Attack ads are going "online and underground," says the Los Angeles Times in a story exploring the impact of YouTube and other social media on the advertising side of modern campaigns. "'Viral' Web video spreads fast and far, biting candidates hard - sometimes with their own words," reports the LAT. Campaigns that don't understand the trends the LAT is writing about will be losing campaigns.
In a dim Culver City editing room, two video snippets of Republican presidential hopeful John McCain fill the monitors. In the first, he says same-sex marriage should be allowed. In the second, he says it should be illegal.
The clips are part of the payoff of a weeks-long hunt by filmmaker Robert Greenwald and his production team for damaging Internet video of the Arizona senator.
Greenwald, the producerdirector of scathing documentaries about Fox News and Wal-Mart, hopes to shatter McCain's image as a straight-talking maverick. But instead of creating a full-length film, he is assembling clips of McCain for a series of two-minute Web videos. The idea is to turn McCain's own words against him, spreading the videos through e-mail, blogs and websites.
"The effectiveness is hearing and seeing him say stuff," Greenwald said in the editing bay. The videos "go right to the character issue — who he is."The first whack at McCain, now on the video-sharing site YouTube, joins a rapidly growing collection of Web videos posted by critics of leading contenders in the 2008 presidential race. Targets so far include Barack Obama, Rudolph W. Giuliani, John Edwards, Mitt Romney and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The explosion of video-sharing on the Web poses major risks for presidential candidates: Gaffes and inconsistent statements witnessed by dozens can be e-mailed instantly to millions.For the candidates, as well as their detractors, the chief attribute of Web video is its broad reach, accomplished at little or no expense. "You can grab it, send it, link it, and at zero cost," said Matthew Dowd, a top strategist for President Bush's 2004 reelection campaign. "Two hundred thousand people could see it in 24 hours."
... "What the campaign can do in a Web video is show a more personal side of the candidate," said Spencer Whelan, who works on McCain's online communications team.
But the same technology allows others to broadcast - often anonymously - videos utterly outside the campaigns' control. Already, attack videos range from the caustic to the ridiculous.
The other part of the story: YouTube and social-media makes it possible for ordinary citizens to impact campaigns in ways that go far beyond just donating some cash and putting a bumper sticker on their car.
Obama, a newcomer to presidential politics, is just starting to draw the sort of negative attention that the Clintons have long attracted. Last week, Chicago-area political consultant Joe Novak posted several Web videos taking aim at the Illinois senator's wife, Michelle, for her healthcare business dealings.
"I've gotten very angry over the fawning cheerleading that's going on in this city by so-called reporters," Novak said.
...For candidates, one of the troublesome aspects of Web video is also one of its most appealing: the ability of viewers to send it to untold numbers of like-minded voters on an e-mail list.
"A lot of what strategists rely on is the viral impact of sending something to your existing list, and have them push it out to friends and family - make them evangelists and messengers," said Brent Blackaby, the founder of Blackrock Associates, an online political strategy consulting firm.
But the impact of a negative video can be devastating - and undetectable. For candidates trying to appeal to a distinct demographic group, for example, video that shows them taking stands that the group opposes can spread fast without the campaign's knowledge. And the words pack a more profound emotional punch when they come from the candidate's own mouth.
The 2008 presidential race - and every other race - will be different than any that have come before. Participatory democracy now includes campaigns that are participatory at an unprecedented level.
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