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I still say that Rep. Ricca Slone (D-Peoria Heights) dug her own political grave by being… Ricca Slone. But a Peoria-area subscriber has a different take on what turned out to be a super-close contest.
The house “professionals” always make the same mistake in Peoria. They did it back in 1994 against [former state Rep. Jay] Ackerman. Negative does not sell well here - especially on abortion. This isn’t Chicago and it isn’t southern Illinois.ÂBut you should have heard the radio ads. They just made people uncomfortable. Using the words “rape and incest” and they would play the ad back to back!! It really put people off. I heard women calling on the radio complaining that they were upset about having to explain to their kids what those were. Every time those ads played she lost 10 votes. I truly believe that had they not run ANY ads the strength of the district would have carried it. The tone of the ads motivated people against her. I’ve never seen anything like it. The more money they spent the worse it got. I understand the district office was inundated with phone calls every time the ad ran.Â
Again, I think this loss is mostly Slone’s fault for alienating so many of her constituents, but these points are worth considering.
Negatives don’t work everywhere, especially when they are cartoonish. Many of the attacks on Rep. Bill Grunloh’s Republican opponent were too over the top to be believable, as was the early mail against Rep. Beth Coulson (although, I will say to my dying day that Coulson protested way too much about a couple of silly mailers). The super-harsh negative TV attacks on Republican Supreme Court candidate Lloyd Karmeier obviously didn’t work. A terribly negative and completely false attack on Democratic Rep. Careen Gordon fatally backfired on the House Republicans.
Of course, all of those candidates and their campaigns had numerous other flaws which led to their downfalls yesterday. I’m not trying to blame losses solely on negative ads. They worked very effectively for Grunloh’s opponent David Reis and most of the other winners yesterday. I do think, however that too often a bludgeon is used when a scalpel would more than suffice.
posted by Rich Miller
Wednesday, Nov 3, 04 @ 2:30 pm
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Negative advertising must be believable to be effective. They should reinforce or highlight attributes or decisions of the target. Ad hominems never work.
The image of John Kerry as a flip-flopper worked because it reinforced the fact that as a legislator he had a tenedency to behave in an opportunistic fashion. You could point to things and say, “See look at this, there he goes again.”
Comment by Greg Wednesday, Nov 3, 04 @ 3:23 pm
I agree 110% with the poster who said:
“Negative advertising must be believable to be effective. They should reinforce or highlight attributes or decisions of the target. Ad hominems never work.”
Whoever wrote the mail for Bromberg’s attacks on Coulson obviously didn’t know anything about the district or Coulson and simply read the Demo’s polling data. Plus that mail got the Tribune on board. I think those mailers sunk her. Coulson got lucky that they didn’t do a better job on her.
Comment by Anonymous Wednesday, Nov 3, 04 @ 3:49 pm
Obviously you did not live in the Karmeier Maag district. Karmeier was by far more negative than Maag. You should have seen the filth he was pedaling on my TV screen nightly. He should be ashamed. Now go about your normal life and stop bothering us. There is nothing more to see. All those pesty ads are gone.
Comment by Anonymous Wednesday, Nov 3, 04 @ 8:06 pm
Rich, your not going soft on us are you? What fun would covering campaigns be without both the House Dems and House Repubs doing ads claiming their opponents let a sex offender out on the streets, an alleged rape victim on broadcast television stumping for a state rep candidate they never met, or claims that someone voted for a “Rapists Bill of Rights”. If people aren’t putting crowns and robes on pictures of candidates or putting their heads on the bodies of actors in bermuda shorts what fun would it be you to write about this stuff? Or any of us to follow it?
Comment by Troy Sammons Wednesday, Nov 3, 04 @ 8:21 pm
Now go about your normal life and stop bothering us. There is nothing more to see. All those pesty ads are gone.Another wealthy trial lawyer heard from.
Comment by Anonymous Wednesday, Nov 3, 04 @ 8:32 pm
I just think people really hated ricca.
Comment by Anonymous Thursday, Nov 4, 04 @ 9:51 am
The same people who wrote Bromberg’s negative mail wrote Careen Gordon’s negative mail and Lisa Dugan’s negative mail. The mail in the Gordon and Dugan races was MUCH harder hitting and negative in tone than the mail in the Coulson race - yet they won their suburban races!
Let’s not forget that the Coulson Camp sent their fair-share of negative mail - including one piece that placed an unflattering photo of Bromberg inside of a huge “zero” - alleging Bromberg was a “big zero.” This was just one of many negative GOP mailers that fit your definition of “over-the-top.”
Yet not a peep about Coulson’s negative attacks against Bromberg out of the GOP-leaning Chicago Tribune. It didn’t fit their partisan agenda, did it?
Obviously the “offended poster” isn’t aware that 98% of incumbents are re-elected or that pro-choice, Personal PAC aggressively supported Coulson with heavy mail and telephones in a 75% Pro-Choice legislative district?
No, it must have been the Democratic Party’s “mean-spirited” direct mail…
Comment by Anonymous Thursday, Nov 4, 04 @ 6:48 pm
Completely agreed on the negative mail. People expect negative mail. When the negative charges are earth shattering, it usually back fires.
As is the case in the Gordon/Hayse race. First off, they gave Gordon way too much time to respond. The Hayse campaign dropped the sex offender story too early in the game. They totally misplayed their card, Gordon had a full two weeks to fight back those charges, which turned out to be completely false. That is where Careen won the race, when she proved the Republicans flat out lied about the sex offender case. The TV Ad was frightening, it scared me!
That was the nastiest negative you can get, and it back fired in the their faces. A very inept campaign by the Republicans in the 75th district.
Mary K. O’Brien took this seat in ‘96, and it looks like the Democrats will hold on to what should be a republican seat for as long as Gordon is there.
Comment by Anonymous Friday, Nov 5, 04 @ 6:13 pm
Negative does not play well in some areas. Perhaps Peoria is one of them. I tend to think so considering the very mild mannered and calm Congressmen they have had over the years: Bob Michaels and now Ray LaHood. Saltzman was the same way as State Rep. Dugan and Gordon’s areas are used to that kind of thing. I also completely agree that it must be credible to be effective.
As for whether Demo mail is more negative than Republican, please. Does anyone out there remember the “It was a dark day in Illinois…” mailer that Tristano put into several targeted Dem races in 1994? The photo on the front had something like a house in black and white. I forgot what the issue was…gay rights or something like that? Even independent analysts concluded it was one of the worse they’d ever seen.
Comment by CatholicDem Saturday, Nov 6, 04 @ 9:05 pm