The genuine absence of leadership

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Dear politicians:

I have watched with interest, mostly feigned, at this season’s political advertising, and I applaud you for being incredibly effective in your attack ads, which seem to be 99% of your advertising spend. You have done an amazing job of convincing me of this simple fact:

Not one of you corrupt morons should ever be allowed in office.

As a marketer, I get that you need to contrast yourself with the other folks running. In regular marketing, some contrast is mandatory. But by spending all your time telling me why I shouldn’t vote for the other guy or gal, you’ve convinced me you’re all a bunch of corrupt morons, regardless of party or affiliation, because I’m sure there’s a grain of truth in each of your attack ads somewhere in there.

Let me give you a comparative analogy. Pretend we’re all on a desert island somewhere, and most of us have survived a plane crash. As the survivors gather and figure out what’s going on, we start the inevitable discussion about who should lead us and what roles we should take to help the community survive until we’re rescued.

What you’re doing by throwing as many attack ads is effectively having two or more people on the desert island screaming at each other: DON’T FOLLOW HIM! HE’LL EAT ALL THE COCONUTS! That’s not leadership. If government were a matter of desert island life or death, the rest of us would leave you on the beach to starve and die.

Wait a minute. Government is a matter of life or death, for our society as a whole. Take a look around. 14.7 million people are unemployed. 26.4 million people are underemployed – that’s nearly 1 in 5 working Americans. The desert island is the entire country, and a good portion of us are hungry, if not starving while you spend all your time screaming why the other guy/gal/party is a bad choice, while stealing as many coconuts as you can.

Our only hope is that the citizens of America do as the desert island folks would do: leave you idiots to starve to death on your own and run this place ourselves. Call social media a fishbowl, call it frivolity or time wasting, call it narcissistic, but PodCamp Boston 5 raised $7,000 towards the Greater Boston Food Bank’s Kids Meals program. One silly little conference started by Chris Brogan and I a few years ago has done more real good for people with immediate need than all of your political campaign spending combined.

So politicians, congratulations. Your attack ads have achieved their goals: you’ve convinced me that the other guy or gal shouldn’t get elected. Unfortunately for you, they’ve convinced me the same about you.

Comments

18 responses to “The genuine absence of leadership”

October 26, 2010

JonDiPietro

While I don’t disagree with you (especially with regard to the lack of leadership), I respectfully suggest that your rage is directed at the wrong side of the equation. Politicians use attack ads for one reason and one reason only; they work. And they work very, very, very well. So it’s the audience and not the politicians that deserve the blame.

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1. October 26, 2010
  
  Christopher S. Penn
  
  They do. They work very well. The problem is, and this goes back to leadership, they’re taking a short term gain (election – this time) for a very large longer term loss: the elimination of faith in the people they’re supposed to be leading. In the long run, incessant attack ads dampen our faith in everything and anything associated with the government, which in turn makes it that much harder for us to do the things that must be done in order to fix bad situations.
  
  For good or ill, regardless of political position, President Obama’s campaign platform on change and hope did a decent job of trying to leverage positive values in the 2008 election cycle. His marketing team was fairly effective in conveying a message that was greater than “the other dude sucks”.
  
  Reply
  1. October 26, 2010
    
    Doug
    
    Marketing and sales is pretty much same regardless of the product. When you’re not selling (winning) you typically change the approach. Obama was winning, so no reason to change the approach. If he was 15 points down, it’s extremely likely the message would have changed.
    
    Regarding trading short term gains for a longer term loss, if they don’t win, they lose anyway. So what do they have to lose? You’re right that’s not leadership, it’s sales and marketing, and rational self interest. If you make the sale, you can deal with the fallout later. If you don’t make the sale, you’re out of business.
    
    Sure many, if not most, of us won’t trade our integrity for a sale. But in large measure it’s because we have some sales and can get more. Our reputations matter as we aren’t in an all or nothing game. They can call business war, but it’s not really that cut and dried. In politics, you lose, you’re out. Binary results can lead to desperate measures and different decision making. Think about it as war. Would you expect the same integrity in a war as in peace time?
    
    While I have the same frustration, if not more, than you do with the system, there’s logic to why it happens this way. Most try to run a positive campaign at the start. Then someone gets behind and starts the mudslinging, and if that starts to work, the other side starts slinging it too. Pretty predictable.
    
    This is the same thing that happens in sales. When the other firm is getting the business and your positive message isn’t working, you point out their flaws in competitors. Not as ugly as politics, but similar. If you make headway, the competition starts pointing out your flaws. And then it can get ugly, but still rarely like politics as it’s not all or nothing.
    
    What I have been thinking about is how to change the process for the better. This is a very complex and difficult question. How do allow debate without leading to dissension in an all or nothing (some would say life or death) take no prisoners situation? The wider the two sides are and the more adamant they are, the more likely it is to get out of hand, and the more likely to lead to mutual assured destruction.
    
    I don’t have a good answer to this quandary. But I am not giving up, despite frustration that we share, and would like any thoughts on solutions you might have. Noble prize to the one that figures it out first, methinks.
    
    Reply
October 26, 2010

Greg Fleischaker

I find that I also agree with Jon in the sense that these ads will keep being run as long as we, as a society, keep responding positively to them. The same can be said of the mainstream media, or social policy, or all sorts of things…. we deserve what we make popular or are willing to pay for. Study after study shows that many people are in favor of policies that are actually detrimental to them, and yet there they are voting them in. And lots of people watch the tv shows that they also say are damaging to our society. We will continue to get the politicians we deserve, and until we grow up as a group and demand more from our politicians, this apparently is what we deserve. What does it say about voters that a candidate can refuse to answer questions from the press and still find themselves in line to be a member of our government? I don’t think the answer is very flattering.

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October 26, 2010

Greg Fleischaker

I find that I also agree with Jon in the sense that these ads will keep being run as long as we, as a society, keep responding positively to them. The same can be said of the mainstream media, or social policy, or all sorts of things…. we deserve what we make popular or are willing to pay for. Study after study shows that many people are in favor of policies that are actually detrimental to them, and yet there they are voting them in. And lots of people watch the tv shows that they also say are damaging to our society. We will continue to get the politicians we deserve, and until we grow up as a group and demand more from our politicians, this apparently is what we deserve. What does it say about voters that a candidate can refuse to answer questions from the press and still find themselves in line to be a member of our government? I don’t think the answer is very flattering.

Reply
October 26, 2010

Greg Fleischaker

I find that I also agree with Jon in the sense that these ads will keep being run as long as we, as a society, keep responding positively to them. The same can be said of the mainstream media, or social policy, or all sorts of things…. we deserve what we make popular or are willing to pay for. Study after study shows that many people are in favor of policies that are actually detrimental to them, and yet there they are voting them in. And lots of people watch the tv shows that they also say are damaging to our society. We will continue to get the politicians we deserve, and until we grow up as a group and demand more from our politicians, this apparently is what we deserve. What does it say about voters that a candidate can refuse to answer questions from the press and still find themselves in line to be a member of our government? I don’t think the answer is very flattering.

Reply
October 26, 2010

Roman

I can empathize with your frustration Chris. Perhaps our politicians truly feel they can make a difference once they get into office and are seeking the most effective means of actually getting into office. My sense is that more difference can be made by creating a million different economic engines – whether that means running a small company, buying and rehabbing a house in an area targeted for gentrification, or teaching at a university. All these methods seem (to me, at least) more effective and less bureaucratic ways of impacting change.

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October 26, 2010

jlbraaten

Well said, Chris. I loathe all of the candidates in my district. Every ad is the same:
– Mention your opponent three times
– Each time, tie them to a sound byte appropriate for the candidate’s party (For Dem’s, tie them to “Obamacare.” For Republicans, tie them to the “same failed policies that got us here.”)
– Every ad must be narrated by the voiceover guy used for scary movies

Enough already. Tell me why YOU are worthy of my vote.

Pretty sure you struck a chord with a lot of folks today, Chris.

Reply
1. October 26, 2010
  
  Christopher S. Penn
  
  Actually, I’m fairly certain Don LaFontaine is glad he’s dead 😉
  
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_LaFontaine
  
  Reply
October 26, 2010

Guest

You’re right on target in my opinion, Chris. And, the mainstream media never calls them on it since it would be a case of killing the goose that lays golden eggs in the form of advertising revenue. Lying your way into office will work until enough people say enough.

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October 26, 2010

April

Well said.

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October 26, 2010

billhanifin

Just imagine if the only spending of campaign money were towards debates in public forums where candidates would actually have to address the issues. The cost of those debates couldn’t account for more than 10% of the total money raised by each candidate, meaning the balance of the money would be available to do some real good in the real world.

The most obscene aspect of politics today is the waste of money on the campaign itself. There has to be a better way and this one proposed would eliminate the attack ads all together.

I wonder how many of the candidates would have the courage to campaign solely on the issues?

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October 26, 2010

Marcus Sheridan

Chris, wow this got my juices flowing man. Tremendous.

It would be nice to see a candidate take a completely opposite approach to the easier, moronic method. It’s time the whole system of campaigning and how they’re done was scrapped….alas

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October 27, 2010

RobertKCole

You hit the target. However, the most distressing thing is that people repeatedly state that they do not like attack ads, but the stats indicate they work.

Politics has almost always been about getting elected not solving problems. The current political environment, unfortunately, is now providing positive reinforcement for the minority party to apply obstructionist tactics to hinder the ability of the majority party to succeed. Failure to make progress results in frustration and creates opportunity for incumbents to be tossed out.

If these guys perfect this strategy, nothing important will ever get done.

The saddest part though is that tough, unpopular decisions need to be made to fix a great number of issues – like unleveraging our country & society. The problem is that the populace don’t want to elect a candidate who promises to bring swift, necessary pain for long term benefit. People prefer to superficially hear that change is easy if you just change the person in charge – and then skip the details.

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October 27, 2010

Kyle Clouse

Instead of making it clear what they will do they make it clear what their opponent has not done. Great post! Well said.

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October 27, 2010

jayhawk

I agree. I especially like the coconut analogy. As long as the first kneejerk response to an opposing opinion is that they are idiots and both sides of the isle steadfastly refuse to listen to the other, the coming together to solve the real problems of this country will not happen. In defense “(God help me) of the attack ads, much like the drug war, porn, and “reality” TV, the very presence of these ads are a sad reflection of the intended audience. And like these scourges of society they would simply go away if people quit buying into them.

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October 27, 2010

barryrsilver

I share your (lack of) enthusiasm for politicians and the plethora of negative advertising. Much of the blame goes to us the consuming public; as soon as negative campaigning fails to succeed, it will disappear.

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November 4, 2010

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