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              Development of technologies affected the majority of the aspects of our lives. Politics and its appearance for the society were shifted by extremely frequent usage of social media, the emergence of television and radio. As the history shows media's impact on politics and especially on the election races was crucial. According to the article "US elections 2012: is Facebook 'the real presidential swing state'?", the famous television debate between Ronald Reagan and J.F. Kennedy was one of the first examples of how important and influential appeared to be the role of television. As it is stated by The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History: "The debates made Kennedy look like a winner. His practice of looking at the camera when answering the questions—and not at the journalists who asked them, as Nixon did—made viewers see him as someone who was talking directly to them and who gave them straight answers." Furthermore, the display of Kennedy on media assured the society that he is an intelligent and trustworthy candidate. The media impact on the elections' results is undeniable and has to be taken into serious considerations. 

              Previous US 2012 presidential elections were named as the first internet based elections. The win of Barack Obama serves as a proof of social media's power. According to Dr. Pamela Rutledge, The 2012 Obama's presidential campaign was focused on such social media outlets as Twitter and Facebook. The campaign was built on the most used forms of communication, which is social media networking. It has played a crucial role in the elections because it is important to communicate with people through the most accessible outlet. Therefore, in comparison of Obama and Romney’s campaigns, the usage of Facebook and Twitter was much higher for the current US president. Moreover, it is important to highlight that media and social media, in particular, are predominant aspects of our lives.  As the author of the "How Obama Won the Social Media Battle in the 2012 Presidential Campaign" article states: "Social media creates a new political dialogue.  It takes the power of political messaging away from the mass media model and places it firmly into peer-to-peer, public discourse." Barack Obama's team effectively used the social media triggers. To illustrate, the study by Pew Research Center claims that Obama’s social media profiles had 4 times more posts than it had Romney’s profiles. For today, social media market acquired more tools for posting and spreading information. Snapchat, Instagram and other photo and video based applications make the society be more dependent on social media, and therefore, create a new way for politicians to reach more and more people.  

The current events that are connected to the US presidential elections prove that social media matters in the modern world. One of the most popular candidates on social media websites gains more and more votes during this poll race. Donald Trump, the billionaire, and businessman, is being criticized for his extravagant claims and attitude. However, he is leading in the states like Nevada, Virginia, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee and many others (Smith, 2016).  The simple comparison of the social media frequency usage and votes leads to the simple conclusion that social media is a powerful outlet and denying to post and share will play a bad joke to the candidates. Moreover, the flow of the candidate's posts has to be carefully analyzed in order to be an objective voter and do not take quantity for quality.            

Works Cited

 Smith, A. (2016, February 22). Polls show Donald Trump dominating everywhere. Retrieved May 01, 2016, from http://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-polls-states-super-tuesday-2016-2

 Pew Research Center: Journalism & Media staff. (2012, August 15). How the Presidential Candidates Use the Web and Social Media. Retrieved May 01, 2016, from http://www.journalism.org/2012/08/15/how-presidential-candidates-use-web-and-social-media/ 

 The Great Debate: Kennedy, Nixon, and Television in the 1960 Race for the Presidency. (n.d.). Retrieved May 01, 2016, from https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-by-era/sixties/essays/great-debate-kennedy-nixon-and-television-1960-race-for-presidency 

 Rutledge, P. (2013, January 25). How Obama Won the Social Media Battle in the 2012 Presidential Campaign. Retrieved May 01, 2016, from http://mprcenter.org/blog/2013/01/how-obama-won-the-social-media-battle-in-the-2012-presidential-campaign/