Laughing Matters: Our 99% Solution For Negative Political Ads

The next time we see or hear a negative political campaign ad, we should just laugh.

Laugh in disbelief. Laugh out of frustration. Laugh because we’re not stupid. Laugh because no one can buy our votes. Laugh to chase away our fears. Laugh because we won’t be manipulated. Laugh because we’re keeping score.

Laugh in disbelief because political ad spending across the U.S. will reach about $10 billion in 2012, up from $7 billion in 2008. Just what our country needs, a 40%ish increase in anything involving politics.

Laugh out of frustration because negative political ads hijack our time. Between January 23th and 29th, 11,586 television spots ran during the Republican primary in Florida. So far in 2012, 69% of all presidential campaign TV ads have been negative. Just imagine between now and November.

Laugh because we’re not stupid. Super PACs (political action committees) are formed to influence the outcome of elections. A super PAC can legally receive unlimited donations as long as the money is spent independently from a candidate’s campaign. Any cooperation or coordination would be illegal. Yet family members of candidates have set up super PACs. Candidates and super PACs share consulting firms. Former campaign officials of 2008 are staff on super PACs for the same candidates in 2012. Now consider that through mid July, super PAC’s have received $306 million in contributions. Part of this money has been used to fund political ads. Presidential campaign TV ads from the top 3 super PACs have been 90% negative. So laugh because we’re not stupid and we know that super PACs are just ways to manipulate the law and fill our heads with negative political ads.

Laugh because no one can buy our votes. Almost $100M or 63% of total donations to super PACs have come from 50 very wealthy contributors. Forbes has reported that one billionaire may contribute $100M to super PACs in 2012. Much of this money will finance political ads to buy our votes. 90% of the presidential campaign TV ads for the top 3 super PACs so far have been negative. These wealthy contributors spend their money to promote their agenda for our country. But what does their agenda have in common with the agenda of middle class Americans? Healthcare? Jobs? Home ownership? Education? Retirement? Social security? Medicare? Common sense says we shouldn’t buy the agendas that super PACS are selling. And as a result, super PACs won’t be able to buy our votes.

Laugh to chase away our fears because millions of dollars from anonymous donors have poured into politically active nonprofit groups (501(c)(4)s) who do not have to disclose the names of these donors due to certain provisions in our tax and election laws. Super PACs, however, must disclose their contributors to the Federal Election Commission. Crossroads GPS, is such a politically active nonprofit group. It has received 23 contributions of $1 million or more totalling $67 million from undisclosed donors with one donor giving $10 million. The advertising for Crossroads GPS has been 100% negative. So who are these donors? People? Corporations? Foreign interests trying to influence US politics? What do they expect in return for such large political contributions? Because we don’t know and because they are spending millions to influence our voting, we should be very afraid.

Laugh because we won’t be manipulated. Product advertising relies upon information to persuade us to buy something. There are legal consequences to false product advertising. Yet negative political advertising relies on misquotes, soundbites, distortions and misinformation all of which are methods of manipulation and not persuasion. A recent Annenburg study found that the top politically active nonprofit groups spent 85% of their dollars on ads that were deceptive. We should make it very simple for ourselves as voters in 2012. There will be consequences this year. Candidates who rely heavily on negative political ads are manipulative people and we won’t be manipulated by them.

Laugh because we’re keeping score. We will experience a blizzard of campaign ads between now and November. Candidates and their super PACs and non profits who extensively use negative campaign ads will tell us what lengths they will go to to defeat their opponents and little if anything about their own candidacies. Candidates using more neutral to positive ads are likely to tell us what they will do if actually elected with less emphasis on their opponents. Political ads do affect our opinions so we all wind up keeping a mental score card. We should keep the scoring simple. The candidate who runs the fewest negative ads is the candidate we prefer.

Let’s establish a standard for ourselves and candidates regarding political ads. The only ads that we should consider are ads that start or end with a statement or graphic that says the candidate endorses this ad. The ad material should tell us what the candidate’s position is on an issue or policy and why his/her position is better than their opponent’s positions. That’s it. Anything else will probably be laughable.

You may think this is no laughing matter. You may feel there is nothing you can do. But our laughter empowers us. We can refuse to listen. We can refuse to be manipulated. We can laugh privately. We can laugh out loud. We can laugh with a friend. We can hold a political laugh-in party. After all, our laughter will cause those running negative political ads to throw away billions of dollars.

I’ve tried to keep this as non-partisan as possible. If you want to determine which party relies more heavily negative ads, then use Politico or The Center for Responsive Politics to begin your research.

Our nation faces numerous and significant issues in large part because our politicians have become so ideological and polarized that government has become dysfunctional. We may disagree on priorities and policies but we should agree that it is time we demand political campaigns that elect candidates who will govern using solutions not slogans, statesmanship not street fighting, compromise not conflict, responsibility not recklessness, facts not fiction, decision not deferral, commitment not contradiction and patriotism not partisan politics.

Share this far and wide across your social network. If our laughter becomes loud or “viral” enough, it will be the message to politicians that becomes the 99% solution to negative campaign advertising in our country.

This blog was first published as an article in Technorati entitled “Laughing Matters: Our 99% Solution for Negative Political Ads.”

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