We flatter ourselves by declaring we do not believe everything
we hear on TV and Radio. We adamantly reinforce this thought with statements such
as, “This is ‘common knowledge” or “Everyone knows that”. However, we all know,
with equal certainty, that advertising works, which means we tend to believe
some of what we hear. The sad truth is that they we tend to believe enough of
what they hear to be dangerously misled. Advertizing agencies have perfected
their skills to the point that they can call your attention to an ad and
package the false information in it in such a way that it is believable. Among
the techniques is the repeated issuing of the same information; we see the exact
same ad time after time. Another way is
to dress the ad in terms that appeal to certain prospective buyers; colorful
cartoon time ads aimed at young children, for example, or a deep gruff voice proclaiming
how tough a certain pickup truck modal is while showing the driver pulling a huge
load of logs or a gun rack in the rear window. The simple expedient of playing the ad louder
than regular programming works well as an attention getter. These ads are
usually associated with the promotion of some type of product or service: the
power of positive thinking.
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However, there is another type of ad perfected by #Karl
Rove, the personal attack ad. Years ago Rove, working for a local politician, accidently
stumbled onto the idea that people vote on politicians’ negatives. Karl Rove discovered
that negative attitudes toward a politician have a power influence on their
voting and advertizing works to build these negatives; the power of negative thinking. Using this thought, he developed a stellar
career as a political consultant: how many other political scientists (?) do
you know who are multimillionaires? He shepherded George W. Bush into office twice
with deceitful advertizing aimed at building opponents “negatives”; it even
worked the second time after an unbelievable disastrous first term. The obvious
conclusion is that in people’s minds, negatives are even more powerful than positives
attitudes. All a person has to do to see how pervasive the Rove induced anomaly
in political advertizing has become is to consider that poll after poll headlines
results based on a certain politician’s positives verses his or her negatives
and not his or her position of an issue. The later is often not even mentioned.
An easy example of how implied negatives works is to examine
Roves’ statement that Hillary Clinton suffered brain damage when she fainted and
hit her head. This is all-true and at the time was all over the news; she did
fall and she did do damage to her brain. Roves’ implication is that she is no
longer a viable candidate to be president. An even more damaging example has to
do with the public perception of the success of Obama’s presidency. When scholars
examine what he has done as president, it is clear he is the best president we
have ever had. He is bringing peace to a world more troubled than it has ever
been. Domestically, He has had to fight a totally negative lock-step Republican
vote that controls the House of Representatives; they no longer represent the
people in their districts rather they represent the GOP. Nothing they have done
makes sense, unless you look at it through Karl Roves eyes. They have built the
“negatives” to the point that they have turned our government and our President
into something people hate. The public approval rating (poll) indicates both the
government and Obama’s negatives are much higher than the positives. The House
of Representative’s approval is at around 8% meaning the negatives are 92% and
the President Obama’s approval rating is as low as it has ever been.
Think about that; the president single handedly has done absolutely
everything that government has accomplished and the House of Representatives has
done absolutely nothing, yet media wrath falls on Obama. You should be curious
to know why the President’s ratings so low? Turn on Fox TV, listen to Glenn Beck
or Rush Limbaugh, or go to the internet and read Facebook post after Facebook
post. Hate Obama, impeach Obama, hate the government, hate the IRS, and even hate
Michelle’s vegetable garden. Hate, hate, hate anything associated with Obama or
government seems to be effective advertizing because the polls show it is
working. As I noted above, if you say it enough people believe it.
All you hear are advertisements aimed at building Obama’s negatives
but seldom even a mention of the negatives about the House of Representatives. That
is the new form of the Rove inspired distortion
in political advertizing at work, coupled with the new form of political media—the
social media. Why are Obama’s approval ratings so low and Cheerio Breakfast
cereal so high? I will answer the question with a question; have you ever seen
a negative ad about how Cheerios are made of the same ingredients for which pig
feed is made? Did I mention that pollsters are telling us the Republicans are
going to control the Senate and the House of Representatives after 2014 because
the President’s ratings as so low. If that happens, are you going to be the
first in line to congratulate Rove on his success, for what we let him do to
our democracy?
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