If the political climate were not bad enough for Democrats, a Rasmussen Reports survey finds that 40% of TV viewers say there are more negative reports this year than in the past while another 47% feel there are the same number of negative ads as in the past. Why the increase?
One reason could be that there are very few Democrats who want to run on their record of deficit spending, ObamaCare, Cap and Trade, TARP, and the impending expiration of the Bush tax cuts. So, if you can’t run on your record, you are either mute or you launch personal attacks on your opponent. Here are some examples:
- Congressman Tim Bishop in New York’s First Congressional district has been attacking his opponent for having started a company that provided business services, where many of the employees were based overseas. It seems he only has that one ad and he plays it over and over again.
- Harry Reid is attacking Sharon Angle trying to paint her as far too extreme, because he knows the economy in the U.S. is dismal and it’s even worse in Nevada. If you can’t stand on your record, paint your opponent as even worse than you are.
- Alan Grayson in Florida edited a tape of his opponent so severely it presented a message that was the complete opposite of what the unedited version showed.
- Russ Feingold in Wisconsin “borrowed” film clips from the NFL to accuse his opponent of “dancing in the end zone” prematurely and urging voters to keep him as an independent voice. He doesn’t mention any programs he supported.
The bad news from Rasmussen is that 56% of viewers say these kinds of ads make them less likely to vote for the candidate that produced the advertisement.
The American public strongly opposes most if not all of the major programs passed by the Democrat Congress and President Obama. There is a very strong sense of “throw the bums out.” They are having a hard time localizing the issues because if they talk about how much money they brought into their district, the debt they brought with it is close on its heels. So they can’t run on their record, they can’t make it about local issues, they can’t energize their base to come out and vote for a seemingly lost cause, and if they attack their opponent with negative ads, the people who see those ads feel less likely to vote for them.
If there is a silver lining anywhere, I would like to hear it.
