Brilliant Ad

Ali Bubba at the Alabama Liberation Front has a detailed analysis of an RNC advertisement that is smart, funny, sharp and ultimately devastating. Which, of course, immediately brought much huffing and puffing and totally false charges of racism. (You really should watch the ad before you read what he's written. The video is posted).

This ad isn't Willie Horton. It's clever and funny, with a post-Seinfeld sensibility. (Notice the mockingly childish nursery-school tune played under the RNC announcement at the end.) The basic message is aimed toward "value voters," but in such a way as not to offend young sophisticates.

To understand what the blonde party-girl represents in this ad, it helps to look at her counterpart in the ad, "Man 3," the guy who says, "So he took money from porn movie producers. I mean, who hasn't?"

"Man 3" is a vaguely sleazy young city-slicker type. The sunglasses, the 2-day stubble — you know this kind of guy, right? Just like you know "Woman 3," the ditzy, low-rent chick making "call me" gestures to a congressman she met at a Playboy party, right? And notice how these two characters are bookended around the RNC announcement at the end of the ad.

Now, imagine yourself the respectable 30-something soccer mom in your living room at your upscale home in the Nashville suburb of Franklin, Tennessee. When you see "Man 3" and "Woman 3," what do they represent to you?

Right: They're what you pray your kids don't grow up to be. You don't want your son to be a scummy porn guy, you don't want your daughter to be a party girl, and … hey, I guess you don't want to vote Democrat, either. (That's called association, people.)

That soccer mom sees the sleazy dude in sunglasses and thinks, "Ewww, what a creep." Soccer mom sees the bimbo party girl and thinks of some low-class, hot-to-trot hussy she knew in high school. These "negative identity" characters — sort of anti-role models — are offering implausible arguments on behalf of Harold Ford Jr..

There is indeed a "coded message" here, but it's got nothing to do with race, and has everything to do with the suggestion that only clueless and/or uncouth people would vote for Harold Ford Jr.

In other words: "Be smart, be classy, vote Corker."

It's brilliant. No doubt the RNC worked very hard on getting this just right — the casting, the script, the editing. I'm certain they focus-grouped it, and its humorous tone ensures that this ad will cut through the late-season "clutter" on the airwaves.

Ali Bubba is dead right here. This ad is brilliant and Ford and his campaign know it. So do the other fellow travelers in the media. That's why they've all gone totally off the deep end criticizing it. Which will only make the ad go viral. They don't even realize that going crazy over this ad will ensure that almost every person thinking about the Senate race in Tennessee will end up seeing it. Trying to call it racist is a mark of utter desperation and has probably sunk the Ford campaign.

Other Links to this Post

1. And Still I Persist » Blog Archive » Possibly the best political ad I’ve ever seen — Tuesday, 24 October , 2006 @ 8:49 am

2. Blue Crab Boulevard » Blog Archive » Interpretations — Tuesday, 24 October , 2006 @ 9:36 pm