Monday, October 17, 2022

The limits of political ads

Walter Shapiro is a wise old political writer. He observes:

Politics is always a struggle for the future rather than a toast of gratitude for the past ...

Messaging by both parties is probably overrated in our saturated media environment. Political ad spending during the 2022 midterms is expected to approach $10 billion. Amid this cacophony of voice-of-doom attack ads, it will be hard for even the cleverest messaging to break through to swing voters and the politically under-motivated. ...

Mostly, political ads are boring. Every once in a while, someone makes a charming one that breaks through. I count this one of those, from Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Tim Ryan, running in Ohio.

Not my aesthetic or my politics, but sweet in its own terms. Ryan is a surprisingly telegenic figure for someone running on white-working class cred in a white working-class state. He's about as suitable a candidate as Dems could have found. Just maybe, he'll succeed against the odds in a state turning hard right. We can hope so.

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