Attack advertisements have been around since people were yelling political slogans from horse carts. Everybody intends to make one or two jabs at the competition but in earlier days this was used as a genuine campaign tactic. With the influence of mass communication, invested voters can simply check the record of a politician. So why has the Virginia gubernatorial election been dominated by smear campaigns?
According to recent transmissions through the omniscient glowing tell-a-box, I have been told that Republican candidate Bob McDonnell is a backwards woman hater who wants us to throw away all of our condoms. I have also heard that Democratic candidate Creigh Deeds is a blithering idiot and a liar who doesn’t know how to simultaneously fund a government and not raise taxes. Neither person sounds like a decent public representative, but for some reason these seem to be our two best options.
I am being facetious to make a point. Any intelligent person can determine these attack ads and outrageously out of context. It takes time and energy to understand a person and know their motivations, especially when you considering whether they are worthy to hold public office. That requires effort, which is something neither candidate wants voters to expend.
Let us consider the reasoning behind attack ads such as the “Bob McDonnell doesn’t support women’s rights” ads. Clearly these ads are targeted toward women voters, in one dramatic spot a woman simply asks, “Why would you vote that way?” They intend to brand McDonnell as someone who is attempting to subvert women’s rights by defending unequal wages, denying rights to contraception and taking away a woman’s “right to choose.” If this is the case (which it isn’t) then all of the female voters will vote for Creigh Deeds because he is not Bob McDonnell. Wait a second. What just happened there? Logic was overruled by immediate emotional conclusions.
The governor doesn’t have the power to restrict women’s rights, and I think he would have a hard time keeping wages unequal when 46 percent of the work force is now female according to the U.S. Department of Labor. Women’s rights are still progressively moving forward but overall it is unlikely that one conservative governor is going to divert the course of half of the people in the U.S.- not to mention this is an attack ad. All of these statements are created by the opposition and are not truly informative. The truth is most of this advertisement was pulled from a master’s thesis that was written by candidate McDonnell more than 20 years ago. The Washington Post discovered the paper after McDonnell mentioned it in passing at an interview.
In the subsequent article by the Washington Post explaining McDonnell’s current views and how they relate to his old thesis, the record shows that yes, he votes for initiatives that support traditional families. However, none of the allegations in the attack ad are factually on point. The ad glosses and gleans, citing a few lines out of an outdated, 93-page paper.
The truly sinister thing about this attack ad isn’t so much that it insinuates and incites anger but that it wastes time and money. For those 30 seconds of airtime Creigh Deeds could have explained a future program in his proposed administration or explained a review of a tax code or a real state problem. Instead he lambasted the opposition because it would predictably gather a large swath of voters to his “side.” When both sides do this, the voters get nothing but a bitter taste in their mouths, and campaign funds that could have been used to promote ideas are exhausted for the dispersion of insults.
Every time an allegation comes out in an attack ad, concerned voters have to meticulously sift through files to discover whether or not they’re true. It complicates the decision-making process and obscures the fact that neither party can set specific and attainable goals if it is elected. It requires effort to bear these unscrupulous wastes, which build up like so much noticeable trash. Candidates who put out attack ads like this should be disapproved of by both sides of the aisle, lest some boob actually believes they are an accurate representation of truth.