Do you trust your government? Ron George doesn’t.
It’s an interesting commercial, although given the cuts and canned applause it’s obvious the spot was done in a studio.
But look at the message it conveys. We all know the government rarely deserves our trust in this day and age, and Maryland is a prime example. The waste and fraud run rampant in this state, and decades of one-party rule encourages the spigot to remain full-on. We all know this.
So it was interesting that the question was teed up for him in such a way. The commercial is a “genuine fake” in the sense that it wasn’t recorded at the original debate at which Ron uttered those words, but restating it in the better setting is somewhat creative. Unlike the Larry Hogan radio commercial where I found the message is somewhat cluttered by the crowd noise (because it was recorded live) this works rather effectively.
Of course, the question is who will get to see it? Needless to say, I’m giving Ron a little bit of earned media from this but I’ll bet I’m one of the few bloggers who will because others are backing other candidates. With only a modest amount in the bank and no prospect for public financing, the buy will probably be a limited, cable-only buy – if there’s any commercial space left available between the plethora of state and local candidates who may be in their own primary battles around the major media markets.
Now there is a little bit of good news – in my opinion, the audio from the ad can work as a radio ad as well, with a little bit of work and addition of a spoken authority line. It’s a money-saving measure and by all accounts Ron desperately needs to get the most bang for his bucks.