ANTI-BUSH AD CONTEST SUBMITS SUPER BOWL COMMERCIAL

Adage.com ^ | January 13, 2004 | By Ira Teinowitz

[.cnI redruM]

WASHINGTON (AdAge.com) -- Liberal activist group MoveOn.org announced it has chosen an anti-President Bush ad to air ahead of next week's "State of the Union" address and said

The spot features young children working factory jobs to pay off the national debt. it is negotiating with CBS to gain airtime on the Super Bowl.

The winning anti-Bush TV commercial was produced by Charlie Fisher, the creative director of the Copenhagen, Denmark, office of Publicis Groupe ad agency Leo Burnett.

On own time Mr. Fisher was not available for comment at the Copenhagen office. A spokeswoman for MoveOn said Mr. Fisher created the ad "on his own time."

A spokesman at Leo Burnett USA's Chicago headquarters said the ad was shot in Denmark by a freelance director and a two-person crew who were friends of Mr. Fisher.

The Burnett spokesman said that because the work was done by an employee on his own time, the agency had nothing to do with the submission.

A spokesman for CBS said the Viacom-owned network has received the request from MoveOn to run the ad in the Super Bowl, but added that the ad has to go through standards and practices before CBS will say if it can run an advocacy ad during the game. The spokesman said he didn't think it was likely that the spot would pass standards and practices.

Competition for :30 spot The winning ad was developed after MoveOn created a competition aimed at finding a filmmaker who can articulate everything that's wrong with the Bush administration in a 30-second spot.

Mr. Fisher's spot shows young children working in a variety of manufacturing or service industry jobs -- hauling garbage, repairing tires, clerking a checkout counter -- and ends with the line "Guess who's going to pay off President Bush's $1 trillion deficit?"

A MoveOn spokesman said the ad, which was chosen from a number of entries, will have an initial national run starting with a $300,000 CNN buy that breaks Jan. 17 and runs through Jan. 21; a 60-second ad will incorporate not only the winning spot ad but a description of the contest and mention of some of the other entries. President Bush's State of the Union speech is Jan. 20.

Hitler ad The contest, was announced in October and received more than 1,500 submissions, some of which were posted on MoveOn's Web site (www.bushin30seconds.org). The contest garnered a certain amount of notoriety after the Republican National Committee expressed outrage that submissions pictured on the group's Web site compared President Bush to Adolph Hitler.

Early this month the group apologized for allowing the Hitler ads to slip through, but accused the RNC of being "deliberately and maliciously misleading" in suggesting that the ads were anything other than contest submissions.

MoveOn, which includes a political action committee and a voter fund (which handled the contest), said a panel of celebrities and political consultants judged the submissions. Panelists included political strategists Donna Brazile and James Carville.

'Fear and loathing' Reacting to the winning ad, Republican National Committee press secretary Christine Iverson said, "They should have called the contest 'Twenty seconds of fear and loathing of George Bush.' It proves what we have said all along: The Democratic presidential candidates have a message of protest and pessimism but bring no positive ideas to the debate."

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Here's how you can help CBS decide. 1) GO to http://www.cbs.com 2) GO to the link at the bottom of the page entitled feedback 3) Tell them how you really feel.

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>>>>>>>>Dear Sir;
Please show consideration for the viewing audience of The Super Bowl this year. SHow this consideration by not running explicitly political ads during the game. Your audience will thank you for not subjecting them to political hectoring from deep pocketed fanatics. Thank you.

I thought that I would lead by example and get things rolling.

[Prime Choice]

A spokesman at Leo Burnett USA's Chicago headquarters said the ad was shot in Denmark

I guess it's true. Something IS fishy in Denmark.

MoveOn should be made to answer on why they deprived needy Americans of this work that was given to Denmark.

And FYI to CBS: you're only slightly out of the doghouse over your Reagan mockumentary. You really don't want the likes of me on your back (again).

[RJCogburn]

young children working in a variety of manufacturing or service industry jobs -- hauling garbage, repairing tires, clerking a checkout counter -- and ends with the line "Guess who's going to pay off President Bush's $1 trillion deficit?"

Sounds nasty, but....who is going to pay for GWB's big spending.....farm bill, ed bill, the huge medicare bill, the teach people how to be married bill...?

[Az Joe]

Told them not to do it.

[cmsgop]

I saw the AD. Stupid People will buy it. It would be nice if we could counter it.

[PattonReincarnated]

I'm really torn on this one. I'm a die-hard Eagles fan. (and maybe, just maybe, well not very likely, it probably won't happen - it hasn't happened in my lifetime, but the Eagles could win the Super Bowl) So I want to watch the Super Bowl this year; just to see if by some stroke of luck, the Eagles will win. (I'm avoiding batcat statements, have my fingers crossed, etc.) On the other hand, if CBS runs this ad, I really don't want to watch CBS. I do want to watch the Super Bowl. There has to be some way to watch the Super Bowl, and hurt CBS big-time if run this ad. I've already seen the ad, so I have no reason to see it again.

Perhaps, if people threatened to boycott all of the other sponsors of the Super Bowl if CBS runs the MoveOn.org ad - CBS will refuse to run the ad. I hate to boycott sponsors that are supporting such an American tradition as the Super Bowl, but indirectly, this could be a powerful source. It would hit CBS in the pocket book, it other sponsors started pulling out under threat of boycott.

[Monti Cello]

I wonder if Bush is doing another Brer Rabbit number on the Dems with the budget -- 'please don't make me get rid of that deficit!'.

Bush is clearly willing to spend like a liberal, but he has different spending priorities.

The Dems' clamor for deficit reduction will eventually be met with the demise of their programs, or they will have to call for tax hikes, which hurts them as well.

Perhaps Bush has determined to replace Dem programs with his own variety, removing the Dems' priorities in the process.

If Dems' best argument is deficit reduction, they've got big problems.

[WOSG]

Not only is this

Outsourcing of politics

to Denmark a disparagement of American workers, it also violated the principle that foreigners are not supposed to contribute to American elections. Like the Soros contributions, once again foreigners are meddling in our elections.

[woofer]

MoveOn should be made to answer on why they deprived needy Americans of this work that was given to Denmark.

What, you kiddin'? With Actors' Guild scale as high as it is and child labor laws as they are, it was a no brainer. Mooooo-veOn just proved itself to be another union-busting, profit mongering, showboat outfit.

Maybe they're secret Republicans scamming Soros out of a coupla million.

[Prodigal Son]

Like the Soros contributions, once again foreigners are meddling in our elections.

It is a disturbing trend isn't it?

[bayourod]

I fail to see the point in claiming that children in Denmark are going to pay our national ,debt.

[WOSG]

Yup. Quite true.

I hope in 2005 a conservative Republican Cogress takes a chain saw to the deficit. Defund the left. Defund NEA, NEH,NPR,PBS,CPB,cut UN dues, cut farm subsidies, sell off some federal lands, cut the welfare system by eliminating and streamlining HUD, end the corporate welfare, reform Social security, abolish a few depts like energy, merge commerce and labor depts, cut the overspending in the ed dept, reduce govt overhead by allowing more govt tasks to be privatized and bid on competitively including returning the TSA to private sector, end the duplicative programs and agencies. Create a new "Grace Commission" on govt waste to look at these issues again.

Halt the increase in spending - make it 0% until the Federal Govt is not bigger than 15% of GNP.

I will be mightily disappointed if they dont.

I got kids too, ya know.

[Lucky Lyn]

I saw the AD. Stupid People will buy it. It would be nice if we could counter it.

My tv remote has this ingenious button called 'mute' which I find an excellent way to promote peace and quiet while crass commercials run their course!!

[WOSG]

"I fail to see the point in claiming that children in Denmark are going to pay our national ,debt."

hmmm, on second thoughts, you might have something. That is a far better idea than our kids paying for it. brilliant in fact! 4th ID is due to return soon, Denmark is kind of on the way home ... let's pay a visit and "ask" for a donation.

You know, we could float that story around just to give those Euro weenie Bush-bashers some nightmares. They'd take it seriously that's how warped/antiBush they are. :-)

[Prodigal Son]

It would be nice if we could counter it.

The way the ad contest was run was actually an advantage to the RNC. They have had a couple weeks to examine the advert and think up counter points to it. I think pressure on CBS to not run the ad can help but I really think our best efforts might be to simply come up with the perfect counter argument. If that ad runs at the Super Bowl, it's going to be your neighbors and co-workers who are going to be talking about it. Those are who the counter-arguments are for.

It's obviously meant to play on people's emotions- the use of children is always an emotional appeal. I think I would always stress to people who paid for this ad's creation- George Soros- who created the ad- a Danish fellow.

[cubreporter]

Amen. Watch the game. We even mute the announcers. Makes for a nice, peaceful day of football. :)

[WOSG]

I think he means disprove it by countering it factually or emotionally.

I think the best counter is to realize that alot of the deficit is due to higher spending. A lot of the higher spending is due to lack of fiscal discipline. What's moveon's proposal to cut spending? (And dont give us tax increases; the tax cuts are why our economy is bouncing back.)

Some of the higher spending is due to the war on terror.

Maybe you could have an ad with a nuclear bomb going off on those kids heads and then ask - "okay, so we saved a few billion in homeland security and didnt fight the war on terror fully. ... NOW WHAT?"

[Paleo Conservative]

We can organize a boycott of the five advertisers before and after that ad.

[Prodigal Son]

You touch on a key point. The ad might give a lot of people a negative emotional reaction to Bush, but it will not give the Dems any solid talking points. People aren't going to want to hear "I'm going to raise your taxes". The only thing really left is for the dems to attack spending. Their candidate will have to hone in on what programs he wants to cut and that usually doesn't play to well.

They ought to propose a solution to their complaint that is not impossibly simplistic (like: bring all soldiers home now).