Word: ad
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...campaign of Governor George W. Bush afraid that Steve Forbes will launch a round of attack ads like those that so damaged Bob Dole four years ago? Listen to Bush talk about why we're so cynical about politics. "I believe oftentimes campaigns resort to mud throwing and name calling, and Americans are sick of that kind of campaigning," he says, chatting with an unseen listener. "I'd like to run a campaign that is hopeful and optimistic and very positive." It's a textbook effort at inoculation. If you hear anything bad about me, the ad's subtext says...
Another Bush ad, by far the most striking and unusual of this campaign, reflects an effort at a different kind of inoculation. As a worried little girl wanders around what seems to be an abandoned military base, Bush tells us that "we live in a world of terrorists, madmen and missiles." The girl suddenly disappears, as Bush says that "a dangerous world still requires a sharpened sword." When he promises a "foreign policy with a touch of iron," the girl reappears, reaching out her hand to a uniformed arm. While the ad was produced well before the Governor flunked that...
...ad also aims at defusing the appeal of the Republican candidate whose biography stands in sharpest contrast to Bush's. More than half of Senator John McCain's bio ad details his horrific experience as a Vietnam prisoner of war. There are black-and-white photos of the angry mob that dragged the downed Navy pilot off to 5 1/2 years in prison. There is no reference to policies or programs, only an assertion that McCain has been "taking on the Establishment and defying special interests and never forgetting those heroes with whom he served." (A neat way of referencing...
Look at two Bill Bradley ads, and you can see his entire campaign in microcosm. In one, Bradley sits at a desk, surrounded by a flag, framed photos, an Oval Office-style window in the background. "Wouldn't it be better if we had more than sound bites and photo ops when we were choosing a candidate?" he asks. "I think so. That's why my campaign will try to be different. It'll concentrate on issues, ones that concern you." There's not a single word of substance in the ad. Instead, Bradley is talking about talking about issues...
...Bradley, the "unpolitician," using two Senators in his bio ad? Maybe because polls show most voters still think of him first as a former basketball player--and because he trails far behind Bush and Vice President Al Gore in "leadership" ratings...