The episode of Bill Moyer's Journal that aired last night on PBS featured a discussion with the Annenberg Public Policy Center's Kathleen Hall Jamieson on the role dirty politics may play in the last leg of the presidential campaign.
Jamieson is an especially provacative and insightful guest, having appeared on the program previously to discuss issues relating to the presidential campaign. In last night's episode, she brought attention to one television ad in particular to illustrate a point.
The ad was from the 1964 presidential contest between the incumbent President, Democrat Lyndon B. Johnson and Senator Barry Goldwater, Republican of Arizona (whose seat, incidentally, John McCain now occupies). In it, an ominous drumbeat can be heard as the narrator repeats the chilling words of a KKK leader from Alabama, while sinister images of white-robed men can be seen amid the roaring flames of a burning cross. There is a dramatic pause, and the narrator continues with the KKK racist's endorsement of Barry Goldwater, "I like Barry Goldwater! He needs our help!"
The ad concludes with a simple message, "Vote for President Johnson."
The 1964 election is noteworthy because the Johnson campaign pioneered the use of TV as an effective medium for a new kind of "negative" message reinforcement. The negative ad was born in 1964, and it has been a staple of American politics ever since.
The KKK ad was one of two TV commercials that the Johnson campaign produced to great affect that year. The other was the famous Daisy ad that showed a little girl in a flower-filled meadow. She is plucking the petals from a flower, counting each one as she goes, then suddenly looks up as a mushroom cloud explodes upon the screen. The voice of President Johnson is then heard saying, "These are the stakes."
These TV ads, created 44 years ago, are still considered among the most effective and visceral campaign tools ever created. All these years later, modern viewers still find them deeply disturbing and difficult to watch.
While many will recognize the ads, most people do not know that the "Daisy" commercial only aired once on network television. More than that seemed overkill to Johnson and his campaign team. They feared that the ads would create a backlash against the president's re-election efforts and could cost him crucial votes.
The Johnson campaign chose not to air the "KKK" ad at all. It never appeared on television, despite the great expense of producing the commercial, because Goldwater had publicly repudiated the endorsement of Alabama clan leaders. Johnson felt that it would have not only risked a backlash, but he was certain it would diminish his chances of working to pass his legislative agenda should he divide the country with such blatantly fearful images. He knew that Goldwater was not a racist, and his sense of decency told him it was simply going too far.
I'm reminded of the McCain campaign's current fascination with the Ayers accusations against Senator Obama. Despite the fact that Senator McCain knows that Senator Obama is not a terrorist and has had no more than a casual professional relationship with Ayers, the McCain campaign is determined to keep pushing the story and airing television ads. Indeed, just as Senator Goldwater had repudiated the Alabama KKK in 1964, Senator Obama has repudiated the dispicable deeds of Ayers and the Weather Underground whose offenses took place when he was just a young boy.
Perhaps Senator McCain has forgotten the lessons from the controversial 1964 presidential election between Lyndon B. Johnson and his predecessor.
This mistake is proving to be a costly one.