Obama will make his closing argument to Hoosiers and North Carolinians on Sunday evening in a pair of two-minute ads, one for each state. The central message (and most of the content) in each ad is the same, positioning Obama as the candidate of change, willing to speak the truth in stead of playing the same old political games.
He continues his focus on the gas tax gambit, which I think has been the most impressive part of his campaign over the past week or so, at least on a substantive level. There's no question that his opposition to a gas-tax holiday was a real political loser when it first came up. But now that he has made the case for his principled position, it has actually turned into an opportunity to refocus the campaign on his message of change.
In the long run, that should prove to be a huge plus. If this election is about change, he will win. If it's about pandering or about DC experience, he won't. For the past several weeks, with the obsession on Ayers and Wright, it's been nearly impossible for Obama to talk about his core message. Now, he's found a way to return to it. It probably won't be enough for victory in Indiana, but the more important issue is that it is allowing him to get back to the fundamental reason his campaign was effective in the first place: he is the candidate of change.
I've posted the ads in this blog entry as well as in the video pod.
As you can see the ads here are basically the same, tailored slightly for regional differences, but each focusing on the same themes.
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NORTH CAROLINA SCRIPT – “Minute” VO: North Carolina values. Hard work, community, keeping your word. There’s a candidate who shares those values, who thinks differently than those who’ve spent decades in Washington. Barack Obama. OBAMA: Politics didn’t lead me to working people. Working people led me to politics. VO: After college, he began his career as a community organizer, helping neighborhoods devastated by steel plant closings. OBAMA: I worked with churches to help those workers get back on their feet. VO: For two decades in public life, he’s stood up to powerful interests on behalf of people, taking tough stands, bringing parties together to get things done. It says something about the president he’d be. OBAMA: It’s not enough just to change political parties in the White House, we’ve got to change how our politics works. VO: Now, he’s visiting cities and towns across North Carolina. OBAMA: People are struggling. Jobs disappearing, nothing taking their place. Families facing foreclosure, the cost of everything from healthcare to groceries to gas at the pump going up and up and up. VO: And at each stop, he trusts us with the truth. OBAMA: We could suspend the gas tax for six months. But that’s not gonna bring down gas prices long-term. OBAMA: That’s typical of how Washington works. Let’s find some short-term quick fix that we can say we did something even though we’re not really doing anything. We’ve got to go after the oil companies and look at their price-gouging. We’ve got to start using less oil, and that means raising fuel-efficiency standards on cars and developing alternative fuels. VO: It’s a new kind of politics. With a plan to bring our troops home. Turn around this economy. Deliver real tax relief for the middle class. And bring back some hope at a time when it’s desperately needed. OBAMA: That’s why May Sixth is so important. We’ve got a choice. We can go about doing the same old things with the same old folks in the same old ways and somehow hope we’re going to get a different result. Or we can go ahead and try something entirely different. You and I together, we’ll change this country and change the world. OBAMA: I’m Barack Obama, and I approve this message. |
INDIANA SCRIPT – “Minute” VO: They’re Indiana values. Hard work, community, keeping your word. And there’s a candidate who shares those values, who thinks differently than those who’ve spent decades in Washington. Barack Obama. OBAMA: Politics didn’t lead me to working people. Working people led me to politics. VO: He got his start in Illinois as a community organizer, helping neighborhoods devastated by steel plant closings. OBAMA: And I worked with churches to help those workers get back on their feet. VO: For two decades in public life, he’s stood up to powerful interests on behalf of people, taking tough stands, bringing parties together to get things done. It says something about the president he’d be. OBAMA: It’s not enough just to change political parties in the White House, we’ve got to change how our politics works. VO: Now, he’s visiting cities and towns across Indiana. OBAMA: I meet Hoosiers who are struggling. Jobs disappearing, families facing foreclosure, the cost of everything from healthcare to tuition to groceries to gas at the pump going up and up and up. VO: And at each stop, he trusts us with the truth. OBAMA: We could suspend the gas tax for six months. But that’s not gonna bring down gas prices long-term. OBAMA: That’s typical of how Washington works. Let’s find some short-term quick fix that we can say we did something even though we’re not really doing anything. We’ve got to go after the oil companies and look at their price-gouging. We’ve got to start using less oil, and that means raising fuel-efficiency standards on cars and developing alternative fuels. VO: It’s a new kind of politics. With a plan to bring our troops home. Turn around this economy. Deliver real tax relief for the middle class. And bring back some hope at a time when it’s desperately needed. OBAMA: That’s why May Sixth is so important. We’ve got a choice. We can go about doing the same old things with the same old folks and somehow hope we’re going to get a different result. Or we can go ahead and try something entirely different. You and I together, we¹ll change this country and change the world. OBAMA: I’m Barack Obama, and I approve this message. |
© Jed Lewison