Politics

The current President of the United States, Donald Trump is an idiot and a bully. What is the saying? We reap what we sow. A scary thought. Still, you believe Trump is an aberration that will soon be corrected. You hope. Either way, you know the next President will be flawed too, same as you, same as everyone. Hopefully, he or she won’t be as flawed. Sadly, it’s a low bar. Even you are less marked than this President. Politicians seldom inspire you. Obama did for a while. JFK. When you vote, it has always been for the candidate with least flaws.

Both Sides Burning, What Have We Wrought? Fomenting Extremism In The West.

Becoming a monster to defeat the monster

 

After watching the brutal second-to-last episode of Game of Thrones I turned on a news channel to alleviate my discomfort. What was I thinking? Bear with me, I’m going to start in an unusual place…

I’m troubled by the vilification of highly literate and educated people, labeling them “elitists.” Once upon a time, the most learned among us were undisputed and logical choices to run companies and govern nations. Regardless of their privilege and pretense, cultivated individuals were valued above all else. After all, didn’t we want the smartest people running things? Fallible wisdom is better than uncontested brutishness.

The populist agenda would have us believe otherwise. Higher education is for entitled liberals and rogue progressives. Such elitists don’t care about hardworking Americans, they say. Professors and scientists live in ivory towers. They are so out of touch. Learning is thusly framed as a luxury i.e. elitist. Only snobs have the luxury to care about esoteric things like Truth and Beauty.

There are kernels of truth in such notions; that is why they become popular in the first place. Yet, it’s paradoxical. We all aspire to be successful geniuses even as we relish dismantling those who are. The rich are evil. Yet everyone plays the lottery.

We reap what we sow. Populism has become the new normal. Any satisfaction seeing a Washington elite lose the 2016 presidential election has been replaced by something far more depressing and sinister. We have a dumb-ass for a President. And when absolute power is given to a dumb-ass we all get screwed.

That said the other side has taken the bait of outrage, fomenting extremism. As the POTUS has gone low so, too, have they. To fight the monster they have become one, unwittingly or otherwise. The insidious political correctness demanded by the “smart” and “woke” has made speaking one’s mind a minefield. God forbid you do not walk and talk a certain way. You will be shunned. You will be fired. Or worse. The outraged have become an angry mob. Journalism is no longer objective. Media channels are mouthpieces for one side or the other, both equally repugnant. I am as sick of CNN as I am of Fox.

In this crucible of correctness socialism feels like a reasonable idea, an antidote. It is neither. Power to the people is merely a bizarro form of populism, a ploy fronting as a bold idea. At first the Mother of Dragons was the Breaker of Chains, freeing the oppressed and punishing their captors. She was a good idea, too. Spoiler alert: She isn’t anymore. Give anyone absolute power and invariably all goes to shit. An angry mob created this government. Now an angry mob wants to take it out. What is the common denominator? An angry mob. Brandishing their hash tags like Valyrian steel.

I want my leaders to be literate and temperate. I want them to be smarter than me, vastly so. So that they have the courage to forsake righteousness for compromise, to ask for help in difficult matters, to be able to say the three bravest three words of all: “I don’t know.”

Universally thought to be in the bag, how on earth did Adland bungle this pitch?

Falling on deaf ears?

Like Hollywood and all its stars, the vast majority of Adland despised the idea of a Donald Trump presidency. Which is why for many months so many of us rallied for a different outcome. The best and brightest from our tribe, hired by the DNC, or of their own volition, created films and microsites and social programs in a righteous effort to see the one time First Lady become the first lady President of theses United States and, with perhaps even more ardor, to make certain one very strange and polarizing man didn’t. Emulating the luminaries in La La Land we had our Goodby and Droga and all their get doing everything imaginable so that America voted one way and not another.

Funny or Die presented an entire movie mocking Donald Trump. Baldwin killed with his impersonation of DT on SNL. Poignant commercials told us “our children are watching” as clips of The Donald ran before their innocent eyes. The Tonite Show. The Daily Show. All the shows – ranted and raved. We made memes and anthems. Jay Z and Beyonce’ stood by Mrs. Clinton swearing a blue streak for blue states. The sitting POTUS boldly stated that Donald Trump was “not fit for the office” and we made endless propaganda to support that claim. Oh, those ripping hashtags. So many followers. So many Likes. So many shares.

And yet.

All the Kings horses and all the King’s men couldn’t put Hillary Clinton back together again. Donald Trump won. And he did it with a clown car for support and a fraction of the money.

In Washington the autopsies are well under way. Blaming the FBI. Blaming racist America. Blaming men. And, with eyes to the floor, blaming their candidate as well as themselves. How could we let this happen? They rightfully ask. Were we so wrong? That wildfire will rage for months to come.

And so I must ask the same questions of our industry. Was our strategy and creative so wrong? How did we bungle a pitch we thought so certain we’d won?

I did not create any content for this election but I am available to do so for you: https://steffanwork.wordpress.com/

Will new ad depicting the real Donald Trump (in front of our children) shame us into voting for Hillary Clinton?

Not in front of the kids!

Have you seen this latest TV commercial from the Clinton campaign deriding Donald Trump? As far as political advertisements go, it’s pretty tight. Well produced anyway. The execution unfolds with scenes of Donald Trump laying some of his most well-known verbal turds: mocking the handicapped. Disparaging Mexicans. Et-cetera.

However, showing the world DT’s gross behavior is nothing new. And, oh by the way, it doesn’t work. At least it hasn’t so far. After all, the DNC tried such tactics during the primaries and it only seemed to strengthen his position as the potential Republican nominee. He, of course, would later win the bid in a landslide.

So, what’s different about this particular salvo? Well, now there are children watching Donald Trump say all these crude and stupid things. The theory being, obviously, that if we weren’t ashamed of Donald Trump before we should reconsider knowing that “our children are watching us” and waiting to see which candidate we choose to be President. Will it be the racist buffoon or (shown here in the least screeching way possible) an almost matriarchal Hillary Clinton?

Does the ad work? Well, first of all, it need only do so on the undecided. Getting the previously shameless to feel otherwise for the sake of “the children” is a wobbly argument. Plus, children have always been used as pawns during political debate. In its own way the tactic is shameful.

That all said, the spot works on me. It reinforces my belief that the devil I know (Clinton) is better than someone incapable of making it through a speech, interview or conversation without shitting on himself and countless others. The possibility of a Trump Presidency makes the otherwise depressing scenario of “business as usual” seem like the only sane option.

Dems is denial? Once again, the same wrong strategy is why new anti-Trump TV commercials won’t work.

More of the same…

A bunch of new ads began running yesterday against Donald Trump for President. Like earlier ads they focus entirely on Trump’s infamously nasty comments directed toward women over the years. One in particular stands out because it puts these misogynistic sound bites into the mouths of regular women. I say “stands out” because in a normal universe it would be an atomic bomb for Trump’s candidacy.

But this is not a normal universe. And like all the other ads taking Donald “at his word” it will do nothing to change the course of this election. In the end, Donald may not win but it won’t be because of these ads.

Here’s why. The awful things Donald Trump says about women, minorities and ideas and people in general are what made him so popular in the first place. Why the Dem’s keep thinking he’s his own worst enemy is a fatal flaw in their strategy. He is the GOP’s presumptive nominee (like it or not) precisely because he talks smack. People, lots of people, find his candor, albeit buffoonish, to be highly refreshing and a change of pace from, well, anything they’ve seen or heard before from a politician.

it’s working.

Frankly, by dramatizing his words in ever more creative executions Trump’s rivals are only strengthening his position. Why they don’t see it this way defies logic and, moreover, will hurt the Democratic bid, maybe even mortally.

If I were proposing an ad campaign to thwart Donald Trump, I would do ads that point out his utter cluelessness in terms of policy. I would not attack the inherent racism of his “building a wall against Mexico” I would state he has absolutely no way to actually do it, let alone “get Mexico to pay for it.” The Mexican President has already said that his country has absolutely no intention to pay for anything of the kind. And he won’t. Period. End of story. Therefore, I would challenge Mr. Trump –in ads, in debates, everywhere- on just how in hell he intends to do it. He can’t and deep down we know he can’t. But until that truth is brought to light, and so many other truths, his fan base will continue to grow.

But the Democrats and their Super Pacs keeping wasting time on the smokescreen that is Donald Trump’s shocking statements. In a weird yet undeniable way, it makes the Dems seem out of touch with reality, which only helps the Trump machine get stronger. Trump has a foul mouth. We know that. Go after his brain. Do you want me to write the ads for you?