The Reasoning Voter is an insider s look at campaigns candidates media and voters that convincingly argues that voters make informed logical choices Samuel L Popkin analyzes three primary campaigns Carter in 1976 Bush and Reagan in 1980 and Hart Mondale and Jackson in 1984 to arrive at a new model of the way voters sort through commercials and sound bites to choose a candidate Drawing on insights from economics and cognitive psychology he convincingly demonstrates that as trivial as campaigns often appear they provide voters with a surprising amount of information on a candidate s views and skills For all their shortcomings campaigns do matter Professor Popkin has brought V O Key s contention that voters are rational into the media age This book is a useful rebuttal to the cynical view that politics is a wholly contrived business in which unscrupulous operatives manipulate the emotions of distrustful but gullible citizens The reality he shows is both more complex and more hopeful than that David S Broder The Washington Post