So how do the parties shape up?
The author disputes this by arguing that conventions let the parties shape their images and platforms.
Throughout Europe, xenophobic and racist parties shape the agenda, preying on people's ignorance and fear.
This general election will not be won and lost at the national level, as such contests normally were in the second half of the 20th century, when there was a standard Conservative-Labour battle in most constituencies, and when a broadly uniform national swing between the big two parties shaped the final verdict.
As if to prove his point, polls today both reflect public opinion and are used to test policies and messages that help political parties shape that very same public opinion.
The remaining members of the gang of four, and more disinterested politicians and historians, have long argued that the SDP's ideas – such as the "classless society" and "more responsive public services" called for in the Limehouse declaration – outlived the party, shaping the Lib Dems, New Labour, even the Conservatives.
To debate: At the Washington Post, Dan Balz asks: Will the 2012 G.O.P. Presidential nominee re-shape the Republican Party or will the party shape the candidate?
Theoretically, I address how electoral threats to the ruling party shape the incentives of politicians to deliver benefits to core and non-core interest organizations.
But even if they are not tested in office, the far-right parties are shaping policy-making and setting the agenda across much of Europe.
The campaign stops provided a window into how both men, should they become the nominees of their respective parties, are shaping their candidacies, employing the power of their biographies and honing their arguments in their appeal to voters.
