Friday, November 03, 2006

DeVos second in the nation on number of ads placed

And, no, you're not crazy, overall it is heavier than it has been before.



NEW YORK (AP) — With control of Congress at stake, politicians are aggressively taking to the airwaves. Through mid-October, the number of television campaign commercials was up 31 percent compared with the same period four years ago, a report released Thursday found.



Nielsen Monitor-Plus counted 942,900 political ads running between August 1 and Oct. 15. That doesn't even take into account the last week before the Nov. 7 election, when advertising is at its heaviest.



The biggest factor in the number of ads going up is the spending by the national party organizations, with Democrats sensing they could seize control of the House and maybe the Senate during the midterm elections and Republicans playing defense.



Together, the Republican and Democratic national committees paid for more than 110,000 TV ads through Oct. 15. During the same period four years ago, they ran under 50,000 ads.


On the individual side- will our boy Dick beat out Crist? From the onslaught I've seen in the past few days (and I have been turning off the TV quite frequently), my guess is he might.



By a significant margin, two politicians placed the most ads: Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist, the GOP candidate for governor (21,214 ads) and Dick DeVos, the Republican candidate for Michigan governor (20,093).



20,000 ads, and that doesn't include past few weeks. If it weren't so obscene (and to me, there is nothing more obscene than watching a billionaire stand in a restaurant surrounded by obviously well-fed people telling us how one of the first things he will do is cut off assistance to children and the disabled), it would be fascinating.



Can you buy an office with just TV advertising? No experience, no ideas, just endless ads? Whatever happens next Tuesday, this will be a case study for years to come.



Well, until 2008, that is.



(and a sidenote- one very interesting phenomena, my YouTube ads are almost at 1300 views, up almost 500 views in just a few days. That just blows me away, that people come to the internet to watch them. Isn't the TV enough?)