Bruce Benidt
Jon Austin
tcarideo
Ellen Mrja
Mike KeliherI dispute the base policy claim, but this is a pretty darn good piece of political advertising.
Humanize the candidate by showing him interacting in a loving relationship. Check.
Insulate the candidate from criticism by deploying human shield. Check.
Appeal to women voters by spotlighting unquestioning spousal submission. Check.
Appeal to men voters by highlighting the knowing ‘hey, you do what you gotta do’ eye twinkle.’ Check.
Show the candidate is a regular guy who hauls the Hefty’s just like the rest of us. Check.
A lot of people in politics act as if all undecided voters rely strictly on policy positions to make their voting decision. But many people choose people, not positions. And Norm appears to be a real, grounded, and down-to-earth person in this ad. Check.
- Loveland
Filed under: Communications, Politics | Tagged: advertising, garbage, Laurie Coleman, Minnesota, Norm Coleman, tv ad, U.S. Senate race
You know the absolute worst part about this ad? The snow in the alley scene could very well have been filmed in mid or late April. Jesus.
Are you telling me this isn’t reality TV???
Y’know, I saw the ad with my wife last night. I thought, “That’s a pretty darn good ad…even has a whimsical sort of sense of humor, which was supposed to be his opponent’s forte.”
So feeling clever and insightful, I expressed this thought out loud, at which point my wife scoffs at my analysis, saying, “Why, because it says he has a wife?” Then, as I muse on the fact that she’s right — I can’t even remember what he said about policy and issues — she says something about Coleman’s teeth.
Then I restored my sense of certainty by staying up late and watching Starship Troopers.
Loveland, your usually infallible political judgment is out of whack. This is a completely lame ad.
Where to start…
1) Laurie’s not even remotely in the same room with Norm. Hell, she probably wasn’t even in the same timezone. I’ll eat a piece of clothing if she wasn’t Chyron-ed into the ad. What does it say that these two couldn’t find a half day to be in the same shot?
2) The completely gratuitous close up of Laurie’s hand holding a coffee cup and sporting – ta-dah! – a wedding ring. What, people needed to be reminded that Norm’s married? Given #1, maybe the answer is “yes.”
3) The out-of-season alley shot. Keliher is right, we had snow for too long, but they couldn’t do an in-season shot? The juxtaposition is jarring and knocks whatever message they’re trying to impart (see #7 below) right out of people’s heads.
4) Norm goes after the “I’m whipped” vote. Watching the two “interact” (see #1 above) makes me think Laurie’s probably got more backbone than her husband; maybe she should be running instead.
5) Norm goes after the MILF vote. In addition to more backbone, Laurie looks way hotter than he does. Maybe that’s a key constituency that’s up for grabs. I know Franken is probably counting on the porn vote, but maybe that’s premature (’ba-bump”). It would definitely make for a ground-breaking keyword search ad buy on someone’s part.
6) The teeth thing. Kadet’s wife is right; even through the degradation of quality YouTube imposes, they look like they’re battery powered.
7) Sloppy writing. Back in the day we called stuff like this an “inoculation” spot in which we tried to frame – and diminish – the anticipated criticisms of our opponent. It’s effective when it’s done well but this ain’t that, IMHO. I suspect this particular one will just make people slightly nauseous.
Add it all up and I give it – at best a C-.
- Austin
PS – Starship Troopers was a much better book than the bullshit movie. An oldy but a goody by Robert Heinlein.
PPS – I went looking for the name of the brainiac consultant who masterminded this disaster (20 points to the Crowdy who can correctly identify Senator Coleman’s media consultant), but instead found out that I’m not the only one who thinks the shot is a composite. Check on Eric Black’s take on it and carefully parse the spokesperson’s comment on the topic. She doesn’t actually deny that it was a composite shot.
PPPS – Good thing I didn’t specify which piece of clothing I’ll be dining on tonight.
After looking at some outtakes from the shoot, I retract #1 – it sure does look like they were together. That said, the interaction in both the outtakes and the final product still makes it look like Laurie was delivering her lines to a green screen rather than her spouse.
I’m thinking a sauteed beret with onions and garlic might go down well.
- Austin
Pardon my reptilian brain for noticing, but why do you suppose the bananas in the fruit basket are positioned as they are relative to what direction the senator is facing at the beginning of the ad?
Fun take Gang. Frigid air (in the alley that is). Acronyms we can’t spell out. Sad bananas.
BUT…
The fact is, most of us don’t watch or ponder these ads that closely. We catch bits and pieces while pulling the household levers.
It’s not that other voters aren’t smart enough to notice those things. It’s that they are busy and generally don’t care enough about this race to notice those things. Kind of like me and hockey rules and strategy. It’s possible that even I am smart enough to understand more, but I just don’t care enough. Same with drive-by voters.
And if drive-by voters do notice a technical flaw or two, it doesn’t erase the central take-away of the ads. Yes, the flaws are an unnecessary distraction that is not helpful and the consultant should be accountable for that. But the flaws don’t wipe out all benefits.
And the benefits are there. The viewers of this ad will take something away, and I bet it will be pretty helpful to Norm. Let’s say the Colemanistas ask a representative sample of the 30-ish% of Minnesotan still in play (undecideds and leaners) the following questions a couple weeks after this ad wraps up:
- What political ads do you recall seeing in the last few months?
- Is Norm Coleman a family man?
- What kind of person do you think Norm Coleman is?
Family man. Decent guy. Compared to the pre-ad state, I bet they will make good progress in these areas, even among the relative few who may have noticed the technical flaws noted.
Yes, you may say, but will more people say that they think Norm has an independent voting record, the central policy claim of the ad. Maybe a few, I’d guess, but not a lot. Ken is right. The personal part drowns out the policy part.
But my point is this ad is primarily about advancing Norm The Person more than Norm The Policymaker. We policy wonks ignore that benefit at our own peril. The last 10% of Minnesotans who remain undecided until the end often make their decisions based on things like “seems like a slightly better guy.” This kind of ad helps on that front.
[...] in April, Loveland dissected and thumbed-up the now-famous Norm Coleman ad in which he takes out the trash at his wife’s [...]