In what some broadcasters are calling “news,” negative ads have come from both camps lately attacking the leading presidential candidates George W. Bush and John Kerry. Making the ads particularly noticeable is the level of enmity and unfounded allegation passing muster in attempts to gain early lead in the presidential race.
Democratic debates for the past several weeks, indeed as early as they started, painted unpleasant, however true, pictures of President Bush as a “man” out of touch with the people and leading America down a path toward unjustified war and economic chaos. Bush, sitting on a monster-sized war chest of campaign finance, reserved specific retaliations until John Kerry emerged as the Democratic front-runner. Many theorize Bush was urged to action by comments made by Kerry calling allegations on his defense record as false and referring to those behind the ads as “the most crooked” “lying group I’ve ever seen.” The Bush campaign demanded and apology, and 50 lashes with a leather whip—no, 60! 100! 100 lashes!
The Democratic campaign refused to apologize, and were outraged when an ad began running Friday in major markets, following Thursday’s historic terror attack in Madrid which killed 200 people. The ad showed President Bush laying a wreath at the Spanish embassy with an ominous voice narrating: “Thursday, when Spain was the victim of terrorists, President Bush was in the White House all day. Several people saw him. Where was John Kerry?”
Representatives of the Kerry campaign, teen-agers working the phones, described the attacks as “unbelievable bullshit.” Campaign insiders suggest the “vicious character” attack inspired the release of a television ad they had originally thought too harsh for airing. The ad uses headlines and quotes from a Los Angeles Times story pointing to a division of intelligence in the Pentagon that privately briefed the White House on Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction, and may have been broken the chain of command and been responsible for the failure of intelligence. The Kerry campaign comment on the story was in text: “WtF?” Those knowledgeable in abbreviations inform us the letters mean “What the fuck?”
The Bush campaign hit back Saturday, with a speculative radio ad featuring the same ominous voice, saying, “You know, they never did catch the killer of Jon Benet Ramsey. John Kerry—you ever been to Colorado?” The ultimate insult, according to insult experts, was the added tag: “John Kerry: Soft on defense, sweet on little girls?”
Democrat campaign spokespeople described their candidate as “super-pissed,” but promised retribution in the form of ads that would “tell it like it is.” Sunday morning found the airing in metro markets of a hastily-assembled new Kerry ad. In it, aerial photographs of Roswell, New Mexico play to accompanying voice-over. “People are hearing a lot of things about Area 51. And the president hasn’t been very forth-coming on what’s there. If it’s nothing special, why don’t we get to see it? But if there’s an evil alien menace lurking in the heart of New Mexico… what will it look like?” At which point a super-imposed picture of the president in his jet fighter suit appears on the screen. “George W. Bush. A pilot… but not of our planes.”
Also joining the advertising this week was Ralph Nader’s under-funded campaign, who passed around a flip book to supporters in town halls. In it, as one flips the pages, a stick figure appears to dance, while text at the bottom of the page indicts the other major campaigns: “The two-party system has the same old song and dance.” the commune is currently on a waiting list to receive the flip book when everyone else is done with it.