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To help kill time before the polls close, we’ve decided to hold our own Super Tuesday contest. Five winners will receive copies of Anything For A Vote: Dirty Tricks, Cheap Shots, and October Surprises in U.S. Presidential Campaigns. Here’s how to play:
1. Use The Wayback Machine to find a nostalgic/quirky/embarrassing political website from a previous election cycle. When leaving your comment, paste the political site’s Wayback Machine URL in the field marked ‘Website.’ (That’s the only way to sneak comments past our anti-spam forces.) Below I’ve listed a few examples.
2. We’ll take screenshots of your suggestions and announce the winners later this week. Our five favorites win the book. We toyed with the idea of letting people vote, but that might be too much democracy for one book giveaway.
Any questions?






Looking forward to seeing what you guys dig up. Don’t feel limited to high-profile elections. If you find a crazy campaign site for a deputy mayor or sophomore class president, point us the way.
Dean for America, 2004!
posted by Martin on 2-5-2008 at 9:55 am
Larry Craig, Idaho’s Senator
2002 re-election
posted by Blake on 2-5-2008 at 10:07 am
Join Arnold!
posted by PJC on 2-5-2008 at 10:09 am
AND WE’RE GOING TO WASHINGTON DC TO TAKE BACK THE WHITE HOUSE! YYYYYYEEEEAAAAAAH!
posted by Ben on 2-5-2008 at 10:09 am
It’s a shame those bobbleheads didn’t sell.
posted by Steve on 2-5-2008 at 10:13 am
Ralph Nader, 2000 Election.
posted by Lauren on 2-5-2008 at 10:26 am
Is it me or is anyone else having trouble with the Wayback machine? I know who I want to look up, but darned if I can remember the URLs.
posted by beth on 2-5-2008 at 10:51 am
Me too, Beth. I keep getting a ‘data retrieval’ error. And, I can’t even get their Alexandria Library mirror site to load at all. There must be a lot of us _flossers. ;-)
posted by Roger on 2-5-2008 at 10:54 am
Sometimes The Wayback Machine needs to rest. I had a few times where it gave up on me, but it always eventually came back to life.
posted by Jason on 2-5-2008 at 10:56 am
the dancing meteorologist?
so happy i don’t live in LA
posted by zaahit on 2-5-2008 at 11:03 am
Clinton/Gore ‘96
Building A Bridge to the 21st Century
Ah, yes. A bridge.
posted by Stephanie on 2-5-2008 at 11:07 am
Lyndon LaRouche in ‘04!
posted by suzanne on 2-5-2008 at 11:10 am
deanXcore 2004! \m/ He’s hXc!
;) I bet there’s a lot of regret in that tattoo…
posted by Ashley on 2-5-2008 at 11:16 am
Hattiesburg, Mississippi City Council 2005 run by Rick James. The signs were stolen constantly (I’ve still got one). Unfortunately, the website is not really available, but a google search turns up lots and lots of stories
posted by Lori on 2-5-2008 at 11:23 am
Lovely Jeb Bush “JEB!” graphics on the one I posted from 2002 gubernatorial campaign.
posted by Kellie on 2-5-2008 at 11:25 am
From the Romney website:
On Abortion Rights
As Governor, Mitt Romney would protect the current pro-choice status quo in Massachusetts. No law would change. The choice to have an abortion is a deeply personal one. Women should be free to choose based on their own beliefs, not the government’s.
Ah, the winds of politics.
posted by Davd on 2-5-2008 at 12:26 pm
This one really *does* go way back, at least in internet terms. Vote for Grandpa Munster!
posted by Roger on 2-5-2008 at 1:11 pm
While my previous post was the ‘official’ site, this one’s better!
posted by Roger on 2-5-2008 at 1:13 pm
Jessie “The Brain” Ventura for Governor!
posted by Silas on 2-5-2008 at 2:21 pm
This one is current- but great!!
posted by Lori on 2-5-2008 at 2:55 pm
A 2006 Wisconsin State Assembly primary runner-up’s site…it’s pretty bad.
posted by Joe G. on 2-5-2008 at 4:04 pm
Aaak! It’s not working!!! Could you extend the deadline?
posted by Ash on 2-5-2008 at 4:15 pm
The Wayback Machine was not working at all for me, but I found a great one otherwise :)
posted by Bethany on 2-5-2008 at 9:01 pm
BTW — It’s WABAC Machine (learned that the hard way after getting WAYBACK as a custom plate for the car).
posted by Bill Smih on 2-6-2008 at 10:32 pm
Boo YAH
2000 Quayle campaign came in 8th in Ames Straw Poll….the most clueless candidate to ever think he had a shot in heck….
posted by Chris Coultas on 2-7-2008 at 1:27 am
(NSFW)
The Wayback wasn’t working for me either, so I poked around to see if any old sites just happened to be around still.
I don’t think 2000 very conservative Republican candidate Gary Bauer would approve of the current use of his campaign’s domain name.
posted by Chris B on 2-8-2008 at 3:46 pm