November 4, 2006
Do you want fries with that?
By Bill Kraus
My travels have taken me to Minnesota and the East Coast in the weeks leading up to the election of 2006.
I can report, without fear of contradiction, that crooks and rogues are running for office in Minnesota, New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. You already know about the Wisconsin choices.
They are similar elsewhere.
The only exceptions are the shoo-ins like Hillary in New York and Herb in Wisconsin. They are running positive, sweetheart, beauty contest advertising.
Every other campaign that is important enough to have the money needed to run television advertising is trying to persuade the viewers to vote against someone. (I have not, incidentally, seen a single political ad in a newspaper).
The only time the candidate who is paying for the ad appears in these blasts is at the end of the presentation when they admit who they are and that they approve of these atrocities.
So it has come down to this.
Campaigns talk about the sins of opponents.
Campaigns do not talk much about ideas and only occasionally about accomplishments.
The winners are mostly those candidates who have the most money to spend on media and on talent to produce the best commercials.
Campaigns make the members of the campaign management industry (a relatively new phenomenon) and the owners of television stations rich.
It’s fast food politics, and the voters are the customers.
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