How is the early ad war going? Is this early negative blitz going to help Bush? Kerry? Or will it just make people so board with negative campaigning that we end up turning off even more people that usual?
It's really hard to say. everybody is in such a frenzy right now, republicans and democrats, and there seems to be this concern that neither side can afford to not hit back when attacked. nobody wants to be michael dukakis. the other thing is that there is a feeling out there that even though the country is so split, there's the potential for it to break to one side or the other. it's mostly that someone's negatives will just get so high that someone will end up winning by 5-7 points and carry with them a bunch of senate and house seats.
Mark Penn who was a media guy for Clinton wrote and article in the New Republic talking about how both Bush and Kerry's advertising was missing the boat. Than someone else wrote how they thought that was wrong. The thing about negative ads is that though people say they don't like them, they work. I kind of agree with Penn that Kerry should be putting out some ads that talk about how good he is on national security, that if there was another terrorist attack that he'd nuke somebody, something. All he has to do is dent Bush's advantage on nat. sec. and show that he can protect the country and if he does that i think he's in good shape.
but the problem right now is pace. ads are getting tossed back and forth so fast, bush has the money to do it, Kerry really dosn't. and Kerry has more opportunity (good and bad) to be defined. people know Bush already. we've already seen how important it is to stay on the offensive and the feeling seems to be whoever can stay there longest and be there at the right times will win. it would be really risky to turn that conventional wisdom on its head and go in another direction. might work, might lose you the election. but CW has been wrong about just about everything so far. they're playing it safe for now.