Political TV ads losing impact?
10:52 PM 9/20/02
Scott Milfred State government reporter

indentAbout 100 political television ads aired every day in Madison during the first half of September, a new study shows.
indentBut David Gallagher of Sun Prairie didn't see a single one of them.
indentGallagher, 22, owns a digital-recording machine called the personal video recorder, or PVR. It automatically records all his favorite shows and lets him pause and rewind live TV.
indentThis means he can zoom past most commercials - including those run by candidates for governor - with the press of a button. Gallagher also owns a satellite dish with so many channels that he rarely watches the local networks where most political ads appear.
indent"A commercial is not going to swing me one way or the other" on who to vote for, the warehouse worker said.
indentUW-Madison political science professor Dennis Dresang thinks PVR technology, voter fatigue with incessant and exaggerated political ads as well as the popularity of cable and satellite television are changing how political campaigns are run and won.
indentTelevision ads, Dresang contends, are slowly becoming less important and effective at swaying voters.
indent"There's more of an emphasis now on a return to good old-fashioned, face-to-face campaigning," Dresang said. "That's something that's really pretty critical. And I think that's a good thing."
indentU.S. House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., offered a similar analysis earlier this month.
indent"We are moving into a new world, and I think the traditional model that we have gone on for 30 years - jamming millions of dollars into a television set and hope you drive enough folks to the polls on Election Day - is a passing method," Gephardt told the New York Times.
indentYet the major party candidates for Wisconsin governor and their well-financed backers including unions and big business are on pace to spend a record $15 million or more on political television ads this year.
indentIn the Madison television market alone, 1,493 campaign ads aired from Sept. 1 through Sept. 16, which included the Sept. 10 primary election, according to the Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks ads. (Only on the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks did the ads seem to stop.)
indentIncluding the Milwaukee and Green Bay television markets, 4,632 ads ran at a cost of $1.4 million in just over two weeks, the CMAG found. And that doesn't count political ads run in smaller markets such as La Crosse, Wausau and Superior.
indentFrom the first of the year through Sept 16, a total of 16,706 campaign ads have run in Madison, Milwaukee and Green Bay at a cost of $5.4 million, which includes production costs.
indent"If television ads didn't work, campaigns would stop using them," said Mike McCabe, executive director of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, a non-profit group that monitors campaign fund raising. "I don't think it can be disputed they have a major impact."
indentChris Micklos, a partner at Visuality, a Madison media consulting and production company that caters to Democratic candidates and unions, said the popularity of cable and satellite television and the introduction of PVR may dent the influence of political advertising on network television.
indentMicklos' firm, for example, produces Web pages and interactive CDs for clients. He also noted the Democratic Attorney General Jim Doyle ran campaign ads on political and newspaper Web sites leading up to the Sept. 10 primary.
indentBut the power of television can't be underestimated, Micklos quickly added. It is and will continue to be for the foreseeable future the best way to reach and motivate the broadest group of voters, he said.
indentAs for Dresang's comments, Micklos said, "That's the difference between the classroom and the war room. When you're working on a campaign, TV is still where you have to be."
indentJim Pugh, a spokesman for the business lobby called Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, largely agreed. Pugh's group has run television ads touting Republican Gov. Scott McCallum's record. In the past, WMC has targeted Democratic lawmakers with hard-hitting TV ads leading up to elections.
indentFewer people may be watching network television, but it's still where the masses are, Pugh said. That said, you need a good message and strong candidate, not just a lot of money for air time.
indent"It's people who match the mood of the public who are successful," he said.
indentWMC has run phone banks, sent out mailings and advertised in newspapers and on radio leading up to elections, Pugh added. Old-fashioned, grassroots campaigning is still important, but it won't work alone, he contended.
indent"People don't turn out to listen to political speeches from the back of a hay wagon like they did in the days of Fighting Bob La Follette," he said. "I would venture to guess that if a candidate for governor rode around the state in a hay wagon today, he wouldn't win. Unless they filmed it and put in on TV."
indentMcCabe doesn't see less emphasis on TV and more on grassroots campaigning in Wisconsin. Yet McCabe hopes Dresang is right that the influence of television will gradually wane.
indent"Political TV ads are a scourge," McCabe said. "There's a kernel of truth in most every political ad, but then they take liberty with that truth or take it horribly out of context. They're misleading and sometimes downright false."
indentA Republican Party of Wisconsin ad currently airing in Madison portrays Doyle as a bumbling executive whose desk and office is cluttered with coffee-stained files that a hound regularly tracks across.
indentAn ad by the state's largest teachers union called WEAC, which stands for Wisconsin Education Association Council, portrays McCallum as a reverse Robin Hood who steals from "working families" to give to the rich.
indent"Sad to say, I think many voters do rely almost solely on TV ads," McCabe said. And by the time the Nov. 5 election arrives, the saturation of negative ads may convince many people that both McCallum and Doyle are "just shy of criminals and complete buffoons, which isn't fair," McCabe said.
indentThat might help third-party maverick Ed Thompson of Tomah, who doesn't expect he'll be able to afford a single television ad. Thompson, the younger brother of former GOP Gov. Tommy Thompson, is running as a Libertarian for governor.
indentThompson said he sure hopes that old-fashioned politics is on the comeback. Thompson has relied on hundreds of 8-by-4-foot signs and non-stop appearances at community festivals and other events to spread his against-the-system message. He's also benefited from lots of free television exposure. All four Madison stations, for example, covered him recently when he ate venison sausage from deer killed in southwestern Wisconsin where chronicwasting disease is present.
indent"If the election can be bought, we don't have a chance," Thompson said. "If it can be won on hard work, I'm right in the middle of it."
indentDresang agrees that political television ads "are still important." They're good at packaging candidates, but "you don't always have the truth value," he said.
indent"When you see someone face to face, you can make a better" assessment of who to vote for, he said.
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