http://www.livingroomcandidate.org/commercials/1960/mrs-jfk

Jackie Kennedy certainly fit the part of the beautiful presidential candidate’s wife. In office, she became a style icon and an image of ideal beauty. So, it is only right that JFK and his campaign team would put her in a commercial all by herself to speak for her husband’s race to the presidency. The visual appeal and family theme of this commercial is a given. A happy wife like Jackie Kennedy in the 60s would have spoken to the ideal household and dream family life. One of the larger themes that came out of JFK’s campaign and presidency was his role as a family man. Clearly, the nation found that storyline appealing. I wasn’t expecting much else besides a strategic commercial to showcase those two things. And then she started talking.

The entire commercial is in Spanish. Now, as a Spanish major I could nitpick her accent (which is very American) and at first I thought she was just reading a script. But apparently Jackie Kennedy was fluent in four languages: English, Spanish, French, and Italian. She spoke Spanish slowly and enunciated well in the commercial. The message of the commercial was not actually about family, as I probably would have expected seeing Jackie at the center of the screen. However, it was another commercial about how JFK was the right candidate to stand firmly against communism. She tells her audience that JFK wants to protect all citizens in all parts of the United States from the danger of the communist party. The campaign team was trying to reach the Spanish speaking population, a marginalized group back then and still a marginalized group today.

It is interesting to me that in the 1960’s the Spanish speaking population was a recognized and important vote for our country, whereas in the recent past presidential campaigns the topic of Spanish speakers was polarizing. Donald Trump successfully convinced many Americans that all Spanish speakers in our country are criminals, undocumented, and only here to take things away from “hard-working Americans”. The topic of immigration and Spanish speakers is now so much more than Jackie Kennedy sitting in front of a camera reciting a short Spanish script. I think on one side of politics, the message that they will continue to be protected by the US government still stands. But on the other side, the Spanish-speaking population is constantly threatened with detention and deportation. This short commercial from 60 years ago compared to our political climate now is really jarring. Jackie makes it seem so simple, way too simple for the reality of 2021. 

I was assigned the 1980 election of Reagan vs. Carter. The first impression I had was that the ads were pretty mild, especially the attack ads. Most of the pomp and flair of modern day ads is missing. Furthermore, the attack ads stick to criticizing the opponent’s political views not trivial matters such as social status or appearance. Additionally, I found it interesting that the vice-president candidates where essentially missing in action. At the end of some of the ads they are present on the re-election posters, but they never appear in any of the live portions of the ads. I am likely giving the VP position more attention than the average voter in 1980 because of Bush’s future presidency and Mondale’s abject failure of a campaign in 1984.

Seeing the difference some of the the ideas that are associated with which political party in 1980 versus the present day was fascinating. Carter running as the Democrat was a champion of the military and the South. The South has traditionally been carried by the Republican Party since Nixon, however, Carter is the notable exception. Furthermore, the Republican Party is typically associated with large military spending. Obviously those views are not held by everyone in the Republican Party and same can be said with the Democratic Party with the opposite.

My “favorite” ad was the Republican “Kennedy/No more” ad. At the end of the advertisement we see that it was made by the Democrats for Reagan. I find this an interesting contrast with the Republicans for Biden group that emerged during the most recent elections. I had thought that it was a novel idea at the time, but I was clearly wrong. Also, the ad has a Kennedy in it. Being the gullible, brain-washed, all-American that I am of course I am going to like an ad that the Kennedy family is tied to.

Within the 2012 Democratic campaign ads, the “47 percent” ad was my favorite. In the ad, they showed Americans a video of Mitt Romney speaking to his donors at a high dollar fundraiser behind closed doors. To summarize, Romney said that 47% of Americans will vote for Obama no matter what, calling those people “victims” who are dependent on the government to care for them and think they are entitled to health care, food, housing, etc. Then he goes on to say that his job is not to worry about those people, because he will never convince them to vote for him. They then asked the Americans what they thought about what Romney had said. Everyone that was shown in the ad was very upset by Romney’s comments, disagreeing with the fact that half of the country behaves as victims who just want handouts. “I don’t think anybody is ever looking for a handout, I think that we all want chances and opportunities,” was one thing that a woman said. They thought his comments sent a bad message to the American people and showed his true character.

The reason why I liked this commercial so much was because it felt real and authentic. The interviews were done on the streets outside, so it looked like they were just random people walking by who were stopped for the video. Instead of hearing a politician or narrator try to convince me to vote for someone, it was nice to hear the voices of the American people and receive instant feedback of what other people thought. I think the ad was well done and got their point across very clearly. However, those interviews could’ve easily been staged and acted out, but out of all the ads I watched, this one felt the most authentic and convincing.

I was assigned the democratic party for the 2008 election. The ad that stood out the most for me was the “Yes We Can” ad as it was really eye-catching with it’s musical jingle that repeated the powerful words of Obama through music (with his speech playing in the background). They also used plenty of well known celebrities in the ad singing along which only further caught my eye. Reading through Obama’s speech, it was extremely powerful and in my opinion certainly does a good job of inspiring hope in Americans for the future (with hope being the main part of his campaign) as well as bring in all Americans rather than certain small groups. Regardless of which party you were a part of, I think this ad playing on TV would certainly make you stop at least for a second and listen as the song is extremely catchy. I guess its ability to be so attention grabbing is where it is so successful at least in my eyes.

Thinking about the rest of the ads I watched and the podcast itself, it really makes me think about how these commercials give an insight into the character and the overall leadership potential of these candidates. Looking at how candidates handle their attack campaigns, how they talk about social issues, how they talk about current crises, and even how they present themselves physically and verbally. These are things that viewers pay attention to both consciously and sub-consciously, so it is important for a campaign to manage this wisely.

I was assigned presidential advertisements from 2004, and I got to see commercials from the Democratic National Convention and John Kerry. My absolute favorite one was titled “Turned the Corner,” and it started with a montage of Bush saying the country would “turn the corner” for a certain issue. Then, the ad showed various graphs (which our class would’ve laughed at for how mathematically-wrong they were) where things were going “wrong.” There was a graph showing the price of gas increasing, another one showing the amount of jobs decreasing and much much more. The funniest part was the goofy song they had playing over it, like Bush’s claims were straight out of a clown circus.

I think this ad was a prime of attacking the opponent. I don’t think it said anything about John Kerry or Democrats until the very end, if that. What made it so eye-catching was the humor that they put into it. Coming from someone who loves to laugh, humor is a great way to reach your audience. Even thinking about Super Bowl commercials and how a lot of insurance companies have running jokes, it’s crazy how much of a hold humor has over viewers. It’s almost as if the ad is telling us if it makes you laugh, it must be a good thing. And if it’s a good thing, you should vote for it, buy it, talk about it, etc. I think that the media shapes how we think about the world around us just as much as our parents and peers. The amount of power it has is almost scary.

My assigned year was 2000, where the margin of victory was incredibly small for Bush and many believe that Gore should have won instead. After watching their respective ads, I can’t help but wonder what America would look like today if Gore had won. While Bush focuses on military defense and fear, Gore’s ads are mostly related to access to healthcare, education, and environmental protections. Although he might have exaggerated his claims and not actuated everything he mentions in the ads, I think that our environmental and educational systems would be far better than they currently are. Additionally, his tax plans seem to benefit the middle class with little harm done to the wealthy (this is not my expertise so excuse me if that is terribly incorrect). I believe that with him as president in 2000, we could possibly have better environmental protections and a less significant wealth gap today in 2021. Maybe I only see Gore as the better candidate because of this sense of possibility (and Bush as the worse candidate because I don’t agree with what happened during his presidency), but still, it’s an interesting reality to consider.

My favorite ad of his was “Question” because it states the facts to refute Bush’s false promises that were made in his campaign. Bush apparently promised one trillion dollars of surplus to both students and seniors, when only one could have the money. I liked this ad because I think that it’s a sneaky way to manipulate the audience without them noticing. By presenting the information as neutral facts with an open-ended question, the viewer is far more likely to agree with the narrator and vote against Bush.

http://www.livingroomcandidate.org/commercials/1972/russia-response 

After watching the various Presidential Campaign Commercials for 1972, I found the “Tanya” commercial from McGovern’s Campaign to be intriguing as it relates to what we do in Critical Thinking! This commercial starts by recounting what President Nixon said about Tanya in his speech at the Republican Convention. Essentially, President Nixon told the audience how Tanya, a Russian child, witnessed her family die during the siege of Leningrad, which happened during WWII. President Nixon quotes from Tanya’s diary how distraught she felt when she realized she had no more family because of armed conflict in Russia. President Nixon even said to the Republic Convention: “Let us think of Tanya and all the other Tanyas everywhere as we proudly meet our responsibility for leadership.” What follows from this is the narrator stating how since President Nixon’s term in office, roughly a quarter of 165,000 South Vietnamese children- or “Tanyas” who are under the age of 12- have been killed by American bombs despite America’s efforts to save the South Vietnamese people from North Vietnam. McGovern’s campaign commercial ends by saying, “As we vote November 7th, let us think of Tanya and all the other defenseless children of this world.”

I feel that the strategy employed in this campaign was very effective. Given that the Nixon Administration limited the flow of information being transferred from Vietnam to the States, he could control the war effort’s narrative without many rebuttals since society tends to never question those in high authoritative positions- for instance, Presidents and professors. With McGovern’s campaign, it can be argued that the campaign might not have convinced the majority of Americans to vote for him, but the campaign commercial did give those Americans a reasonable cause to not vote for Nixon. Generally speaking, human beings do not like when people say one thing yet commit an action contrary to the thing they said as this is a reflection of who they truly are as a human being, let alone as a leader. In other words, this reminds me of how an entire “If X, Then Y” statement is false when the X statement is true, yet the Y thing is false.

This ad was my favorite from 1968 when compared to all of the rest for three reasons. One it was far different than all of the others, it was much simpler and to the point. Secondly, it did not attack another candidate. In general, I do not like attacking ads at all. I really feel like if a candidate is strong and confident, then he/ she would not need to waste time, energy, and money attacking his or her competitor. Third, I thought the ad was unique because it aligned  itself with such an iconic figure, Frank Sinatra. I know now from class, that this a type of appeal to authority: If a legend like Frank Sinatra endorses a certain president, then I am sure it would influence others to cast their vote in a similar way. It was interesting to see that even fifty years ago marketers and campaign managers knew the power of authority and really attempted to capitalize on it. This ad really did very little in terms of talking about policy or ideas,  but the fact that Frank Sinatra was in it, I am sure persuaded some potential voters in a way that other ads would not

My favorite advertisement out of the 1984 election was Reagan’s ad called “Peace.” I like this advertisement because it took less of a political approach and focused on the value of family. Within the ad, Reagan and his campaign team focus on changing America for the kids and finding peace. It shows young kids playing happily together and pulls the audience in emotionally. Surprisingly, this ad showed a variety of ethnic kids but still gives off the typical white family sense. Within all the ads, Reagan gives off a white american dream vibe. It does not address the issues of racism, crime, immigration, or other diverse problems within the United States. This was very interesting to watch especially when analyzing his opponent, Mondale. Mondale solely addressed taxes and what his opponent was doing wrong. He never addressed the other social issues going on during that period.

I found these advertisements interesting when comparing them to the podcast. The media has completely changed leadership in both good and bad ways. Presidents and other people in government were able to attract people through their visual appeal. I also find this interesting because social media has only gotten more apparent in the present-day through sites like Twitter, Instagram, and more.

The advertisements that I watched were the from the Republican Party during the 2004 presidential election. This election was Bush running for his second term versus John Kerry. Most of these advertisements were attack ads on Kerry. The ads the were not attack ads focused on American freedom and the war on terrorism in Iraq. This makes sense given that much of Bush’s first term was dealing with the tragic event of 9/11 and then focusing on terrorism in the Middle East after being attacked at home.  The attack ads targeted mostly his contradicting and often changing opinions by pulling different legislation that he had both supported and opposed at different times. They also targeted Kerry’s credibility particularly through his time in the military by interviewing many people who had served with him in the military. This effectively created a feeling of distrust and lack of understanding of Kerry because who is someone if those around them don’t trust them and they change their mind often. I do not know much about this election so cannot make judgements about Kerry or Bush, but given that Bush was reelected, these ads clearly were effective in creating a dislike and distrust of John Kerry.

My favorite ad was titled “windsurfing” and was an attack ad on Kerry. The ad used a series of photos of John Kerry that showed him windsurfing. The message of the ad was that John Kerry’s opinion will go where ever the wind blows and the use of the windsurfing pictures was a funny way to attack Kerry’s inconsistency in policy decisions and stance on a variety of matters. I liked this ad the most just because it was funny. The little dance that the picture does at the end when they keep flipping the picture was funny and a refreshing break from the serious ads that focused on Iraq and the events around 9/11. I also think this ad was used to make Kerry’s image look unpresidential. Our generation knows the funny pictures of Obama on vacation due to the increase in paparazzi and media during his terms. But before the 2004 election, pictures did not float around as quickly as they do now and circulating this picture of Kerry in beachwear while windsurfing established him as the opposite of Bush who was always shown in suits with ties and looking very professional.