A 1960’S POLITICAL AD IS REFERRED TO AS, “THE MOTHER OF ALL ATTACK ADS”

 

…This is the only individual that is shown in the political ad called “Daisy”.

 

An amazing TV ad that only ran one time, but is responsible for changing all future campaign ads.

 

Exactly 50 years ago, the Democrat, Lyndon Baines Johnson, was running for president against the Republican conservative, Arizona’s Senior Senator, Barry Goldwater.

 

In prior years, political campaign ads had usually been very up-beat pieces and were always full of American flags, colorful bunting and up-beat songs by well-known vocalists.  Even the crooner of the late 50’s, Frank Sinatra, had previously done a political ad for John F. Kennedy where he re-wrote some of the lyrics to his hit song, “High Hopes”.  That ad gave candidate Kennedy a real boost against Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential campaign.

But the New York ad firm that had done that Sinatra ad for Kennedy was also the firm that was hired by the 1964 Johnson campaign.  The firm had also been instructed to go hard after Goldwater using the fact that he was in favor supporting the US using nuclear weapons as a chess piece during the cold war with the Soviets.

Basically, Johnson wanted to paint Goldwater as a “crazed, trigger-happy Arizona cowboy”. The Johnson team wanted the American public to assume that if Goldwater’s finger was ever on the nuclear trigger, he would pull it and the world would explode.   (One must also remember that this was only 2 years after the Cuban missile crisis of which Americans were very aware as to how close was that potential nuclear catastrophe.)

All of this became what is today referred to as the, “Mother of all political attack ads.”

The name of the ad was simply, “Daisy”.

As compared to previous political ads, this one was all in black and white and the filming was a bit grainy looking.  It pictured an adorable little girl plucking and counting the petals off of a single daisy flower.  As she plucks and counts each petal, her voice changes into a male voice saying, “Mission Control” and then it starts counting down in an official voice like a NASA shuttle launch.  Them you hear the explosion and see the horrible mushroom cloud. 

As the mushroom cloud is developing you hear President Johnson’s voice reading a slow piece of spiritual poetry by W.H. Auden: “These are the stakes: to make a world in which all of God’s children can live, or to go into the dark. We must either love each other….or we must die.”

Then a very serious “Voice of God” type announcer says: “Vote for President Johnson on Nov. 3. The stakes are too high for you to stay home.”

That’s it.  No picture or image of either candidate was offered and Goldwater’s name is never mentioned.

The ad caused so much negative response from the GOP that it only ran one time on the networks.  The Johnson campaign immediately pulled the ad after the Goldwater campaign had rightfully erupted in total outrage..

But by then, the ad had become a news item.  That was also back when there were only three TV networks. The network news programs, in order to show the American people what all the fuss was about, they ran the “Daisy” ad time and time again. 

 

Of course, because it was being run on the network’s news programs, it gave the “Daisy” ad that much more credibility.  (And this was all prior to there being a faux cable network like Fox News where you get more opinions than accurate news.)

The ad may have only run “officially” one time, but “Daisy” changed the concept of future political ads forever.

Just as the pictures of what occurred decades ago at Ohio’s Kent State College, where the National Guard had killed student protestors.  And years before, when black protestors were seen in the films being beaten by the police in Selma, Alabama, and now those recently in Ferguson, Missouri, the Daisy ad had made a similar negative impression on the American public for the '64 elections.

Yes, the Daisy ad had truly earned its reputation as the “Mother of all campaign attack ads.”

Copyright G.Ater  2014