan's speech, on bank failures, seems sadly prescient now. Taft's, on the progress of the Negro, sounds condescending to modern ears but was progressive at the time. There are great images from the campaign; lots of fun."

Comments

Re:Can't listen, Flash only

[Munk]

They are MP3s. Listen to them directly

http://www.sciencenews.org/sounds/files/bryan_guarantee_of_deposits.mp3

http://www.sciencenews.org/sounds/files/taft_rights_and_progress_of_the_negro.mp3

Banking and Democrat Change

[Orne]

The problem is that the people who were supposed to oversee Fannie Mae are the same people that are now supporting a certain Democrat candidate for president, and it would not be beneficial for the media to expose those relationships to the public-at-large until after the election.

• Jamie Gorelick, on the board of Fannie Mae, received > $75 million in bonuses when the company was "doing well"; she is now assisting Obama's campaign. Investigation would reveal that FM was "cooking the books" in order to pump up executive bonuses.
• Barney Frank, served on the House Banking Committee, and stopped many legislation attempts to regulate Fannie Mae.
• Frank Raines, former Fannie Mae executive and Clinton budget directory, received preferentially lower interest rates on personal loans. He is now advising the Obama campaign.
• Democratic Congressional Black Caucus, who was praised by Fannie Mae's CEO Daniel Mudd for passing beneficial legislation, in the name of loosening regulations allowing people with poor credit scores to overextend themselves with home loans. We know today how that turned out.

I don't understand how the Enron Trial is on the tip of everyone's tongue, but the media isn't calling to put these banking executive in jail for a fraud that is 10x worse!

Re:Banking and Democrat Change

[mathmathrevolution]

You're so full of misinformation. Barney Frank was the one who passed regulations on Freddie & Fannie. In July 2007 Frank became chairman and he and the Democrats passed regulations within two months. These regulations had been blocked by the house Republicans since 1994.

It's incredible that the Republicans claim the big mean Democrats prevented them from instituting a proper regulatory framework despite over a decade of Republican majorities in the House and Senate.