'Star Wars' Strategy: Celebrity and Politics Combine Forces

May 6, 2008 — -- In the week before the Indiana and North Carolina Democratic primaries, supporters of Barack Obama unleashed a force they hoped would prove strong enough to take away Hillary Clinton's momentum.

Their weapon: an Internet parody. The Empire Strikes Barack

Obama's latest dismissals of Clinton's gas-tax holiday and Clinton's insinuations of his elitism are brought to battle in a montage of "Star Wars" lightsaber battles and news conference sound-bites.

While unlikely to help the Obama campaign dramatically change what look to be tight races in those states, the YouTube video does demonstrate how political campaigns have learned that crossing into media coverage where celebrities normally roam means as much as a meet-and-greet on the campaign trail.

Robert Thompson, professor of media and popular culture at Syracuse University in New York and director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television, thinks appearances in media outside of the news cycle are helpful for aspiring presidents.

"The presidential candidates are trying to put together a constituency of voters that will help put them over the top," Thompson said. "It's almost like the old whistle-stops where the presidential candidates got off at every stop and kissed a few babies. The modern day equivalent of the whistle-stop campaign is you do the stops on television."

Of course, politicians in the media are nothing new. Richard Nixon was on "Laugh-In" in the 70's. Bill Clinton played sax for Arsenio Hall. Last election, candidate Howard Dean demonstrated the power of Internet organizing with his campaign.

But today we see impersonators of the candidates pummeling each other on the "WWE" on the night before the Pennsylvania primary. We watch Obama adding Oprah Winfrey and the Obama Girl to his endorsements, and Clinton popping up on "The Tyra Banks Show" for a heart-to-heart. All three candidates have visited late-night shows and "Saturday Night Live" for some self-depreciating comedy.