Gore vs. Bush

The 2000 presidential election pitted Republican George W. Bush against Democratic Vice President Al Gore in a race that will go down in history for its controversial ending. Another historical aspect of the 2000 election is the way in which the two principal candidates, along with some of their third-party competitors, mobilized the power of the World Wide Web to communicate their messages to the voting public. Both the Gore and Bush campaigns used the Web to reinforce and expand upon the messages contained in their television commercials.

On "The Living Room Candidate" website that you have been visiting throughout this Timeline, a link to "The Desktop Candidate" explores some of the multiple ways in which the Web played a role in the 2000 election.

One other intriguing development in the 2000 presidential campaign was the appearance of several websites designed to pick apart the candidates' television advertisements, separating truth from fiction and distortion. Some of these "ad-buster" sites were created by the political parties themselves, whereas others were the efforts of independent organizations to provide a public service to voters.