I must be about the only person in the U.S. who enjoys "negative advertising." Even the Democrats' lying ads (video). Because I enjoy the game. I remember in 1988 chuckling at a Democrat ad (fourth one down on the right) called "Crazy" attacking Dan Quayle. It was a brilliant ad. From what I read at the time, too brilliant: nobody got it, apparently.
John Ellis has a typical negative piece on negative ads. He says one billion dollars was spent on negative ads:
According to Advertising Age magazine, the total amount spent this year on political advertising will reach $2 billion, a hefty increase over 2004. If one conservatively estimates that at least half of all political advertising can be fairly described as "negative," then 2006 will be the first year that negative political advertising expenditures reached the $1 billion mark. That's a dollar amount greater than all of the television, radio and print advertising buys done by Anheuser-Busch (estimated by Ad Age to be $919 million) in 2005.
Of course, it's not just the paid-for ads, but the media lives for the gotcha:
What makes our politics so sensationally awful is not just the amount of money spent denigrating the category and the profession, but the equally stunning amount of energy that is expended by party apparatchiks to amplify the negative in news-media coverage of politics. And the news media are only too happy to comply. The truth is they can't get enough of it.
So it's negativity everywhere you look. No wonder people think all politicians are crooks. No wonder only the crassest or most ambitious types want to run. As Ellis says: "The reaction to the onslaught [of negative ads] is aversion; qualified, capable people avoid politics and the political process at all costs, thus diminishing the talent pool."
But if everyone runs "It's morning in America" ads (Reagan's brilliant ad from 1984 [first one, top left]) how will we know who to vote for, where they stand on the issues?
I hate to admit it but AARP has been running some amazing ads and touting their site dontvote.com (of course, AARP doesn't want social security changed, 'cause they'll all be dead by the time it goes broke or their grandchildren have to pay 80% of their income to keep it afloat). But their ads have a point: U.S. elections are about image, not the issues. The "swing voters" are the least informed, least connected voters. And they decide all elections. All advertising is aimed at them. The reason the Dukakis "Crazy" ad failed was swing voters weren't sophisticated enough to get it.
The equivalent would be having people like me vote for the baseball All-Star teams. All I could do is choose the names I recognize because I know very little else about the players because I don't pay attention to baseball.
At least I'm smart enough not to vote for the all star players and I don't have people hounding me that it's my civic duty to do so.
But the bottom line on negative advertising is: it works. Politicians aren't dummies. If it didn't work, they wouldn't do it. You may hate it (and I may chortle at it), but it works.
And I don't know how to fix it. Ban all campaign advertising and only allow debates? Hell, even the debates are only worth the questions asked and they are usually issues important to the media (who moderate the debates). I'd like to see the candidates be able to ask each other questions. I'd like to see partisan party hacks ask questions.
But try to get a ban on advertising past the First Amendment (now that O'Connor has retired).
Well, we get a few days off until the 2008 Presidential election starts up.
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