Negative Campaign Ads

The BBQ Pit
1

It’s election season, and where in the Bay State it looks like Kerry Healey, our current lt. governor and Republican gubenatorial nominee Kerry Healey is getting increasingly desparate. Now, I’m not on top of the latest polls, but last I heard that Democratic candidate Deval Patrick was edging into “dead girl or live Mark Foley” territory. It’s understandable. Massachusetts is among the bluest of the blue states, and Bush has poisoned the entire GOP. Plus, Healy was a silent second-in-command to a governor that was more interested in getting the republican nomination for presidnet than governing the state. But Healy’s got tons of money.

Now, before I share what she’s been spending it on, let me say that there is a place for negative campaigning. A candidate should be called to defend his record and policies. But there’s that… And then there’s this.

:confused:

What?!?

Yes, we do! He was a defense attorney. That’s what they do. They’re an essential part of a free society. Even cop-killers have rights under the law, and one of them is the right to consel by people like Deval Patrick! My God, are you really suggesting that defense attorneys condone the crimes of their clients? That Patrick is going to pardon all cop-killers in MA prisons? That defense attorneys (again, essential components in democracy) should be pariahs for public service? Or do you think we’re just stupid?

I’ve seldom seen a dumber political ad. It’s not like Patrick is a perfect candidate. He’s a liberal Democrat that has promised to raise spending and not lower taxes. And it’s a Democratic legislature, so he’ll likely get what he asked for. He’s vulnerable! That’s a valid point! MA voters *like *a split state government! Hammer that home!

But the fact that he was once a successful defense attorney? Come on. It’s not like he doesn’t have a perfect answer to that charge either.

From Patrick’s site:

When, in rebutting your negative ads, your opponent gets to mention a piece of his personal history that’s absolutely awesome, you’ve made a bad ad.

But let’s not make this all about Healey. What stupid and/or outrageous negative ads have you seen this season?

2

I live in DC and there is a pretty heated senatorial race in Virginia (Senator Allen of macaca/nigger fame is up for re-election). He is still leading the polls but he has gone from something like almnost unanimous to about 55%. The Democrats aren’t running very many positive ads, they attack his voting record (tax cuts for the rich, Iraq), his party (Bush), his character (he was a racist 30 years ago in college and is probably at least slightly racist today). The senatorial campaign in Maryland isn’t much better, there is a black Republican candidate that doesn’t have much hope of winning to begin with but his race is giving him a snowball’s chance. He is getting trashed for being too aligned with Bush. I see a lot of ads linking Bush to Republican candidates and republicans spending a lot of time denying this connection.

It looks like the entire Republican party is going to take a drubbing here because of their (until recently) unquestioning support for Bush.

3

There’s the negative ads by Patrick himself. There was the one where… um, then there was… but let’s not forget…

Huh, a cadidate who is taking the high ground? Sounds like someone who gets my vote.

4

I have the questionable fortune of receiving Detroit network affiliates in my cable package, giving me the unmitigated pleasure of watching gubenatorial candidates DeVos and Granholm snipe at each other endlessly. I’m in Saskatchewan. I don’t give a flying fuck whether DeVos owns a factory in China (though personally, and this may be just me, I’m not sure I’d want the CEO of the largest pyramid scheme in existence as a political leader - but none of the anti-DeVos ads even go after that point). Hell, I don’t even know why the clip of Granholm saying, “And in five years, you’re going to be blown away,” is supposed to be incriminating, but I’ve seen it so often I hear it in my sleep. Can you guys hold the fucking election already? I just want to watch Lost.

5

There’s the one where he gently criticizes his opponent for running so many negative ads. :wink:

6

Study the insidious phrasing of that snippet. What does the word “one” refer back to? On first hearing, doesn’t it seem to equate “one” with “admitted cop killers” rather than “lawyers”?

I wouldn’t have voted for Healey anyway, but this just disgusts me.

7

Here in Iowa, I am getting repeated spam voice mail messages from one candidate trashing the Democratic candidate (Boswell). I was planning to vote for Boswell anyway, but the opposition spamming my phone really only cements my resolve.

8

I have seen the ad in question in the OP (We get the Boston ABC Affiliate)

That attack ad was really screw and writing it down doesn’t do justice as to how it portrays the candidate in question… but I’ll try.

After going on and on about a Cop Killer the ad (with the written graphics matching what the narrator is droning on about) suddenly brings in teh candidate in question with his picture along side the nasty old cop killer.

Then against black are the words
“While lawyers have the right to defend admitted cop killers”,

Heavy long pause followed by

“do we really want one for governor?”

Say the sentence aloud and ask yourself what is the “one” we don’t want want in office.

The ad by its wording makes it sound like the candidate is the Cop Killer not the lawyer.

I was stunned the first time I saw this. I usually don’t see too many American election ads and I was pretty blown away by this one.

9

Is that what those calls are? I haven’t picked up the phone in weeks.

One of our candidates is running an ad that says his opponent wants to repeal English as Iowa’s official language. I didn’t know we had an official language. I suppose there might be something on the books from way back that says official documents should be printed in English. But the ads imply that we’ll all be forced to speak Spanish. (They do stick some French in there too though.) :rolleyes:

Some of these ads are very anti-immigrant, meaning anti-Mexican, which I hope will backfire. Don’t they know they’re losing the Mexican-American vote?

At least the early ads about “hands in the cookie jar” and “raiding pension funds” have stopped running.

I’m so disgusted, I’m tempted not to vote for any of them.

10

Absolutely. I have to parse this out in my head for a few seconds before I get what they mean. No matter how many times I’ve seen the ad.

I should say, however, that negative ads were not invented just this year. I remember one in which a slimy bum popped out of a manhole, and said something like “Let’s elect the Democrats, then we can bring back all the sewers!” Even at my young age I remember thinking how not only adversarial, but stupid, that was. That was in 1972.

11

One of the ads (the one to the tune of “Jingle Bells”) warns that “Steele will run Maryland like George Bush runs the country”. Apparently, it no longer need be said that the latter phrase is a synonym for “badly”.

12

One of my favorites was an ad criticizing Judy Baar Topinka a couple of months back. I don’t remember the whole thing, I just remember it saying something along the lines of “Judy Baar Topinka supported President Bush in the last election and even helped him campaign in Chicago. Judy Baar Topinka …what’s she thinking?”

I loved that they used the mere fact that she supports the nation’s leader as a reason not to vote for her.

13

Correction: That one was anti-Ehrlich, not anti-Steele.

14

Heh, I saw this add in Canada too and at first I thought it was a joke. Unfortunately we Canadians can’t cluck our tongues too much these days. Our last federal election campaign plumbed the depths too.

“Stephen Harper will put soldiers on our streets with GUNS!”,

15

In all fairness that one got pulled before it aired… just not off their web site.

I wonder if these types of ads actually have any effect. I mean there is obviously a preceived one otherwise they wouldn’t keep doing them, but what do actual studies say

16

There’s one ad (somewhere on the Atlantic seaboard) where the challenger accuses the incumbent of voting to allow illegal immigrant child molesters into the country. Somehow I missed that one when they voted: “House Bill XXXX–The National Invitation Offered to Foreign Child Molesters Without Visas Act. All in favor?..”

17

According to something I heard on NPR, negative ads do have sway over truely undecided voters, but piss off people who were already leaning towards the opponent (and in doing so ensures that they’ll actually vote, and may even become active in the campaign). That seems to vibe with what I and EddyTeddyFreddy thought about it. I mean, sure, I’d probably vote for the liberal anyway, but now I really want to make damn sure that bitch doesn’t get in.

And sadly, I just heard that Patrick’s lead is slipping. I suppose that that probably has more to do with the fact that Patrick had more exposure during the primaries (Healey was unopposed, and lt gov for a governor running for president is as obscure a job as one could find) and the conservative elements dripping over as they find out who the hell Healey is, but I’m sure all the slime she’s thrown hasn’t hurt.

::sigh::

18

I live in PA, where it seems that every other commercial is for Rick Santorum. It would be nice, except that 'ol Ricky-boy actually got his facts so wrong in one commercial, which named his own supporters as Casey-supporting slimeballs.

I’m gonna laugh my ass off in a month.

Robin

19

MsRobyn,

Really? I hadn’t heard that about the Santorum ads. That’s hilarious.

Man, I hope he’s defeated.

20

In our congressional district, the race is between Republican incumbent Tom Feeney and Democratic challenger Clint Curtis. I had not paid too much attention to the race until after the primaries were settled, since I don’t vote in primaries.

A couple of weeks ago I got a mailer about “Crazy Clint Curtis,” and what a nutjob he was. I assumed it was from some fringe group, or at worst some overzealous subset of the local Republican party.

Last week I got another one, this one proclaiming that no less a degenerate than Larry Flint was a supporter of “Crazy Clint Curtis,” and wouldn’t it be awful if this man were elected to Congress. It offered a few quotes from a Hustler article about Curtis, and invited the reader to the website www.crazyclintcurtis.com for more information.

For some reason, this time I looked closer at the mailer, and saw, “Paid for by Tom Feeney” at the top. I (like a fool) visited the website, but never made it past the front page. It did, however, make me get off my duff and start looking into the challenger.

Now it appears that Mr. Curtis may, in fact, be nuttier than a fruitcake. But this ad campaign is just very, very distasteful to me. Feeney will win the election, probably against anyone the local Democrats could throw at him, so there’s no need to stoop to this level. Curtis seems to be running a one-note campaign; Tom Feeney tried to rig the 2004 election, and he’s an evil man. It would be very easy in Feeney’s position to simply say that Curtis is wrong, and grossly unqualified to be a Representative and that would be that. I just think this is very low.

I was planning on voting against Feeney. This just solidified my resolve. On the other hand, I don’t think I can bring myself to vote for Curtis, there are no other candidates on the ballot, and there’s no blank for a write-in. So I’m not sure what I’m going to do, but I certainly will not be voting for Feeney.