McGovern against welfare? Ted Kennedy for Reagan?

[pmbryant]

I saw a fascinating exhibit at the Sixth Floor Museum in Dallas last weekend. "The Living Room Candidate." It has TV sets showing sets of campaign commercials for each Presidential campaign from 1952 to 2004.


At least two of the commercials from the older elections really jumped out at me:

(1) In 1972, George McGovern had a commercial where he was filmed talking in a factory face-to-face with a group of blue-collar workers. He was railing against welfare, interestingly. Not the typical image of the McGovern campaign.

(2) In 1980, there was a commerical that showed a clip of Ted Kennedy railing against Jimmy Carter, concluding in his typical voice: "No more President Carter!" No doubt a relic of the primary fight that year. But then it went silent and a screen came up with words "Democrats for Reagan".

I'm pretty sure Kennedy and Carter patched things up before the convention that year, so this commercial really struck me as a horrible misrepresentation. My partner, who didn't pay close attention to politics back then, had been taken it. "Oh my God!" she said, "I didn't know!" Alas, a terribly effective misrepresentation, even 24 years after the fact.


I think all the commercials in the exhibit are online here: http://livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us/


Peter

[markdd]

1. Wasn't Teddy considering a run in 1980

And overheard saying "I'll kick Carter's ass"?

[pmbryant]

2. Kennedy ran against Carter in the primary

But he was absolutely never a "Democrat for Reagan". His convention speech from that year conclusively prooves this.

Peter

[Yupster]

20. Reverse

Carter said he'd kick Kennedy's ass -- and he did.

[pmbryant]

3. This is fascinating stuff, I promise!

http://livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us /

:kick:

[OneTwentyoNine]

7. Great site,damn....go watch the Clinton commercials....

Was it that long ago when this country was on solid footing??


David

[sr_pacifica]

4. Great Site!

Thanks for passing that on. I just looked at the McGovern anti-welfare commercial, and darn, if the guy doesn't sound like a damn republican! I think that was the era when the repubs had so stridently and persistently griped about welfare painting its recipients as lazy (and welfare became code for "Black people") that even the democrats were jumping on the bandwagon for political gain. Also, this was the era of the "silent majority" and the white working class guys in the video represent that group that sociologists and politicians were starting to pander to.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

6. As I recall, McGovern was for replacing the welfare system with

cash grants and job training, not with throwing people onto the street.

Wait a minute: Google just directed me to McGoverns actual policies on welfare:

http://www.google.co.jp/search?q=cache:nmdSmpRZApQJ:www.4president.org/brochures/mcgovern72.pdf+%22George+McGovern%22%2B%22welfare%22&hl=ja
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The month Richard Nixon took office, the unemployment rate was the lowest it had been in 20 years -- 3.3%. By May, 1971, the rate had risen to 6.2%. Today it stands at 5.5% or 67% higher than when Nixon took office.

Senator McGovern has pledged an Administration that would seek to build a full-employment economy which would provide jobs for every able-bodied American who can work.

By saving $52 billion through plugging tax loopholes and cutting wasteful military spending, and rechanneling this money into education, health care, housing, and other things our nation needs, he would create thousands of new jobs.

And to insure that no one need go jobless, he would recommend the creation of public service jobs for as many million heads of households who cannot otherwise earn enough to keep their families off welfare.

During the Nixon recession, the number of people on welfare soared to 14 million. Senator McGovern will reduce the welfare rolls by a job program and an expanded Social Security System
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The welfare system had been broken for a long time, and nobody really liked it, but McGovern's proposals definitely do NOT sound Republican.

As for "Democrats for Reagan," I suspect that they simply stole the image of Ted Kennedy campaigning against Carter in the 1980 primaries and used it for their own purposes. I also suspect that the "Democrats for Reagan" were largely like the "I'm a life-long Democrat but I think Bush is doing a great job" types who occasionally infest this site.

[sr_pacifica]

14. True, he was for cash grants and job training

BUT the political ad presents him in such a way that the main message you get is "the Democrats also are anti-welfare" and I think that was intended since criticism of the welfare system was such a big issue then.

[jwirr]

22. I Worked in George McGovern's

campaign and I was on welfare at the time. He was not anti-welfare. I was also in college - he wanted a guaranteed wage and full employment.
If the ad seems otherwise it may be that it has been edited. Also I do not remember real anti-welfare bias until Ronnie called us names and convinced the country that the programs were not working. They weren't working for him but they were for many of us who were poor.

[Blue Wally]

11. McGovern was pushing

A guaranteed annual income (read negative income tax) to replace welfare. A vestige of this survives in the Earned Income Tax credit.

[sr_pacifica]

25. Yes, to all you who responded to my post

I KNOW McGovern was pusing a guaranteed annual income. I was of voting age and well remember. I was addressing the ad and its intent. In the ad a pissed-off working class guy (an actor) comes up and complains about welfare and how he doesn't think his hard-earned wages should go to support welfare. McGovern pipes up that he agrees. Then he goes on to tell what he would do (guaranteed income and create jobs).The manner in which the issue is brought up in the ad was catering to the belief fostered by Republicans that working people were carrying the weight of supporting welfare recipients, and that welfare was being abused. McGovern strongly responds to the working guy in the ad that he agrees with him, implying, to my mind, that he thinks the guy is getting ripped off too. And I think the ad was contrived that way to make McGovern look like he was "tough" on welfare, since his guaranteed annual income stance was very unpopular; most people saw it as a handout.

[Zero Division]

5. Very illuminating, especially for someone like me who was born in '79

The parallels between Nixon and Bush's campaigning styles seem striking to me. Both like/liked to go for vague, but slick emotional appeals that might create an illusion of centrism at times. And the attacks on Mcgovern are oh so familiar, calling him a flip-flopper and someone who would drastically cut defense funding. The more things change....

[OneTwentyoNine]

8. Go watch the Bush 2000 RATS commercial....

Very easy to see when you know what to look for. KKKarl Rove at his shitty best....

David

[Julien Sorel]

9. There was a mildly famous dustup

between T Kennedy and Carter after the nomination was decided. Carter approached Kennedy after Kennedy's speech as an attempt at reconciliation, but Kennedy walked away from him. This was at the podium in front of a bunch of cameras and both their families. It was a low-class act that hurt Carter because it received widespread media attention.

Kennedy also launched a floor fight at the convention trying to wrest the nomination from Carter even after Carter had won it in the primaries. It was a nasty, nasty primary, and it wounded Carter and the Democrats.

After Chappaquiddick and in particular, his behavior during this primary, I've always considered Kennedy a spoiled, petulant little kid trapped in an adult's body.

[Blue Wally]

10. Quite common

When a party has a hotly contested primary election campaign, the other party uses the campaign invective of the losers against the winning candidate in the general election.

We certainly used McCain quotes in 2000 against Bush.

[Lenape85]

12. Eisenhower Painted As Flip-Flopper In 1952

Check out Platform Double Talk

[Gold Metal Flake]

13. Check the ad run by Nixon against Humphrey in 1968.

http://livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us/election/index.php?nav_action=election&nav_subaction=overview&campaign_id=169

I saw it on Nick at Nite yesterday evening. Replace the name Nixon (missing from the online version) with Kerry and replace the images of Humphrey with Bush and you got yourself an ad. What is missing from the online version is the tagline at the end. It said "this year, vota as if your whole world depended on it". This was followed by the name Nixon.


{edit: added info}

[tritsofme]

15. I've never forgiven Ted Kennedy for what he said about President Carter

I really do not like Ted Kennedy and he still makes my blood boil when I see him.

I know Carter was in trouble, but we needed unity within the Democrats in 1980, and all Teddy did was give Reagan campaign materials.

[auburnblu]

18. I'll take Kennedy any day

Carter got crushed by Reagan. Ted certainly couldn't have done any worse. The country longed for the days of JFK at that time, Carter should have stepped aside as LBJ did and let Kennedy be the nominee.

[bobbieinok]

19. NO WAY WOULD TEDDY HAVE WON....chappaquidik, chappaquidik

Most democrats I knew did NOT vote for Kennedy in the primaries precisely for this reason.

[liberalpragmatist]

16. DId MOst US households have TVs in 1952?

Or are those films to be broadcast in movie halls/etc? 1952 seems early for television advertisements. Am I wrong? When did most households begin having television?

[burrowowl]

23. In El Paso

TV was starting. People who had TVs would have people over to watch. I remember the coronation of QE II, some Ike and Adelai ads and even Protestants came over to watch Bishop Sheen, I never know why.

[Vox_Reason]

17. Where are the Clinton ad producers?!?!?

It's obvious to see why Clinton was helped tremendously in his '92 and '96 campaigns by these TV ads after reviewing them.

Why doesn't Kerry have ads as good as the Clinton ads were??

WAKE UP!!!!! Do you want 4 more years of fascism?!??!

WAKE UP!!!!!!!

[Yupster]

21. Great site PMBryant

Best story I heard about the ads was a Reagan guy years ago (Lynn Nofzinger maybe?) Anyway, it was about the 1984 'Bear in the woods' ad. He said they did focus groups on it, and the results were amazing. Very few swing voters understood that the bear represented the Soviet Union, and the point of the ad was that the US should be strong.

But, the swing voters loved the ad. People in the focus groups over and over talked about how they loved forests and animals, and how President Reagan was an outdoorsy kind of guy who loved animals too. So they ran the ad anyway.

The best ads overall I ever saw though were Paul Wellstone's senate ads with the bus in them. They were funny as could be, yet serious too. He would get off his bus and talk while he was running into a senior center. "No time to talk. I've got so many things to do. You just don't get much time. We opened up 150 senior centers throughout the state (old ladies yell Yeah Paul). Then running back on the bus to another cite of accomplishment. Here's what we did, but no time to talk, so much still to be done "Yeah Paul." Wonderful ads.

[proud patriot]

24. What a trip

:crazy:

[Vox_Reason]

26. FANTASTIC site--thanks so much for the link!

I spent about 2 hours there last night, watching ad after ad. Absolutely riveting.

Many thanks!