It almost worked
beautifully for
George W. Bush in the
primaries for the
2000 U.S. Presidential Election. He
amassed so much
money to
spend on the
election that the
press treated his
nomination for the
Republican Party as a
given, a
foregone conclusion, an
inevitability. As a result, many
Republican voters voted for
Bush...
just because they think he will win. And they want their
vote to
count.
Of course, this didn't stop an election push from John McCain - part of said push coming as a backlash against Dubya's supposed electoral infallibility. And Bush ended up winning the Republican nomination for the White House after a fierce battle for South Carolina, where the Bush underlings ran a massive smear campaign on McCain (all seperate from Bush himself, of course, to keep his 'unity' rhetoric intact).
Skip ahead to the Florida showdown - the fight for the 25 electors there that would decide the Presidency. Part of Bush's strategy there was, again, to project the air of inevitability - no, no, a recount won't matter, the vote has been certified twice, Dubya's the winner of the election, no foolin'. I'm noding this addendum in December of 2000, so it's still way too soon to say if this strategy worked as was planned, or if even any part of the massive PR battle that went over the airwaves daily made a lick of difference (and I shouldn't be the one to say, since I'm biased against Bush).