Spin Sucks…Even in Political Ads

@kamichat @ginidietrich How long have you been waiting to use that headline, Gini? :)

Yes.both sides of the aisle are killing me with bursts of BS.

G'Day Gini,

When I was about 15 years old, I became very interested in politics. One of our two major parties, the ALP--read Democrats in USA- was going through huge ructions that ultimately kept it out of office for about 20 years.

I complained to my father about the spin and even blatant lies that the politicians involved were telling. He replied, "Don't worry son. They're only politicians."

That happened over 50 years ago. The older I get ,the more I understand how smart my father was.

To quote one of your better known dramatists: "it comes with the territory."

Have fun, Best Wishes

Leon

I think the problem is the most egregious political ads we see on the TV/radio/internet come from PACs, and not the politicians. It seems their main goal is to deceive the general populous as much as possible to get them to be so disgusted with one candidate that they'll vote for the other.

You know the end of each ad when it says "X-Y-Z is responsible for the content of this advertisement...?" Well I'm sure they didn't actually develop the ad and instead hired some advertising/marketing/pr firm to produce their dirty work. I wish there were a way to find out who these firms were and call them out for developing these completely dishonest ads. We need to hold our industry more responsible for producing this garbage. 

@barrettrossie Ha! Good point.

Situations like this are truly a shame. Is there such a thing as "honest politicians" anymore? We've become so accustomed to lies and stretched truths that we're actually surprised when we find out someone is being honest (at least I'm surprised). I dread elections because of all the smear campaigns and finger-pointing ads. They're so disheartening. This is going to make me sound like a total hippie, but can't we all just get along?!?

This is a very difficult area. To one side, an ad interprets a policy and its results. To the other side, it's a lie. To one side it's a powerful argument. To the other side it's complete straw man. To one side it's an article of faith. To the other side it's a sign of ignorance.

Yeah, there are plenty of examples of cynical advertising and absolute lies on both sides. The only solution is a better informed electorate, and sadly, I see us (at least in the USA) moving in the opposite direction. 

Did you have start off the week this way, after such a stellar ending to last week? Gee whiz....

The really disappointing part is that it seems to WORK. Too many people are just not interested in learning the truths behind the situation, so they take the latest soundbite and take it as gospel. Speaking of that, I'd like to start the rumor here that I'm awesome. If I say it enough, it will be true, right? I'm awesome. Truth.

@ginidietrich Hey Gini, curious what you think of @dmscott's concept of "newsjacking" - is it spin or something else? http://t.co/JHO3Wi0G

Having run a few campaigns myself, I have to say that the "air war" has completely disintegrated to the point of being nothing but a real liability for everyone involved.  The key to any political campaign has always been efforts on the ground to organize and mobilize - and this nonsense only makes that harder.  What's interesting is that the lessons we learn on the ground in politics have a place in general marketing, especially for small biz.  But this crap?  Feh.

Big media has been rendered useless by terrible practices, IMHO.  I think that goes all around.  As long as it doesn't ruin social media, too, but that may be too late as well.

How profoundly disappointing, regardless of the "industry" it occurred in. How can anyone behind this kind of dishonesty be proud of their work? Call me old fashioned, I believe in hard work, honesty and creativity. Yes, communications (advertising, PR, politics, etc.) is a really tough field, but if you can't handle the heat then get out of the kitchen -- please, for the sake of the rest of us. Thanks, @ginidietrich 

We're always looking for an angle, an edge, a hook. It's like everyone (all us bloggers, writers, companies, politicians, speakers, etc.) are all on the same stage elbowing each other to get to the front of the stage to be seen and heard.

The pressure is immense. What do we say? What do we do? Do we dance, yell, do flips? How do we get people to see us? Attention is so hard to come by especially if we have a short term view. 

It's this sense of immediacy and speed that gets us in so much trouble. Hey, the other guy lied, I gotta come back with a better lie now! (so, here's another elbow to the face.) That's what turns so many of us off to politicians, corporations, heck, to marketing in general. What's the #@!#$!! rush?

Yeah, let's do better. Spin DOES suck.

Hey Gini, you've just described politicians to a "T"... " Poor taste, lying, cheating, and being completely and utterly dishonest."

And that's not going to change - it just keeps getting worse because they have to keep their previous lies afloat...

Just sayin.

@meghan5580 @spinsucks I DO like it as it pertains to my Washing Machine! :-)

That's just plain dumb. They couldn't take a couple hours and find a real disillusioned person? I'm sure there's plenty out there. Why put yourself in a position to be called a liar? It's either stupidity or laziness. 

make content creation about truth & transparency, not lies and spin http://t.co/rz4SZhtf MT .@SpinSucks

@ginidietrich Well said, Ginny! Amazing that so much of this still goes on.

@ginidietrich Politics is the same all over the world.Your article applies "EXACTLY" to our recently-past National Elections. Shameful...

@ginidietrich Awesome! Thank you....

BOOM!!! Brilliantly said!!

I'm hardly one to play apologist for any political candidate, but politics has always been a dirty, deceitful game that has only worsened over the years. There was a time when I considered a career in that world, but soon thought better of it. 

The result? Political discourse has been reduced to sound bites and vilifying those who hold alternate viewpoints to gross caricatures. It deeply saddens me that it's gotten so bad.  Sigh. 

In Louisiana we know from crooked politics and yeah, spin sucks. Even though so-called fact checking sucks b/c even that is biased and slanted, twisting the lies, damn lies and statistics every which way. All we can do is try to be better about what we create - and smarter about what we read and watch and share. FWIW.