Now this is troubling.
Posted at 10:39 AM ET, 08/22/2007
Ad Wars Heat Up Ahead of 'Surge' Report
...The latest pro-war campaign rolls out today. Freedom's Watch is a non-profit group "dedicated to educating individuals about and advancing public policies that protect America's interests at home and abroad, foster economic prosperity, and strengthen families," according to the group's Web site. President Bush's first White House press secretary, Ari Fleischer, is the group's spokesman. He tells The Post that the group will spend $15 million on a month-long TV, radio, and grassroots campaign.
One anti-war group running ads, Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, states in a release:
"The White House-tied group Freedom's Watch is targeting the same Republicans who are under extraordinary pressure from their constituents to abandon Bush's failed war policy."
Among the Republicans targeted are Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and Sen. Norm Coleman.
Okay, note that the limited purpose of the Freedom’s Watch ad campaign is to put pressure on vulnerable Republicans who may be wavering in their support for the war. But note the kind of advertising that this group is doing:
The new Freedom's Watch ads are testimonials from Iraq war veterans, victims' family members, and the mother of a Marine killed in Iraq. They end by urging viewers to call the group's toll-free number to be connected to their member of Congress...
"We've already had one 9/11, we don't need another," a tearful Vicki Strong says at the end of her ad (see below). Strong's son Marine Sgt. Jesse Strong was killed in Iraq the week before Iraq's elections in 2005. The ad with Iraq war veteran John Kriesel end with him saying, "It's no time for politics." But these ads are designed to do just that -- influence how politicians react to the surge report, and how they decide the future of the war.
(I can't give you a direct link to the exact post, because the blogger doesn't give you that option. But if you click on this WaPost link, you will see the web page in its entirety and you can scroll down to the entry marked "Ad Wars Heat Up Ahead of Surge Report.")
I saw one of the ads on television today, in Minnesota. This is very bad news, if the conservatives see that this sort of TV campaign is effective in turning around opinion on the war.
Because we simply can’t compete with that kind of spending on television. The anti-war people are truly grass roots. Even raising the millions necessary to elect a candidate is a big stretch for us. If the contest for the hearts and minds of Americans over the war turns into a spending contest—we lose, and the GOP and the military industrial complex know that.
For every million anti-war Democrats could raise for television ads, the GOP, the conservatives and the businesses dependent on war spending could spend ten million, twenty million. It’s a little sand off the beach for those right wing lobbies, and the potential return in profits is in the billions—from war-related deficit spending.
Worse: if anti-war Democrats try to counter with an anti-war TV campaign of their own—that’s money taken away from contributions to particular Dem causes and candidates. It’s another win-win for the GOP and the conservatives; they’re starting to use their money advantage intelligently again.
Even worse: if this kind of commercial TV advertising campaign is effective, why shouldn’t the Right apply the same spending strategy to dominate the debate on other foreign policy questions—eg, expanding the war into Iran?
Perhaps worst of all: if the "outspend the war critics" strategy is effective, and sways the polls—the mainstream media/professional news media will follow the trend. I say that because the professional news media began to follow or at least reflect the trend toward right wing propaganda after the rise of right wing talk radio during the eighties.
Am I being "Henny Penny" here, or could this new TV strategy (if effective) really lead to a conservative power renaissance—sooner than we thought possible?