Apolitical Staples

Stephen Harper has a reputation as a bit of a bully. This is a factor, I’m sure, in the results. I bet if you look at the breakdown of the answers by sex, the negatives would be higher among women. Just a guess, but I bet I am right.

“Stephen Harper has a reputation as a bit of a bully. This is a factor, I’m sure, in the results.”

Because this poll is the gospel truth! Incontrovertible! 229 people out of 388 who could recall seeing the ads said they weren’t “fair” to Dion. Anyone who says different is a Decima denier!

Maybe some of those responding thought the ads should have been harsher.

Is that ‘reputation as a bit of a bully’ ‘fair’? Is it based on fact or hearsay? Liberal hearsay?

From what I can see, in public, Harper is a leader but not a bully.

From what I can see, in public, Dion is a bully, but not a leader.

Why is Dion a bully? He publicly stated that Khan could only be loyal to the Liberal party, not the government of Canada. But - all elected parties are part of the government of Canada. If they were not part of the government, there would be no need to have them vote in the House.

Maybe some of those responding thought the ads should have been harsher.

LOL, Well, it’s kind of a stretch, but I will given you a point for audacity.

I think Decima should do another poll and ask people if Iggy is unfair to Dion.

Because that’s what Dion says to Iggy in the ad “dats unfair”.

Then if people say no Iggy wasn’t unfair ; then Decima should do a third poll and ask people if Dion was unfair to Iggy for saying that Iggy was unfair to him (Dion).

Then Decima should do a 4th poll and …. oh never mind …

No matter which way you spin it, just 22% out of 38% - i.e. only ~8.5% - of a typical nationwide sampling saw the ads and thought it was fair.

Not exactly what “effective ad campaigns” are made of. Perhaps the next time the PMO will research the term “earned media” before they launch an ad campaign.

Oh come on!

This poll didn’t measure the ads effectiveness ie. are people more or less likely to vote for Dion. In particular were they going to vote for him before they saw the ads, but now they’ve changed their minds. If it changed the minds of 8.5% of the electorate, that’s huge.

The polls effectively asked if the ads were “nice”. Well, no negative ad is nice. That’s why they’re called negative ads.

Let’s see what the next poll about voter intentions show. That’s a better indication.

I find the ads incredibly annoying, and I say that as a CPC supporter.

Lousy quality on the video clips combined with too much repetition. How many times in a single ad do you get to see Stephane Dion say the Libs have got to get back to power as soon as possible… Four? Five? Do they think we’re all three-year-olds with the attention span of a gnat? I got it the first time.

Absent the argy-bargy of an election they seem oddly devoid of context. I could probably tolerate them a little better if an election were actually underway, but at the moment the message I get is Waste… of… Money.

I’ll still be voting for them in a future election, but I will likely withhold donations as pure petty punishment. I watch maybe a two hours of TV a week off the PVR, and I get to see the ads repeated several times during the two hours that I watch. Fortunately I can fast-forward through them all. But the media genius behind these lame-o productions can go pound sand.

My guess? It’s not the ads themselves, but running them outside of an election campaign that made people balk. If this had happened at any other time, no one would have batted an eye.

Regarding the so-called attack ads, as a conservative I must say that not only do I take great satisfaction at the discomfort they have showered on the Grits, I am quite pleased at how effective they have been in changing people’s perception of Stephane Dion (who I actually think is a nice enough guy but way out of his depth). Let me explain.

The fact that 59% thought the ads were unfair is irrelevant; unfair or not the ads’ purpose was to sow doubts in peoples’ minds about Dion’s environmental credentials. And even if they were discomfited by the ads they WILL remember that the Liberals’ own guy (and deputy leader), Michael Ignatieff, telling Dion that “we didn’t get the job done” with Kenny Dryden chining in. The seeds of doubt are now embedded and no longer can Dion level these wild eco-exaggerations at Mr. Harper. Even neutral non-Tories will remember the “we didn’t get the job done” message. Dion’s environmental credentials have been eviscerated and not just by the ads but all of the other revelations that have come. The ads generated tons of free media (Thank you “normally-reflexively -Liberal/left wing-MSM”; you played your parts well) which allowed the public to focus on all of the other stuff about Dion’s environmental record that is now being revealed.

All of this sets it up very nicely for Stephen Harper to roll out a results-oriented (hate to break it to you Grits out there but we want “results” and not endless talking, money spending and bureaucracy) environmental program that delivers the environmental goods. Go to the PM’s website and read his Feb 7 speech to the Canadian Club of Ottawa where he unveiled his next steps on the environment.

Lastly, its no coincidence that Conservative PM Brian Mulroney was named as Canada’s greenest PM. Conservatives always deliver. So to you whining liberals and lefties out there, just step aside, go back to your lattes, and watch the results roll in; the adults are now in charge. Cheers.

Woodsman, did you even read the linked article? Here’s a refresher:

And two thirds of the respondents said the information in the ads was not relevant to their choice in the next federal election, compared with 26 per cent who said it was relevant. Among the subset of respondents familiar with the ads, the margin of error is plus or minus five percentage points, 19 times in 20. “To the extent that they had the desired impact, it was largely among the core supporters of the Conservatives,” said Decima pollster Bruce Anderson. “Ads do tend to work best at reinforcing existing perceptions. I’m not sure they can’t start the process of creating perceptions — probably that’s what the Conservatives are hoping they will have done here. “I think the evidence is pretty scant at this point as to whether or not they’ve succeeded.”

Go easy on the Kool-Aid next time.

Your ads bombed people. Deal with it.

It’s a critical ad.

No one “likes them” per se,

but they are effective.

Oh yes they are effective.

Oh yes they are effective.

If the MSM were doing their job the Conservatives would not have had to put the adds out at all. Instead of a Dion love fest they would be pointing out that saying you will do something and then doing nothing is worse than telling the truth and doing something.

Simply repeating the partisan mantra doesn’t make it so, Chester. :-)

From where I’m sitting, these ads preached to the choir. The ones who proved to be most amenable to them were already voting Conservative in the first place. The rest, though, were simply irritated.

Minds will really only start to change when the campaign gets going. To this end, how each leader performs in the debate will have far more impact on the final results than anything we’re seeing here now.

Ok, folks. Lissenup. Woodsman’s gonna make a few points.

Point 1. Chris: I’ll take you at your word that you are a CPC supporter but, and I hate to break it to you, in order for us to win we have to be as tough and ruthless at the Grits have been. Now we have to be careful since we are held to a much higher standard than they are; a compliment of sorts. I’d much rather be thought of that way as opposed to the low expectations that most people have of the lieberals; sorry, is that nasty? So our ads had better tell the truth, as opposed to “Stephen Harper will have soldiers on our cities;we’re not making this up!” As John Crosbie said, “When you have your hands around a Liberal’s throat, you better not let go.” So we go at them, hard, with competence, and never stop. Politics is our equivalent of war and is definitely not a gentleman’s game, no matter how much some “refined” Tories wish it were.

Point 2.Regarding your quote above Chris, don’t you think that the CPC brain trust did extensive focus testing before the ads were released? A pollster’s job is to describe public opinion after the fact while a political party’s job is to create public opinion. Pollster Anderson’s opinion is mere guesswork. Don’t you worry, the process of “mental seepage” has begun across Canada as our citizens begin to take a really close look at M. Dion.

Point 3. My, my, my BigCityLib, I doth think thou protest too much. I’ve read some of your other “work” and you are truly a nasty person; quite representative of the rotten beast that has become the Liberal Party of Canada. Humourless, intolerant of other views, and with a deep desire to tell the rest of us outside of Toronto (or whatever big city you exist in) how to run our lives, you and yours have gone a long way to ruining this great country.

I guess I better confess now. I’m a rural, firearms owing, farmer, woodcutter, hunter, redneck kind of guy (and white, too!); can you possibly forgive me for daring to crawl out of my cave????? Betcha didn’t think us knuckle-dragging troglodytes could even run a compooter, didja? Just keep in mind, it’s folks like me who put food on your table.

Anyway, enough fun. The ads are working and beyond the wildest dreams of their creators. ta ta.

I think some people are missing the intent of the ads — to drive up negative perception of Dion amongst those who haven’t formed a hard view of him yet. Those saying the ads were too harsh probably already liked Dion.

Do we really need to get personal in our disagreements with each other on this board? I mean, I can understand disagreeing on policy, and being angry at the missteps of current and previous administrations, but too often we forget that the people posting on this board are just as decent a set of human beings as everybody else posting on this board. And I say this with full memory of the heated discussions I’ve had with other members of this board. I mean, I’ve called Chester a pompous ass, but that’s only during my weaker moments, and only in my head. :-) I don’t know most of the people here from Adam, but I know both Gregs (Staples and the socialist version), and I know them both to be fine upstanding individuals. I don’t know BigCityLiberal from Adam either, but while I might debate him on his partisan attitudes, I would never say that he was a truly nasty person. And I don’t know you from Adam, Woodsman, but I’d never call you a redneck or a knucle-dragging troglodyte, even though you are clearly a very partisan Conservative party supporter. In my mind, being a very partisan Conservative party supporter makes you just a very partisan Conservative party supporter. I’d never stoop to insult you like you seem to believe we would, so you are projecting somewhat if you think that I or others on this board would do that. Even with your posts here, I’d never call you a redneck. A man with a big chip on his shoulder, certainly, but not a redneck.

Let’s treat each other with a bit more respect, please? And that includes me. My apologies, Chester.

…but, and I hate to break it to you, in order for us to win we have to be as tough and ruthless at the Grits have been.

I’m afraid we will have to agree to disagree. I would rather the CPC be tough and effective, not tough and ruthless. You can be as ruthless as you want and still end up having your ass handed to you. Ask the Germans and Japanese about that one. These ads are effective with the base, and the base only, not the Joe on the street.

They are heavily reminiscent of the Liberal “Soldiers. With guns. In our streets.” ads. Our ads, like their Grit predecessors, presume to tell the electorate what to think in a very ham-fisted and clumsy way. And the electorate, surprisingly enough, is not that easily manipulated. If it were, Paul Martin would have been re-elected in a landslide and the CPC would be seeking a new leader right now.

don’t you think that the CPC brain trust did extensive focus testing before the ads were released? A pollster’s job is to describe public opinion after the fact while a political party’s job is to create public opinion. Pollster Anderson’s opinion is mere guesswork

No argument about the pollster’s job vs. the media director’s job.

I don’t think the polling was adequate though, any more than it was for the Grit soldier ads. Sure, these guys have careers managing this stuff, but it doesn’t mean they hit a home run every time. And it is clear to me that this time, they did not.

I don’t think these ads “bombed” as BigCityLib puts it. They certainly aren’t the worst political ads I have ever seen. But if they paid any more than ten bucks for the post-production work, they got badly ripped off. First year Ryerson RTA students can put together higher-quality commercial spots than these sorry specimens.

Attention Political Staples readers, if I may please have a moment of your time:

James Bow is wrong.

James Bow is wrong.

Thank you and have a nice evening.

To judge how effective an ad has been, study the opposition reaction.

The Liberals have been quiet. Not a single negative ad, not even one on the web to try to get some media play.

Either they have suddenly gone nice (not!), or they have done some polling and have decided that the ads are having zero impact on Liberal, NDP and Green voters. They are also probably helping build more name recognition for Dion at little or no cost to his negatives.

“Simply repeating the partisan mantra doesn’t make it so, Chester.”

“James Bow is wrong.

James Bow is wrong.”

That does nothing to prove your magical powers, Chester. It’s like predicting the sun will rise tomorrow.

What, should I not have apologized? Does Chester accept he’s a pompous ass? ;-)

The James Bow: why cant everyone get along is getting old.

sorry James but politics is dirty business and this isnt some neo-liberal school where all points are valid and accepted.

BCL is a puke, a vapid, dense, I know better than you so shut up liberal…

That aint gonna change, so go back to sesame street and blow mr. hooper.

Im gonna continue taking down sinisterchavezsocialistadscamgreg, and if BCL could form a decent arguement I’d take him on too.

While the artistic merits of the ads is being discussed, it’s easy to forget that threats of nationalization of Alberta oil by the Liebrals get zippo run time on the MSM and a 5 year old letter by PMSH gets headlines and non-stop news coverage. How much coverage did Dr. DidLittle get with his “Easy Money” statements? Can you imagine the S#!t storm that would have been generated if Harper had of come up with something like that.

Getting the word out, anyway we can is what it’s about. The CBC is taxpayers money for the Libs, the Star has it as part of it’s mandate, the G&M runs along to the same trough.

I like the ads and hope we see more of them. If we see lots, maybe lots of other folks will see them too.

Pat

Gee, with ambassadors like colin, one wonders why the Conservatives continue to be mired in the low to mid thirties.

The salient point here is that it the ads effectively shut the mouths of the liberal media, who had previously been proclaiming Dion as saviour of the environment without one iota of criticism (surprised we are not), and shattered the image of Dion as an environmental king.

The ads were meant to kneecap Dion on the environment, and they did just that.

The ads had nothing to do with fairness, and the public perception thereof is and was irrelevant.

The ads had nothing to do with fairness, and the public perception thereof is and was irrelevant.

You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. Sorry, that last line spoke to my inner geek. ;)

“mired in the low to mid thirties”

“Mired”. That’s funny.

They must hate being more popular than any other party.

James, please explain how Colin is an “ambassador” for anything. I don’t recall his appointment to an official position with the Conservative Party of Canada.

“Civil” is a term like “progressive”. It’s true meaning never gets past the teeth of the speaker.

When the media brings story after story after story before the ads actually aired telling the viewers they were “attack” ads and using phrasing and facial expressions to express their shock and outrage - what else is the uninformed Canadian to think other than what the Leftist media thinks.

Because these ads were done to get around the shoddy, biased journalism practiced in this country, the media took exception to their poor performance being brought to the forefront so by putting the work “attack” into the minds of Canadians, they effectively told the Canadian public that these ads were not fair. So like good little boys and girls who don’t read or listen any further than the headlines (fodder for another post) the respondents for this poll dutifully stated they thought the ads were unfair.

Like Sheep to the Slaughter!!!

Oh - and James - you profess to want to be nice and not name call - then you turn around and name call in a later comment.

And BCL - well - nuff said.

I am not sure any of us can evaluate the ads sensibly. Remember, their entire purpose was to affect the views of people who might vote Conservative, but also might not (maybe only about 10-15% of voters), and, probably, only the subset of this group who are uninformed enough not to already know that the Liberals are lying about the possibility of meeting the Kyoto targets. I doubt if that describes any individual who reads this blog, and certainly not anyone who comments.

And, bear in mind, if only, say, one quarter of that small group had their views positively affected by the ads, while the rest were at least not moved in favour of Dion, then the ads were effective. So, if 2-3% of voters had their views of Dion affected, that was good enough. You can’t pick up this kind of effect through unsophisticated polling.

The Liberals have been quiet. Not a single negative ad, not even one on the web to try to get some media play. Unless you count Cherniak’s lame attempt to clone his version. Not to mention the Liberals have no money to even pay for an ad. Hmm, no wonder they want to get back into power so much. And if you think the ads didn’t work, then why do the latte crowd think Harper is so scary, and has a hidden agenda - bingo - the pre election ads put out by the Liberals. Hypocrites.

Interesting read, and I love some of the commentary. My 2 cents: NICE GUYS FINISH LAST! Kick ‘em when they’re down, the Libs are like those bug Aliens, shoot ‘em twice to make sure they’re dead, too. It’s the only way to fight in a “war” political or otherwise. That is how you win and as M Chretien has said, “winning is everything”.

cb,

“The Liberals have been quiet. Not a single negative ad, not even one on the web to try to get some media play”

You would be incorrect, The Liberal’s were not quiet. They leaked Harper’s 2002 letter about Kyoto right after the ads were getting a lot of play in the media.

They may not have used the net or video’s, they just faxed something to the press, and they print it verbatum.

My 2 cents: NICE GUYS FINISH LAST! Kick ‘em when they’re down, the Libs are like those bug Aliens, shoot ‘em twice to make sure they’re dead, too. It’s the only way to fight in a “war” political or otherwise. That is how you win and as M Chretien has said, “winning is everything”.

I love this line of reasoning, I really do. If there is a more inappropriate example to cite than M. Chretien, I do not know of it. This is the man whose superb judgment gave us the whiz kids responsible for Adscam. The rusting-out of our armed forces. Rather grievous missteps and decried by left and right alike.

Good thinking there. Playing by Chretien’s rules is a great way to demonstrate superior Tory responsibility and accountability in governance. After all it’s not like the country ever got tired of his shenanigans, did it?

Here’s a poll that really tells whether the ads worked.

http://weblogs.macleans.ca/paulwells/

Léger polled after the he’s-not-a-leader Tory ads against Dion started running in English. It’s a damned interesting poll. Highlights:

• National horse race numbers give the Harper Tories their strongest score since a week before the 2006 election, 38% to 31% for the Liberals, 14% for the NDP and 8% for the Bloc.

• Tory strength in Ontario too: 40% to 35% for Liberals.

• Quebec numbers are a very different story: while the Tories (24%) are only a point below their 2006 election score and have essentially erased their bad summer scores in Quebec, the Liberals are at 32%, which is three points higher than in another house’s poll a week ago and that party’s highest score in Quebec since the Adscam audit. The Bloc, at 31%, continues to slide.