times are gone for honest men
you hear about how severely negative campaigns can create backlash, backfire, causing more sympathy to the one being attacked than new loyalty to the attacker. i can certainly attest to that - i came home this week to a message on our answering machine. it was from the national republican congressional committee, telling me that i should vote for steve chabot instead of john cranley because john cranley once used an 'obscene gesture' in a city council meeting.
yes. the NRCC just tattled on john cranley. fascinating.
i'm fairly sure most of these party committees rarely speak for the candidates or even reflect their attitudes and values... but they have to realize that they just made me laugh at them and anyone who associates themselves with their party. i'll say again - you make me want to vote for the other guy.
and dems, don't think you aren't to blame, either, i've seen some of the most vicious attack ads from you guys. it's like watching an incredibly awkward argument in a restaurant, and then being asked to choose which person won. it just makes you cringe. doesn't seem to bother anyone, though, and the ads just keep getting worse. what's next?
so i'm excited about the lost room, a miniseries coming out in december on the scifi channel. it's got peter krause from six feet under and julianna marguilies from ER. the story sounds pretty interesting. hey speaking of six feet, they're about to start showing it on Bravo on mondays, if you ever wanted to catch it.
Unfortunately, the reason negative ads continue to air is because they work. Otherwise, campaigns would spend their money elsewhere. I think the "Fake 'W'" add is just embarrassing, but obviously someone thought it would work, and it probably is (considering I remember it).
i don't know... i think there are those that think they work, because they subscribe to the age-old marketing rule that any attention / mindshare is good - there's no such thing as bad publicity, etc. it's a rule still perpetuated in business colleges around the world - and there are far too many caveats to make it a valid rule.
beep beep dot com commercials, for example, are awful and, while the jingle gets stuck in my head, it makes me want to stab people from time warner, not buy their products. i feel like negative political ads fall in the same category.
i guess to an extent it is the reality of american culture. i would love to see stats on their effectiveness from a real study - it really seems that the winners of our elections are not the ones who screwed up least, as those ads would have you believe... it continues to fall to whoever's name shines brightest on the marquee, whoever gets talked about more on entertainment tonight or oprah.