Originally Posted By plpeters70 <<Thank goodness we can now forward through commercials on live tv.>> That does raise a good question - how many people actually watch these commercials anymore? I mean, the only reason I know anything about these ads is because our news organizations make such a big deal about them. Otherwise I'd never see them - I fast forward through almost all advertising with my DVR. Someone must be watching - otherwise they wouldn't be spending all that money to run these ads. But I have to wonder what the real return is on their investment. And how low would it be if the "news" media wasn't out there running stories about each and every one of them?
Originally Posted By ecdc Depends on where you live. The only political ads I see are to remove Obama from the ballot because he's not a U.S. citizen (no, I'm not kidding). But I bet if you live in Florida, Ohio, Virginia, Colorado, etc, they get really old really fast.
Originally Posted By Goofyernmost During the commentary it was stated that they didn't think that the commercial actually made the public airwaves. But somehow MSNBC got a copy of it and showed it. I don't call that very responsible either. Someone does an ad that the (name your politician here) doesn't have any say in and they run with it and blame the person for it. Sorry, but that's just sensationalism and a measure of just how desperate the news media is for something to shake their collective heads over and say how awful it is but mostly for something to talk about so they don't have dead air.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 <<Someone does an ad that the (name your politician here) doesn't have any say in and they run with it and blame the person for it.>> I have to question just how far removed these PACs really are from the candidates. I find it hard to believe that there's really no connection - surely someone from the campaigns is in touch with these people in some form. <<but mostly for something to talk about so they don't have dead air.>> Probably. I swear, our 24-hour news media is going to be the death of this country.
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 <<Depends on where you live>> Well with the recall, we've pretty much had ads since the start of last year.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <I have to question just how far removed these PACs really are from the candidates. I find it hard to believe that there's really no connection - surely someone from the campaigns is in touch with these people in some form.> I think it depends on the pac or superpac. Thanks to my archconservative uncle, and the fact that even the groups I like tend to spread email lists around, I get email from left wing, far left wing, right wing, and far right wing groups. Some of them ask you to contribute 20 bucks so they can put an ad on that they're sure will mean the end of Obama or Romney's campaign. It's just that devastating. And we only need 20 bucks so we can air this ad twice in up to 3 states. But it'll be so devastating, that's all it'll take. And did we mention it'll only take 20 bucks? In other words, some of these groups (especially on the left) are pretty small potatoes, and I doubt that the campaigns pay them much mind. Others are much bigger and better funded, and I wonder myself sometimes if they're coordinating with the campaigns proper. That's supposed to be illegal, of course. In short, it's hard to tell - especially since everything can be so anonymous these days - if an unfair ad you see has any imprimatur from the campaign it's supporting or not. However - there's no question that the blatantly lying Romney ad on welfare is from Romney himself. He's Mitt Romney and he approved that message. And it's a lie.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 It wouldn't surprise me if we saw some really, REALLY nasty ads in the very last days of the campaign, filled with lies. In the last seconds, you'd see at the bottom "sponsored by The Blah Blah Group." Perhaps an enterprising reporter would investigate who the Blah Blah Group is, and come up largely empty, because the only public address is a PO Box in Podunk, ND. And if some really enterprising reporter managed to make it to ND, he might find it owned by shell company nestled inside another shell company, nestled inside another. Only AFTER the election (if then) would we find out that it was owned and financed by the Koch Brothers Superpac, for instance. So they wouldn't put it out under their already opaque-but-at-least-we-know-the-name superpac, but some entity they created just for the purpose of getting really nasty and false, just before the election, knowing no one could get to the bottom of it in just a few days. Thus the Romney campaign, and even the official Koch superpac, could say "Hey, it wasn't us. We don't know who the Blah Blah Group is." (And yes, the Democrats could do this too.) Anyone want to take any bets that something like this happens? If not in the presidential race, then in senate and house races?
