Tag: message

Hunting Demon Sheep

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

The Chuck DeVore for Senate campaign has declared open season on Demon Sheep.  Visitors to demonsheep.org can squish, shear, crisp, or mock the ill-conceived star of a Carly Fiorina campaign video:

Aside from being a fun concept, the microsite does all the right things – it lets users share their demon sheep hunting with friends, and hits hunters up for small donations.

The original “Demon Sheep” web video was designed to distinguish Fiorina from GOP primary opponent Tom Campbell – casting Campbell as a FCINO, or “Fiscal Conservative in Name Only.”  The campy quasi-religious imagery a low-budget sheep costume that looks like it was a pilfered sample from a carpet store made for internet mockery.  But it also made for viral viewing, giving an audience for the negative points the video makes about Campbell.

Though the Demon Sheep video doesn’t mention DeVore, he’s doing his best to capitalize – and as Matt Lewis and I discussed weeks ago, DeVore’s campaign stands to gain the most if Fiorina and Campbell descend into a harshly negative campaign that damages both.

This effort can be successful in targeting conservative activists nationwide for support and donations.  The drawback for the DeVore folks is timing.  Demon Sheep is a month old, and while bizarre, the opportunity to latch onto the initial wave of coverage has long passed.

On the air for government health care

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

With Congressional Republicans and President Obama putting on a meeting that could make Bill Lumbergh ask you to go ahead and drop hemlock in his coffee, Organizing for America is pushing its supporters to talk radio to advocate the expanded government control of health care.

OFA’s radio site gives users everything they need to be good soldiers  the government health care army.   The site provides a link so advocates can listen into various programs and phone numbers to call in.  If they are having trouble getting through, the advocates can click through to another show’s information quickly.  A “Calling Tips” section prepares them for what to expect and how to deal with hosts that challenge their views; and a clear list of talking points helps them stay on message.

The site – and the tactic of calling in to radio shows – will likely not change a single person’s mind about government health care.  After all, most of the folks  listening to Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, or even news radio probably have their mind made up.  But there are two important possible results that could come of this:

  1. It’s important for any side in a political debate to have voices that come from outside of Washington.  If Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and Barack Obama are the voices of government health care, it is hard for the average voter to identify with their side.  It’s much easier to identify with someone who calls into a news show; for government health care advocates, injecting their views into the debate through the grassroots is vital.
  2. Making the case for personal ownership of health care is not hard, but it’s much more difficult to make that case to someone who has a personal story to tell.  Further, a bombastic conservative talk radio host – with no electorate to answer to in pursuing the goal of entertaining radio – may slip up and insult an opposing caller.  Whether a conservative host is flummoxed by a personal testimonial or overly aggressive, it’s a clip of a voice from the right sounding stupid on health care.  Enough of those clips can indeed change people’s minds.

The key to the site’s success is the “Report your Call” function – something which allows OFA to at once track progress and people.  Remember, the next campaign is just around the corner.

Palin vs. Family Guy: IT’S A TRAP!

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

It’s old news, but the Sarah Palin v. Family Guy flap shows the danger of dabbling in pop culture references without doing some homework.

The former Governor of Alaska made headlines by smacking Family Guy for a Down Syndrome-afflicted character who claimed her mother was “the former governor of Alaska.”  And all of a sudden, it’s the early 1990s again, when Dan Quayle (a Republican who was named as a Vice Presidential candidate despite doubts about his readiness for prime time) took a swipe at the TV show Murphy Brown when the title character had a child out of wedlock.

Family Guy is a poor target for Palin’s ire, featuring frequent jokes about a wheelchair-bound main character and occasional cameos from a Greased-up Deaf Guy.  Why start hammering Seth MacFarlane and Company for making fun of the handicapped now?

Compounding the issue for Palin is the fact that the actress who claimed to be Palin’s daughter was voiced by an actor with Down syndrome.  Suddenly, the actress is in the position of authority on how to handle the issue and Palin is an outsider to the Down syndrome community.  If MacFarlane was looking to bait Palin into looking foolish, he could not have planned it better.

This also makes for another early 1990s parallel: one of the Fox Network’s first hits, In Living Color, featured a handicapped superhero played by Damon Wayans.  Wayans escaped criticism because he had, as a child, suffered from a club foot.

Tea leaves and straw polls

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Ron Paul won’t win a Republican primary, but he took the CPAC straw poll this weekend.  Mitt Romney came in second with 22% to Paul’s 31%, and Sarah Palin was a distant third, with only 7%.

Paul is a bit of an odd duck as far as candidates go.  He can raise money and gin up excited activist, he appeals to thinkers and rabblerousers alike, but the CPAC straw poll will likely be the most significant election he ever wins.  Yet Ron Paul is not entirely a kook.  His small government ideas – including a very detailed monetary policy speak volumes about the same electoral sentiment that bristles at stimulus spending and bailouts.

Good candidates and campaigns understand that you must win both activists and voters.  Paul can do the former but not the latter, but his CPAC victory does provide a roadmap for Republicans eyeing the 2012 presidential nomination.  The trick is to understand the ideas Paul and other policy wonks talk about so much that they can take another step: explain what those ideas and policies mean to the American voter.

This is the missing ingredient in many of the conservative movement manifestos that have been making the rounds in recent weeks.  Honestly, no one gets excited about the idea of returning to the founding, or creating less government.  People get excited by a path forward that takes them to a better place.

This isn’t a call to nominate professors who can use charts and powerpoints to prove their correctness.  I like slogans and catch phrases.  But to really distill an issue into a meaningful sound bite, catch phrase, or slogan, one has to understand that issue.  Otherwise, the catchprase doesn’t translate meaningfully.

Ron Paul has bold new ideas about the direction the country ought to follow – and it’s an exciting vision to the Republicans at CPAC.  The ideal 2012 Republican nominee will talk about why those ideas will look like as national governing policy – and, more importantly, why they will help American citizens more.

The Contract with America ain’t walkin’ through that door

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

Washington, D.C. is concluding a week under a blanket of snow with a promise of a new Contract With America… sort of.  Under the headline, “Conservative Manifesto coming soon,” Politico reports that leaders of the inside-the-beltway Conservarati are drafting a “mission statement for the right.”

There are two problems with this.  Just as Republican presidential candidates fell all over themselves to quote Ronald Reagan in last year’s primaries, Republicans hopeful that 2010 is the next 1994 are looking to resurrect the Contract with America.

There are two problems with this.

First, establishment conservatives are not the most appropriate voices for an anti-establishment message – and if anything is clear about the electorate, it’s the anti-establishment sentiment.

Second, and more important, the original contract was a political platform, a promise to voters that, if elected, Republicans would follow a certain policy course.  It was not a statement of principles, but a set of specific policy goals.  From tea party groups to conservative organizations, the institutions creating these new Contracts are asking for something from government.

The best “Contract with America 2.0” I’ve seen was written by Matt Lewis, who actually thought through policy ideas and has proposed laws which would roll back free speech restrictions, promote personal retirement savings, and promote national security.  But forward-thinking policies should not find themselves listed under a recycled term.

The Contract with America was a great idea in 1994.  Sixteen years later, conservatives should be looking forward to the next big thing – not the last.

More late night communications

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

Thanks to teaser trailers and shifting advertising philosophy, few Superbowl ads in recent years have been noticeably different from the types of ads played throughout the football season.  But this year, one was jaw-droppingly shocking:

It’s a win for Letterman, obviously, who promoted his show with a memorable and hilarious ad.   But even in appearing in a competitor’s ad, Leno helped his own cause considerably.

As discussed before, Conan O’Brien handled his Tonight Show departure with a solid communication strategy that set him up for future success.  In part because of that, and in part because of O’Brien’s enthusiastic fan base, NBC has been faced with very public rebukes of the new arrangement.  His predecessor/successor Jay Leno has necessarily shifted to damage control mode in the month leading up to his re-assumption of hosting duties.

If Leno wants to return to the top of the ratings, he has to convince viewers he’s the same old, nice, safe Jay Leno they used to have on in the background as they fell asleep – and not a calculating, back-stabbing schmuck.  Much like voters sizing up a candidate for office, the majority of late night viewers are looking for someone likeable who doesn’t resort to petty squabbling (at least, not obviously).

Leno’s first attempt to repair his image, an interview with Oprah, had mixed results. (Seriously, who quotes Bob Sugar while trying to win sympathy?) But in filming this ad, Leno is able to diffuse the situation and put the late night shakeup in perspective.

But this isn’t all image rehab; Leno gets some real, tangible benefits as well.  Superbowl viewers were going to see an ad for the Late Show one way or another – it will likely be the highest rated program CBS airs all year, and they were not shy about pimping their own shows.  Leno’s appearance puts him in front of a large viewing audience in a positive light.  In essence, even though the ad displayed the Late Show logo, it was also an advertisement for Leno’s Tonight Show.

The content of the ad catered to Leno’s interests as well.  As Leno’s 10:00 p.m. variety hour sabotaged NBC’s local news and late-night programming, Letterman has climbed to the top ratings spot after spending a decade playing second fiddle to the Tonight Show.  So when Leno explains Letterman’s grumpiness by saying it’s “because I’m here,” it means more than just Oprah Winfrey’s Superbowl party.

And by the way, Oprah’s Superbowl party was kind of lame… perhaps it would have been better with Betty White and Abe Vigoda?

Sunday Funnies: Learning economics doesn’t have to suck

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

The President’s proposed spending freeze has touched off a debate between Keynesian liberals and free marketers over the role – and capabilities – of government spending.  Perhaps you have seen talking heads bickering about these theories, but the best way to articulate this century-old dichotomy of economic theory is, of course, a rap battle:

What does it say about the state of journalism that this actually outlines economic theories better

Conan the communications expert

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 4 Comments

Conan O’Brien may not be the host of the Tonight Show much longer, but he could have a second career in media relations.   Aside from being funny and smart, his statement this week has set the terms of NBC’s internal debate: either he remains the host of the 11:30 Tonight Show franchise, or he leaves NBC.  It cites not only the 55-year-old history of the program and it’s Mount Rushmore of hosts, but he mentions the effect on the programs after him.  He makes the case that keeping his show at 11:30 is best not only for him, but fair to everyone on the NBC schedule, making him a sympathetic figure.

The statement frames the late night drama that’s unfolding as a choice for NBC between Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien – which is a savvy move for O’Brien.  The landscape is different now than when NBC chose Leno over David Letterman to replace Johnny Carson out in 1991.  Letterman and Leno both had appeared to have decades of television ahead of them – which has proven true. But while O’Brien is in his late 40’s, Leno is 60.  The question for NBC isn’t just who hosts the Tonight Show in March 2010, but who hosts it in 2015?  (The Green Bay Packers can empathize – they had to go through the same decision with Brett Favre.)

O’Brien’s statement essentially painted this picture for NBC: Choosing Leno now means that in five years, the network could be looking for someone to man the Tonight Show desk in a crowded late-night field that includes Letterman and O’Brien.

Incidentally, it also spiked his ratings.

UPDATE: In what could be considered a self-serving blog post, a blogger for CBS News points out that O’Brien’s statement also sets the stage for a legal battle over breach of contract.

NPR’s (unnecessary) mea culpa

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

NPR has sort of apologized in a post by their ombudsman for the controversy drummed up by this cartoon:

The cartoon drew the venom of conservative commenters for both its use of the loaded term “tea-bagger” and the fact that it was summarily dismisssive of the tea party movement.  And though the cartoon has an undeniable ideological bent, the real problem here is not with NPR.  There are two issues at play.

First, conservatives in the Tea Party movement have not found a way to own the term “teabagging.”  There are ways to do so, but they require an attitude adjustment (or, some might say, an attitude problem) that many establishment conservative movement organizations are unlikely to accept.

Second – and more importantly – is an important aspect of all conservative cries of media bias.  Consider this reply from an NPR staffer:

“Would it be nice if there were other Web-original cartoons from other perspectives to run with Fiore?” said [NPR News Executive Editor Dick] Meyer. “Sure. We think there are and we’ve been looking for a while in fact. And I think criticism that we don’t have a conservative cartoon is certainly legitimate and reasonable.”

The problem isn’t really that Mark Fiore made a cartoon that skewers the right, it’s that the right isn’t in a position to skewer back.