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The One, The Hot Chick, or The Antichrist?

The One, The Hot Chick, or The Antichrist?

By: Robert Brumfield, Account Manager, Fusion PR



This is one of the most enjoyable things about any campaign season: the ridiculous, unreasonable connections made between unrelated things in order to influence the opinions of voters who, as we all know, are complete suckers. I’m particularly fond of the stuff coming out of the McCain Campaign of late—it’d make PT Barnum blush.



Nobody really believed this election would be civilized, no matter how much these two candidates have wasted our time discussing this notion of ‘civility.’ And who wants it, really? Thank you, “Children of Rove,” for giving Americans what we really want. So, Obama Campaign, when will you step up?



A story featured in Time this week demonstrates that there are things taking place under the surface of the delightfully goofy ad, The One, released online last week, and that Fred Davis, the ad’s creator, and the other folks down at “Camp McCain” know what they’re doing. Apparently, the language of the ad co-ops the language of the popular series of books, Left Behind, which famously imagines the end of the world, New Testament-style (Kirk Cameron and all).



Yay! This is a particularly good trick because it seeks to influence demographics that would recognize the language of the book, evangelicals, under the noses of other demographics, Senator Obama supporters, who very likely would not.



My friend Adam and I were having drinks the other day and discussed this very same issue. Adam, who is an African American guy, and I puzzled over why they hadn’t done this already. “It seems only natural to suggest the black guy is the antichrist. Why aren’t they doing that yet? That seems the only way to get a Republican in office in this climate—to run him against the devil incarnate.”



We agreed. Today, Adam’s writing the McCain campaign to demand royalties. This guy, however, might have beaten him to the punch. Maybe we could all file a class action lawsuit.



So, my question to my colleagues is, what’s the most tenuous connection you’ve ever made that worked? We’ve all found ourselves doing it when writing trend pitches or, especially, when speaking with reporters on the phone (“Yes, this Web 2.0 technology has everything to do with the shoe industry in Asian nations, I’m so glad you mentioned it”).



Those of us who are writing this blog entry discover that we may be making ridiculous connections right now. In all seriousness, though, while we don’t ever want to misrepresent our clients, there are always connections between the product or service we’re representing and other products, services, concepts, etc, that may not be immediately obvious and, likewise, sometimes we get so immersed in something that we don’t realize that the connection we’re making in our heads doesn’t really exist.



Any good examples of either?

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