pathetic politics

chopitdown

First the numbers.Spending by the two party committees tells part of the story. According to the Federal Election Commission, so far in this election cycle the NRCC has spent $41.9 million attacking Democratic opponents and $5 million supporting its own candidates, roughly an 8:1 negative-to-positive ratio. The DCCC has spent $18 million and $3.1 million, respectively, for a 5:1 ratio. Most of that money on both sides is spent on television advertising.

We zoomed in for a closer look, reviewing all ads by the DCCC and NRCC that appeared since Labor Day in any of the top 101 television markets, which reach 87 per cent of American TV viewers. Copies of the ads were supplied to us by the Campaign Media Analysis Group . Of the 115 NRCC ads, we judged 91 per cent to be purely negative. The DCCC's 104 ads included 81 per cent we found to be purely negative.We found very few on either side that were all positive, but the DCCC's contained more mixed or "comparative" ads –a mix of positive statements about the supported candidate and negative statements about the opponent.
http://www.factcheck.org/article460.html

Hope&Anger

chopitdown wrote:

First the numbers.Spending by the two party committees tells part of the story. According to the Federal Election Commission, so far in this election cycle the NRCC has spent $41.9 million attacking Democratic opponents and $5 million supporting its own candidates, roughly an 8:1 negative-to-positive ratio. The DCCC has spent $18 million and $3.1 million, respectively, for a 5:1 ratio. Most of that money on both sides is spent on television advertising.

We zoomed in for a closer look, reviewing all ads by the DCCC and NRCC that appeared since Labor Day in any of the top 101 television markets, which reach 87 per cent of American TV viewers. Copies of the ads were supplied to us by the Campaign Media Analysis Group . Of the 115 NRCC ads, we judged 91 per cent to be purely negative. The DCCC's 104 ads included 81 per cent we found to be purely negative.We found very few on either side that were all positive, but the DCCC's contained more mixed or "comparative" ads –a mix of positive statements about the supported candidate and negative statements about the opponent.
http://www.factcheck.org/article460.html

Thanks for posting this. The whole article in that link was really interesting . . . and depressing. No wonder people don't vote.

It's sad that our politics seem directed at convincing people that politicians are corrupt scumbags and therefore discouraging voters from voting. But these ads work -- they work by suppressing voter turnout rather than promoting it -- but they work. That's why we're forced to watch them every campaign season.

chopitdown

Hope&Anger wrote:

Thanks for posting this. The whole article in that link was really interesting . . . and depressing. No wonder people don't vote.

It's sad that our politics seem directed at convincing people that politicians are corrupt scumbags and therefore discouraging voters from voting. But these ads work -- they work by suppressing voter turnout rather than promoting it -- but they work. That's why we're forced to watch them every campaign season.

We no longer vote for ideas...we vote against one person