Political Ads

In the Richard Nixon's 1968 ad entitled "Convention", Nixon used a comparison of images dealing with social issues at the time, simple animation, and music to help gain the votes of the American people, especially the people alligned with the Republican party.
In the ad, there are images of the Democratic canditate, Humphrey, laughing and smiling at one of his conventions. The images move by quickly and rather chaotically, to the upbeat tune of "Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight" which was a popular song during the Spanish-American war. The music and the images help to create this idea that Humphrey only cared about having fun and not dealing with the issues at hand. Nixon and the Republican party try to convince their supporters that voting for Humphrey would be voting for a candidate who doesn't have anything really important to say; someone who would rather smile and party than fix problems that surround him. After a few seconds of the party film, the movie shudders and the song begins to break a little. Suddenly images of Vietnam, poverty, blood and abuse at civil rights movements. Nixon's audience would be the more conservative population, one that probably had families, and who's lives had been affected in some way by these problems. Showing images of young soldiers who could have easily been the viewers brother/husband/father/son laying in their blood, children so thin that they look like they could have broken in two, and worn out women were all used to appeal to the public's sense of empathy and conscience. By showing pictures that they could easily relate to, Nixon silently tied them emotionally to his campaign points. By interconnecting these awful pictures to the film of Humphrey partying, he accused him of ignoring the issuses that the Republican party thought the most relevant/important.