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Change Your Life! |
Unpleasantly, it has come down to 'rats' & cats |
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News
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September 14, 2000
WASHINGTON (AP) - A Republican commercial that subtly flashes the word "RATS" across the TV screen is coming off the air amid allegations the Republicans were trying to send a subliminal message about Al Gore. George W. Bush, the Republican candidate, called the notion "bizarre and weird," and his campaign made light of it all. The Republican ad's maker said he was just trying to make the spot visually interesting. But Gore's campaign and experts in political advertising said the word choice - as an announcer was denouncing Gore's Medicare plan to subsidize drug prescriptions for the elderly - could hardly have been an accident. "I've never seen anything like it," the vice president said Tuesday in Middletown, Ohio. His Democratic running mate Joseph Lieberman called the ad "very disappointing and strange." Bush noted that the word appears only fleetingly - for a tiny fraction of a second. Played at full speed, it's barely noticeable, particularly if the viewer isn't looking for the word. Gore aides reveled in the story, which they leaked to the press after being alerted by a careful TV viewer in Seattle. Gore maintained a slight edge over Bush in several presidential polls. He led 48-42 among likely voters in a CNN-USA Today-Gallup tracking poll, 49-41 among likely voters in a Newsweek poll over the weekend and 47-38 among likely voters in a poll by ICR of Media, Pennsylvania. A CBS-New York Times poll out Tuesday had Gore at 46 percent and Bush at 42 percent among registered voters. An NBC-Wall Street Journal poll out Monday and a Voter.com Battleground tracking poll out Tuesday showed the race virtually even, which has been the consensus of most of the national polls taken since the Democratic convention in Los Angeles. The "rats" ad, which has been running in several states for more than two weeks, touts Bush's plan for adding prescription drugs to Medicare, arguing that senior citizens will have more control over their health care under Bush's proposal. Gore's plan, the ad says, will be run by bureaucrats. Words flash on the screen to echo the announcer's message: "The Gore prescription plan: Bureaucrats decide." But just as the announcer says "bureaucrats decide," the word "RATS," in large, white capital letters, fills the black screen. Alex Castellanos, who made the ad for the Republican National Committee, said he flashed the letters - the tail end of "bureaucrats" - so the ad would look more visually interesting and it was just a coincidence it came out "rats." Outside analysts said they found it hard to believe the word was not deliberately placed. "The word 'rats' is so carefully superimposed. It's not like it just randomly appears on the screen," said Darrell West, an expert on political advertising at Brown University. "It's cheap and manipulative. It certainly takes the level of political discourse down several notches," said Loyal Rue, who studies political deception at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa. Bush made it clear he does not endorse subliminal messages. The term itself gave him trouble all day, repeatedly coming out as "subliminable." For its part, the RNC argued that the story is old. Two weeks ago, Fox News Channel noted that the word "rats" flashed on screen - a report that evidentally did not prompt the RNC to change the ad. "This is not a new story," RNC Chairman Jim Nicholson said in a statement.
The ad has run for more than two weeks, and Bush's communications director, Karen Hughes, said it was being replaced Tuesday as scheduled. The RNC already has spent some dlrs 2.5 million to air it in 33 markets. In 1974, the Federal Communications Commission adopted a policy saying that subliminal advertising was contrary to the public interest. If the FCC received a complaint, it would investigate broadcasters who aired the ad, but no complaints have been received about this ad, officials said. Even if it was intentional, subliminal messages aren't necessarily effective, said Bill Benoit, who studies political advertising at the University of Missouri. "There's no conclusive evidence that it works," he said. "Of course, that doesn't stop advertisers."
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