The Velcro Wall

So I see this on CNN.com this morning:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/06/campbell.brown.campaign/index.html

And I read it and I think – this is all she’s got?  And she gets on CNN.com?  Puh-leeze.

Yes – this is a blatant attempt at getting my stuff linked into somewhere people might read it. Minimally, at least, I think I make a better point. 

————Excerpt from previous blog post titled  A Plea for Political Ads ————

Instead of spending your time and money telling me how bad the other guy is and telling me what he does or doesn’t believe and how it isn’t in my best interest, how about you tell me what YOUR views are.  Tell me what YOU believe.  Tell me what YOUR plans are and what YOU would like to accomplish.  Then let me make up my own mind.

This whole idea of getting elected using “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” approach doesn’t work. It doesn’t work in geo-politics (we backed Iraq against Iran, and the Taliban in Afghanistan against the Russians – see how well all that turned out?) and it doesn’t work in domestic politics.

What bothers me is that negative political ads don’t give me the whole story.  And in order for me to get the whole story, I have to spend my time looking up the accusations to see whether or not they’re true. Wouldn’t it be better if I was spending my time confirming what you told me about yourself instead of trying to verify what you told me about the other guy?

Let’s look at it this way:

Let’s say that you are out with a small group of your friends and you spy a very attractive woman. Your friends have spied her too.  And she has seen you and your group. 

So you sneak away from your friends to go have a chat with her.  Basically what you are going to try to do is to sell yourself to her.  Furthermore, you know that at least one of your friends is going to try to do the same thing at some point during the course of the evening.

Now in order to get her attention and to get her to go out with you, you probably try to sell your best points – convince her why she should take you up on your offer of a date, that she’d have a great time and it would make her happy.  What you probably DON’T do is spend your time trying to convince her why she should not go out with any of your friends.  You probably don’t say “That guy, he votes pro-life.  And the other one over there?  He cheats on his girlfriends.  The one in the red shirt spends more money than he makes.”

You don’t do this because if you did, the impression you would ACTUALLY make upon her is that

a) You have no actual merits of your own to tout;

b) You spend a lot of time criticizing other people instead of bettering yourself.  

Furthermore, you have now demoted yourself to being only “the best that group has to offer” instead of “the best possible choice there is.”  And if she’s smart, she’s also now offended that you think that her mind is so easily molded that your opinion of these other people will automatically now be HER opinion of these other people.

Does this sound at all familiar?

Studies show that our reactions to politicians is very much an emotional response – not unlike our reactions to our favorite sports teams.  While we rationalize and rationalize and rationalize why we vote this way or that way, in a lot of cases it comes down to “I feel this way about this person” or this party or this political view.

And I think this is why negative ads are at best, ineffective, and at worst, insulting. 

So please, stop it.  Stop it.  Stop it. Stop it.  Tell me why YOU are the person I should vote for, not why he/she is the person I should vote against.  Because if I don’t agree with your reasons why I should vote against that person, and you haven’t told me why I should vote for you, then maybe I just won’t bother to vote at all.

And we wonder why we have such a low percentage of voter turnout compared to other democratic countries.

I will be the first person to tell you that I am not politically motivated.  I have no interest in office politics (ask any boss I’ve ever worked for) or personal politics, nor do I have all that much interest in Politics with a capital P.

So it will come as no surprise to you that after seeing my first political ad on TV for the upcoming presidential election, I’m done.  I don’t need to see another one.  Not because I don’t care but because I don’t believe anything they say anyhow.

I have an idea. Maybe more like a plea to the major political candidates.

Instead of spending your time and money telling me how bad the other guy is and telling me what he does or doesn’t believe and how it isn’t in my best interest, how about you tell me what YOUR views are.  Tell me what YOU believe.  Tell me what YOUR plans are and what YOU would like to accomplish.  Then let me make up my own mind.

This whole idea of getting elected  ”the enemy of my enemy is my friend” approach doesn’t work. It doesn’t work in geo-politics (we backed Iraq against Iran, and the Taliban in Afghanistan against the Russians – see how well all that turned out?) and it doesn’t work in domestic politics.

Furthermore, using tactics like “Joe Dorknut voted against additional funding for cleaning up the environment” assumes that I know so little about how bills are voted on, that I don’t know that what Joe Dorknut voted against was NOT the additional funding, but against the rider that was attached to the bill that would have given Bob Chubbypants 200 new “No Parking” signs for his neighborhood.

What bothers me is that negative political ads don’t give me the whole story.  And in order for me to get the whole story, I have to spend my time looking up the accusations to see whether or not they’re true. Wouldn’t it be better if I was spending my time confirming what you told me about yourself instead of trying to verify what you told me about the other guy?

Let’s look at it this way:

Let’s say that you are out with a small group of your friends and you spy a very attractive woman. Your friends have spied her too.  And she has seen you and your group. 

So you sneak away from your friends to go have a chat with her.  Basically what you are going to try to do is to sell yourself to her.  Furthermore, you know that at least one of your friends is going to try to do the same thing at some point during the course of the evening.

Now in order to get her attention and to get her to go out with you, you probably try to sell your best points – convince her why she should take you up on your offer of a date, that she’d have a great time and it would make her happy.  What you probably DON’T do is spend your time trying to convince her why she should not go out with any of your friends.  You probably don’t say “That guy, he votes pro-life.  And the other one over there?  He cheats on his girlfriends.  The one in the red shirt spends more money than he makes.”

You don’t do this because if you did, the impression you would ACTUALLY make upon her is that a) You have no actual merits of your own to tout, and b) You spend a lot of time criticizing other people instead of bettering yourself.  Furthermore, you have now demoted yourself to being only “the best that group has to offer” instead of “the best possible choice there is.”  And if she’s smart, she’s also now offended that you think that her mind is so easily molded that your opinion of these other people will automatically now be HER opinion of these other people.

Does this sound at all familiar?

Studies show that our reactions to politicians is very much an emotional response – not unlike our reactions to our favorite sports teams.  While we rationalize and rationalize and rationalize why we vote this way or that way, in a lot of cases it comes down to “I feel this way about this person” or this party or this political view.

And I think this is why negative ads are at best, ineffective, and at worst, insulting. 

So please, stop it.  Stop it.  Stop it. Stop it.  Tell me why YOU are the person I should vote for, not why he/she is the person I should vote against.  Because if I don’t agree with your reasons why I should vote against that person, and you haven’t told me why I should vote for you, then maybe I just won’t bother to vote at all.

And we wonder why we have such a low percentage of voter turnout compared to other democratic countries.