Barack Obama is about to launch this new ad during Olympics telecasts.
At last, the universe is as it should be. Two new ads for the Olympics from the two campaigns. And this time, they're both positive! Sort of.
Meanwhile, outside the high-profile Olympics telecasts, the campaigns are down with negative ads, with many of Obama's in the weeds, showing up unheralded in various battleground states.
For the unprecedented Olympics ad buys (both campaigns are spending about $6 million), Obama started out positive and uplifting -- as befits the positive uplift of the Olympics media environment -- with an ad extolling his vision for a new energy economy. He's about to change it out for another new ad, also very positive, positioning him as the champion of middle class economic concerns and aspirations. Showing people building a house.
McCain, as I noted at the beginning of the week, went in, well, a different direction. With a negative ad. Which kind of stuck out, as the only negative advertising in, well, the history of Olympic telecasts. On the familiar sneering "celebrity" theme. Which worked in holding Obama back in the polls after his spectacular tour of the Middle East and Europe. Yet seemed out of place for the Olympics.
This is John McCain's new Olympics ad.
But suddenly, on Wednesday night, Team McCain had a new ad up. A positive ad. Of a sort. My readers on New West Notes caught it and noted that, as positive ads go, it's pretty dour.
It's an ad the campaign touted to the media not this week but last week, an ad I'm sure the senator liked very much, casting him as "the original maverick." But it turns out that, according to tracking services, it hardly ran last week at all as an actual ad.
What it was then was bait for the media. And fodder for the McCain pushback against the idea his campaign is all about attacking Obama. Of course, the reason why McCain is competitive with Obama in this generally very bad year for Republicans is that his campaign is devoting itself to tearing down the young Illinois senator.
What it is now is a positive ad for the Olympics, replacing the only negative ad in Olympics history.
The ad is much more appropriate for the Olympics media environment. But it's still on the dark side, as you can tell from the title, which is "Broken." It starts off with foreboding music and stark black-and-white photos, proclaiming: "Washington's broken. John McCain knows it. We're worse off than we were four years ago."
Then it switches to color.
"Only McCain has taken on Big Tobacco, drug companies, fought corruption in both parties. He'll reform Wall Street, battle Big Oil, make America prosper again. He is the original maverick." (As "THE ORIGINAL MAVERICK" flashes onscreen with McCain walking up an airplane ramp, like the president.) "One is ready to lead. McCain."
It's an interesting ad, with some intriguing contradictions. The president during these bad last four years is McCain's biggest fundraiser. And, for example, it would be hard to say he's battling Big Oil after he adopted the oil industry's agenda just a couple of months ago.
But, despite its dark overtones, it does more naturally fit into the Olympics environment. And it is more in tune with the overall national mood than Obama's more sprightly efforts. It just may not be right for that media context.
We're seeing the high water mark of McCain's ability to compete with Obama on the air. McCain raised $27 million in July, his best month yet, though he still raises less than Obama. (The previous month had been McCain's best to date. With $21 million to Obama's $52 million.) He has $21 million left and continues to raise money in August. He must spend everything he has before the end of the Republican national convention early next month, because he's agreed to take $84 million in public financing for the general election. But there is a wild card. The Republican National Committee has a lot more than its Democratic counterpart.
Now, let's not pretend that Obama is all sweetness and light and "Yes we can" positive uplift. Not in the least. He is running a ton of negative ads against McCain, rather under the radar, many of them state-specific.
Obama is, after all, while a Honolulu native, a Chicago guy now. And it ain't the "Summer of Love" in the Windy City.
But he does want to preserve his positive, good-guy brand while Team McCain flies candidly in the face of his previous practices.
Here's Obama's latest attack ad running in most of the battleground states.
Barack Obama's new attack ad.
And here are some of Obama's stealthier state-specific attack ads. There is a Nevada ad attacking McCain for backing the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. There is an Indiana ad juxtaposing people talking about their tough economic times with McCain extolling the economy earlier in the year. There is an Ohio ad attacking McCain for helping with a corporate takeover there that is costing thousands of jobs. The Indiana ad may be running outside Indiana. (The campaign won't say where.) There may be more.
Here's the ad pounding McCain for talking up the economy while real people are hurting.
Barack Obama's Indiana attack ad.
Here's the ad pounding McCain for supporting the proposed nuclear waste repository in Nevada while saying that he wouldn't want nuclear waste transported in Arizona.
Barack Obama's Nevada attack ad.
And let's continue on this note of uplift with McCain's new attack ad in battleground states, hitting Obama as a guy who will raise your taxes and gas prices.
John McCain's new attack ad.
Enough.
When do the Olympics start up again?
Want to reply to a comment? Hint: Click "Reply" at the bottom of the comment; after being approved your comment will appear directly underneath the comment you replied to
I'm worried that people actually think that milk, bread, and eggs are the essentials. No wonder we're such a nation of fatsos.
Aren't we lactose-intolerant?
Not so sure that milk and eggs are that good for you ...
McCain and HIS advisors do absolutely nothing "in original form". The RNC will wait to announce the VP. They will wait to attack (with ads) after stump appearances. They will wait to issue their own platforms in an attempt to compare.
How many times will the RNC say ---- "OOPS"?
McCain's campaign, as I've been pointing out, is based on tearing down Obama.
This is obvious.
Well, Yeah. The Republican convention is AFTER the Democratic convention.
I love the state-specific ads...SURELY Team Obama is cooking up a national ad using McCain's "What Did He Just Say...?" comment that "Nations don't invade other nations in the 21st century" as a prime example of McCain NOT being ready to lead...
(NOTE TO TEAM OBAMA : Please use sound effect of needle scratching across record after McCain's statement...for me)!
Presumably. But by focusing the negative narrative on McCain down in the weeds rather than in the overall, Obama risks allowing McCain to set the tone of the election.
McCain IS setting the tone of the election.
Obama's using the smart two-tiered strategy of national positive and local negative. By finding very SPECIFIC painpoints in very targeted areas, Obama's negative ads will seem less negative and more spot on. People mainly see and react critically to negative ads when they don't have a vested interest in the issue. On the other hand, when the issue strikes a nerve and hits home with the viewer, it really blunts the "edginess" of negativity.
For example, the Yucca Mountain commercial, run nationally, would make A LOT of people view the ad as negative because most people nationally don't care about that issue. It would also fit in with McCain's national attack on Obama about saying "no" to nuclear, so it would be seen as overall negative for Obama. By going right at the people who see it as a painpoint, he risks much less blowback. Similarly, the DHL ad wouldn't register with many folks nationwide, but it WILL strike a chord in Ohio, eastern Indiana, and potentially Michigan and Pennsylvania. I'm also waiting for alternative energy, especially biofuels and windpower, to run in Iowa and Indiana with a direct slap at McCain's disdain for biofuel "subsidies."
Brilliant. just brilliant.
Perhaps. But the election is actually quite close. McCain is hanging with Obama.
I thought James Garner was the original Maverick.
James Garner would have made a fine President. :)
I like Jodie Foster's "Maverick."
Yes, McCain knows Washington is broken. It didn't happen just yesterday and I wonder whether he's just noticed or just hasn't been able to 'fix' anything for the past 26 years? I like the Obama Campaign's rifle approach to TV advertising. 'General' ads are 'nice' but being specific is much stronger. I thought the Olympic ads were fine, but I don't know how many people actually paid attention.
I wish the race wasn't so close.
What I love about the O campaign, and they did this in the primaries, is the pin-point precision with which they go after their opponent.
In the primaries, they went after specific counties for delegates; in the general they're taking the fight right down into the weeds targeting a specific group of people..
This is the kind of commander in chief I want. Not some bozo who goes after everything with a flamethrower.
As it happens, "bozo" is doing much better in the election than he should be, given the overall environment.
>This is the kind of commander in chief I want. Not some bozo who goes after everything with a flamethrower.
I think it's wrong to call Obama's ads that mention Mc-Same "attack" ads. McB--- uses a lot of false info to smear O. I don't see where O does that. How are the 2 equal if O is actually using footage of Mc-Same to reveal who he is?
I call them attack ads because they are attacks. They fit the definition of the world "attack." They may be accurate or not, but accuracy is not the standard for the classification.
That's right.
If I attack you with a true statement you don't like and is hurtful, it's still an attack.
Attacks are attacks, true or false.
I don't think it is un-Christian to defend yourself, especially if it is done with honesty and integrity.
McCain's new attack ad is strong.
But isn't it a lie to say Obama would raise our taxes?
I thought that was all debunked.
It's inaccurate. Apparently Obama once voted for a Democratic budget alternative which included a tax hike that might affect some middle class folks. That's not his program, of course.
I hate politics sometimes.
I guess Obama's Nevada attack ad works in Nevada.
Is he ahead there yet?
Posted August 15, 2008 | 02:22 PM (EST)