Kurtz has one of the stupidest, most disingenuous pieces about media that I've seen in awhile in today's Washington Post. "Some Kerry Spots Never Make the Air: Ads Are Produced to Spur News Articles" (
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A46233-2004Oct19.html)
Basically, he finds that the Kerry campaign produces ads that they release to media and then don't really air in local markets. He then notes that "Mark McKinnon, Bush's media adviser, said the president's campaign has never announced an ad that has not run."
Jeez. Hate to break to Howard, but McKinnon is lying (and you're lying to pretend you're outraged and didn't know about this). Campaigns have been producing ads for news for the past two decades. Kerry does it. Bush does it. Every candidate does it.
Couple of quick examples:
Bush Windsurfing ad. Kurtz uses this as an example. Kerry made a response ad that never aired which they claimed (in the Kurtz piece) was because they only do this for ads that actually run.
Well, did the Windsurfing ad really run? The Bush campaign claimed that it would run in "select markets" in battleground states. So, it is surprising that BC 04 decided that it should run in NYC as a happy freeper points:
"To: The_Reader_David
I've seen the Bush ads everymoring on the stations here in NYC. ...Every day I've seen the windsurfing ad and it is the coolest thing i've seen. I love it!
19 posted on 09/27/2004 7:26:04 AM PDT by areafiftyone
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies ]"
Now is NYC a battleground media market? Are NY, CT, NJ in play? Nope. NYC is where the national news media are based. This is the basic formula for fake ads - you run in 'em DC and NY and on a small cable station in the boonies. And, you do it so CNN/FOX/MSNBC/ABC/NBC/CBS/PBS runs it.
Harry and Louise --
Believe it or not, although there was some real money spent on this campaign, most of these ads were not shown widely and were mainly targeted at the news media.
LBJ Mushroom ad --
Aired in only a few markets. Helped to create this whole category.
The thing that really galls me is that Kurtz pretends to be outraged by this and takes McKinnon's absurd denial at face value (just like he does for Luntz). Kurtz and the press know that these ads don't run but run with it themselves because it is more grist for the mill.