Kerry's new strategy for TV ads: One pitch aimed at cities like Seattle

By David Postman
Seattle Times chief political reporter

	One ad for John Kerry that's running in Seattle and other liberal communities features the image above and says, "George Bush ... wants to roll back the Clean Air and Water acts and drill in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge. But you can stop him."
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Democrat John Kerry's campaign this week began a new television pitch targeted at Seattle and a half-dozen Democratic-voting, liberal communities across the country. The ads, which run only on local cable systems, attack President Bush for his positions on abortion, the environment and "appointing far-right judges." They close by asking viewers to donate money to Kerry's campaign.

The 30-second TV spots, developed by Kerry's Seattle-based media consultant, represent a new strategy in this year's presidential-advertising campaign. They make sharp attacks on Bush and are designed to motivate committed Kerry supporters and connect them to his campaign via the Internet.

That's in contrast to a much larger ad campaign Kerry launched yesterday designed to appeal to swing voters in Washington and 16 other states.

Those ads appear on broadcast networks, air in nearly every media market in the swing states and will run much more often. The ads focus on the war and the economy but do not mention Bush by name or position.

It is the most expensive ad campaign Kerry has done yet.

The more low-budget, tightly targeted, cable-only ads air in Seattle; Portland; Madison, Wis.; San Francisco; Manhattan and two New Jersey counties, said Kerry spokeswoman Laura Capps.

The cities were chosen not just because of their historic Democratic orthodoxy, but, Capps said, because in recent months they have shown to be rich sources of donations to the Kerry campaign.

"It's an attempt to spend some money to see if you can generate contributions," said Anthony Corrado Jr., a political scientist at Colby College in Maine and a visiting scholar at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. "In some ways it's the next step up to having the JohnKerry.com banner or sign behind John Kerry at all of his events."

It could be a good investment. Corrado said that so far this year the Kerry campaign has found great success raising money on the Internet. Last year, the campaign trailed far behind in that trend to Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor who set records for online fund raising.

The ads promote the Kerry campaign Web site almost as much as Kerry himself. The Web address is mentioned, the site is shown in some of the ads and they all end with some variation on the slogan, "Log on, call, contribute now."
 
The ads were produced by GMMB, the Seattle and D.C. firm that also buys airtime for Kerry's TV commercials.

Consultant Frank Greer of GMMB said the "direct response" ads are different from the normal campaign fare because they push people to take a specific action — check out the Web site — rather than a more general attempt to introduce voters to Kerry or persuade them to vote for the presumptive Democratic nominee.

There is a difference in tone and content in the two sets of ads.

"For swing voters, you have to go with issues that are more front-and-center, voting-decision issues," Greer said.

The swing-state ads deal with the two most dominant issues in the campaign, the economy and the war. In those ads, Kerry speaks directly to the camera and makes a quick case for what he would do as president.

"He's looking voters right in the eye, and it's a statement really of some of the priorities he's going to bring to the country as president," Mike Donilon, a senior adviser and media consultant to Kerry, said in a conference call with reporters yesterday. "We think it's a very important foundational argument to give people a sense of where it is that he would take this country."

But for ads targeted at committed Kerry Democrats, Greer said, "you can go to core issues."

Those ads open with a narrator making clear attacks on Bush. For example, in the ad focusing on the environment airing in Seattle, the narrator says, "George Bush let corporate polluters rewrite our environmental laws."

In another ad, Kerry says, "I promise to take this fight to George Bush every single day."

Corrado points out that not only do the ads deal with issues that are dear to liberal Democrats, they connect with "real-world events," like Earth Day and the upcoming women's march in Washington, D.C.

David Postman: 360-943-9882 or dpostman@seattletimes.com

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