behind the scenes
I found Newsweek’s Secrets of the 2008 Campaign 7-part series of articles really fascinating. The basic gist was that both campaigns allowed behind the scenes access on the condition that the info wasn’t published till after election day. It’s pretty interesting to see the candidates as human and, for the most part, more decent than their advisers and handlers.
Also, there are even some funny parts:
At one point, Mark McKinnon, a media adviser who had worked for Bush-Cheney ’04, described the difference between the Bush campaigns he had worked on and the McCain campaign as the difference between the Royal British Navy and Capt. Jack Sparrow’s ship in “Pirates of the Caribbean.” McCain loved the comparison. He began making guttural pirate noises, punctuating his jokes and one-liners with “Aaarrgh” and occasionally greeting reporters with this oddly cheerful growl. PIRATES FOR MCCAIN T shirts (complete with skull and crossbones) eventually sprouted on the backs of campaign volunteers and even a few reporters.
Start with chapter 1.