A reader who has some access to media buy figures in the 29th wrote to question the effectiveness of third-party media campaigns in the district. Pointing out that the most recent campaign will air 250 ads this week in Rochester, and none in Corning or Elmira, this reader argues that the ads end up being a "media splash" that won't really make an effective impression on area residents.
Though I wasn't able to independently confirm those numbers, the publicly-available information on April's anti-war ad indicates that the initial buy for that campaign was even smaller: 120 ads. These are $10-20K buys, far less than the hundreds of thousands spent for the seemingly constant ads we saw during the last election.
Since these ad campaigns are small, I think two conclusions can be drawn from the attention they've been given in blogs and in the mainstream media of the 29th. The first is that this reader is right: the media splash accompanying the ad campaigns is probably seen by more people than the ads themselves. This is especially true for the most recent ads, because Batiste's firing from CBS news gave the story a second day of life. The second conclusion is that the ads probably won't significantly impact attitudes about the war in the 29th. There just aren't going to be enough eyeballs seeing the ads for them to have a mass effect.
Though the ads themselves won't change attitudes, I think the Batiste story, which stands on its own apart from the ads, is still an important one. Batiste is making a principled stand, and it's hard to dismiss him as either uninformed or a partisan.
Comments
It's hard to envision a scenario where people that are going to vote have not already made up their minds about the war, Republican rule and George Bush. So the only real question left is that of Congressional provincialism: "Republicans are all bums except my guy." In this regard, the campaign might do some small amount of damage to that relationship that prevents Randy Kuhl from suffering the affects of his own voting record.
Of course as you say, there wasn't that much airplay for the ads themselves and the rest was all spin on national news shows. But since they didn't invest that much money, either, they probably didn't plan on that much in the first place. Here's another good question, then: we know negative ads work in election campaigns, but what about the rest of the time? Does bombarding the airwaves with attacks help or hurt your cause?
I'm just thinking that perhaps they intended to say their peace and let the voters stew on it in their own time.
You raise some good questions.
I haven't seen any studies on the effectiveness of campaign ads of any kind so far from the election. The expressed goal of the ad is to get a constituent to communicate with Kuhl, an act which might or might not make any difference. The underlying goal is to keep Iraq in the minds of voters and link Kuhl to the failures in Iraq. Both of those, as you say, are working on people who probably already have pretty set views on Kuhl, Bush and on Iraq.
In general, the challenge for Dems is to find issues other than Iraq where they can show residents of the 29th that a change in their Congressman would lead to a change for them. Iraq probably won't be the hot-button next Fall that it is today.
Amen to that – issues other than Iraq will decide the congressional races. If the Iraq war stays the way it is (not getting much better or worse) the only folks that will really be incensed about it are the folks off to the far left (just as the only people who will really be excited about it are people to the far right).
The republican base got soft in 2006 mostly on the handling of government spending. Bush will be gone for 2008 and a good candidate could get the base excited again. Also, the state ticket was loaded with democrat winners in 2006 and people knew that ahead of time. Despite all that, Massa actually received about 17,000 less votes than Barend did in 2004.
I do think that the 29th can be in play again in 2008, but Iraq by itself won’t be enough to swing it to Massa.
So, Elmer, do you think that the Republicans who are concerned about spending are going to be convinced by more promises from a Republican? The only President to produce a balanced budget in the last quarter century was a Democrat, but still fiscal conservatives seem to reflexively vote for Republicans. I understand that there may be other issues involved, but 8 years of Bush, combined with a compliant Republican Congress for 6 of those years, makes any claim of fiscal restraint proffered by a Republican a bit suspicious.
I agree that a good Republican candidate could get the base excited again, but who's that? It seems like the Republicans are in the same boat in '08 as the Democrats were in '04 - looking for a better alternative. Maybe Rudy has local appeal: does he excite Republicans because he's a New Yorker?
By the way, Massa receiving less votes than Barend in '06 isn't a sign of weakness - it isn't really a sign of much, actually. Turnout in midterm elections is always lower than Presidential elections.
No question that Clinton (and that particular republican congress) did a much better job with the budget than Bush (and this particular republican congress) did. What I am saying is that a good republican candidate will go back to the party’s core values of fiscal restraint and that would excite the republican base enough to maybe not win the presidency but keep traditional republican districts in republican hands.
Who will get the base excited? I don’t see anyone now, but a year and a half before the 1992 elections, the first President Bush was rolling along with approval percentages in the 80s and the democrats hadn’t really found anyone yet. At that time, President Clinton was only known as the southern governor who gave a long, boring opening night address at the 1988 Democrat convention. He was actually jeered by some delegates. Clinton turned out to be so charismatic that people forget not much was expected of him until he actually campaigned for the 1992 nomination. Perhaps there is some republican who can do the same as President Clinton did.
I agree that another candidate might turn up, but the early mega-primaries are going to make it tough unless someone jumps in fairly soon.
Then again, according to the "experts", Howard Dean was going to run away with the Democratic nomination in 2004, if you believed what you read in the Fall of 2003.
As I think you pointed out, Rottenchester, the ads were run in the North and not in the Southern Tier. Down here there are a lot of stubbornly Republican voters, but now seems to be the ideal time to attack Kuhl as a rubber stamp and someone behind the curve on the war. Randy isn't answering the ads with his own, and its become common knowledge that the Republicans have wasted our money on a useless war. The mainstream media have finally accepted that and are reinforcing the message. If a Southern Tier Republican voter was ever vulnerable to new ideas, this is that time. On the other hand the ads preach to the choir in the North.