Hamilton Holiday Kids Parade
Truancy Court in Butler County
.JPG)
2009 Ohio State football
Home > Blogs > Ohio politics > Archives > 2008 > October > 26 > Entry
Eye on Ohio: Obama ‘Try This’ ad
By Martin Gottlieb
Dayton Daily News
Producer: Obama for America Where you can see it: It’s running in key states now. View it at DaytonDailyNews.com/eyeonohio.
Script: Announcer: “Not sure who to believe on taxes? Try this. Enter your income, marital status, number of kids. Then click. A nurse earning sixty grand? You get a thousand bucks under Obama. Under McCain…just one-fifty. The independent Tax Policy Center says Obama offers middle class tax cuts three times as big as McCain’s. Even leading conservatives say Obama’s plan is better for the middle class. One point five million have tried it. You should too.”
Obama voice-over: I’m Barack Obama and I approve this message.”
Video: The ad opens with a brief shot of Sen. Obama and Sen. John McCain at the last debate. As the ad’s announcer talks, an Internet browser address bar appears at the top of the page with this address being typed in: www.TaxCutFacts.org.
Then a form appears from that site, with slots for entering the information the announcer mentions. Then an arrow points to a “Calculate Now” button. A screen pops up showing, as an example, that a certain head-of-household in the $50,000-$75,000 range in income with one dependent would get a $1,000 cut under the Obama tax plan and a $150 cut under the McCain plan.
After that, the screen shows the quotations the announcer highlights from the Tax Policy Center and from an “analyst” with the conservative Heritage Foundation think-tank, as quoted in a newspaper. Finally appears a man working at his computer, followed by a picture of a smiling Sen. Obama.
Analysis: Through most of the campaign, the Republicans have insisted that Sen. Obama wants to raise taxes. He has said that he wants to cut the taxes of 95 percent of people. In recent days, the McCain campaign has portrayed the Obama plan as welfare designed to give a tax credit to people who earn so little they don’t even pay federal income taxes.
The McCain campaign has used the term “socialism” to characterize the desire to raise taxes on high-end incomes while cutting them at low end.
This ad is effort to undercut that attack, by letting people ask an Obama computer how they would personally fair under his tax plan.
The ad seems to cross a new frontier in the age of computers, bringing interactivity to a campaign in a way that goes way beyond supporters contributing money and getting online pep talks. It is an effort to generate general public interest, to address people via their pocketbooks and to dramatically make a point. The ad seems destined to set the McCain campaign to the task of finding a rebuttal. Whether the answers the Obama computer gives are true remains to be shown.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: Eye on Ohio
Comments
By Becky
October 27, 2008 10:04 AM | Link to this
Good job! Sounds like a very effective ad. Hope he kicks butt in Ohio.By jg
October 27, 2008 9:45 AM | Link to this
1/20/09 Obama will hit the ground running to create more jobs, energy independence, and financial stability for America.By jb
October 26, 2008 10:53 AM | Link to this
More jobs