| Politics The Loneliest Spies Why the Republican Party may not always want to be "tough" on national security. By David Weigel
Posted Friday, Jun 14, 2013, at 12:30 AM ET  Seven years ago, when Republicans panicked about losing the House or the Senate to Democrats, they reached for a familiar bludgeon. The other party was "weak" on national security, wasn't it? It wasn't so committed to "fighting terror," was it? So Democrats in some close races were confronted with spooky-scary terrorism TV ads. The classic, by general agreement, was the spot run against Democrat Chris Murphy by incumbent Connecticut Republican Rep. Nancy Johnson. With imagery purloined from direct-to-DVD thrillers, the ad asked voters to consider whether they'd vote for a Democrat who questioned the National Security Agency's program of tracking calls. "A terrorist plot may be unfolding," huffed the narrator. "Should the government intercept that call or wait until the paperwork is filed? Nancy Johnson says, 'Act immediately. Lives may be at stake.' " Republicans loved that ad. Washington Post race-watcher Chris Cillizza called it one of the 10 best spots of the 2006 cycle. "Interestingly," he added, "though this ad was cited as one of the cycle's best by numerous operatives of both partisan stripes, one GOP strategist noted that Johnson's numbers actually went down after the spot aired." Yep. Johnson was felled in a 12-point landslide, in a district where only 1,112 votes had separated George W. Bush from John Kerry. Today, the strategists who worked on that ad shrug at the results—it was a bad year. Murphy, now the junior senator from Connecticut, knows the ad backfired. "The central argument ... To continue reading, click here.
Also In Slate
I'm a Gay Man Who Wants to Get Married
Golf's Unconscionable Ban on Croquet Putting
Play the Slate News Quiz
|
 |
No comments:
Post a Comment