New Ron Paul ad slams Etch A Sketch 'games.' Does he have a point?
Ron Paul is tired of Etch A Sketches, apparently, and he鈥檚 not going to take it anymore. The Texas libertarian has a that slams the media/political world鈥檚 sudden obsession with red shakable toys.
The ad opens with the now-ubiquitous CNN clip of Eric Fehrnstrom, a Mitt Romney aide, saying of a general-election campaign, 鈥淓verything changes. It鈥檚 almost like an Etch A Sketch. You can kind of shake it up and restart it all over again.鈥�
Then it moves through cuts of Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich holding up actual Etch A Sketches, interspersed with media Etch A Sketch mentions. 鈥淲e鈥檙e talking about big things here, folks!鈥� says Mr. Santorum, while waving the fine Ohio Art product in the air.
Then the ad turns sober. 鈥�$15 trillion in debt鈥� flashes across the screen, followed by 鈥�12 million Americans unemployed.鈥�
At the end, 鈥淭ired of the games?鈥� comes up, just before, in even bigger letters, 鈥淩on Paul.鈥�
The overall effect is to repeat the original charge 鈥� that Mr. Romney鈥檚 positions are erasable 鈥� while simultaneously belittling the political focus on playthings and framing Representative Paul as the responsible adult in the GOP hopeful room. Clever! We鈥檝e said it before: Paul may be losing, but he鈥檚 got the best ad people in the race.
So, is Paul right that this whole Etch A Sketch fixation is silly? Well, we鈥檒l note that from the first, we鈥檝e said the whole thing is overblown and is likely to have little effect on either the primaries or general election.
Some commentary has gone further, noting that political science has found little evidence that gaffes, as defined by the media, have any effect on political races at all. The whole affair should make people rethink 鈥渢he 鈥榝reak show鈥� aspect of the political press鈥� rather than Romney鈥檚 candidacy, in a stinging piece for Columbia Journalism Review.
That said, Paul isn鈥檛 the only Romney rival to pivot off Sketch-gate for his own political purposes. The Gingrich campaign has even launched a website, , with a virtual Etch A Sketch that viewers can shake to see Romney's positions.
The Democratic National Committee, meanwhile, has produced already with an Etch A Sketch theme. So even if the red toy meme doesn鈥檛 really change voter minds, it looks sure to provide material for idea-starved campaign professionals for days to come.
