President lets get in step with the guy thats hep, get in step with ike everybody likes for ike for president you like ike, i like ike, everybody likes ike hang out the banner, beat the drum, well take ike to washington ow is now is the time for all good americans to come to the aid of their country. I am so glad we s again, bob. Ike. Bob. Im so glad were friends again, bob. Ike, we agree on everything. Lets never separate again, bob. Never again, ike. Ike bob. Ike. Bob. Ike. Will ike and bob really live happily ever after . Or a m is the white house big enough for both of them . Stay tuned for a musical interlude. Reuben, ive been thinkin a a joint production of American History tv on cspan3 y and cspans washington journal. Were pleased to be joined by Professor Robert mann, professor of communications at Louisiana State university and author of daisy petals and mushroom her . Clouds. For a look at tv advertising. a thanks for joining us. Good to be with you this morning. We start with 1952, the first Year Television was used as a medium for political ads. Le bit yeah, television had been ste used d a little bit in 1948 to a broadcastrr to the Democratic Convention. Harry truman made a speech fromi new jerseyn at the latter partr the raceigin inal 1948 and was on a Regional Television linkup. U saw candidates advertising in a way that was not just a beach. Even though we are going to see a lot o 1952 was the first time you saw candidates advertising in a way that was not a speech. We saw spots, these 30, 60second spots, its important to remember at the beginning that 1952, 1956, 1960, the candidates still saw television as a way to give speeches. So in 1952, for example, even though Adlai Stevenson, the democratic nominee, and Dwight Eisenhower, the republican nominee, were airing some spot advertising, the vast majority of people who were seeing them or at least certainly with stephenson, were seeing them give 30minute speeches. Stephenson gave 18 30minute speeches 10 30 at night on tuesdays and thursdays in the latter part of the campaign. And both candidates were very reluctant to do this kind of spot advertising. They saw politics as being more dignified. They saw spots as the way you sell soup, soap, and cereal, not lofty political ideas. And we are going to see a lot of spots, a lot of ads in the next hour and a half here with Professor Bob mann from lsu. We welcome your calls and your comments and questions. And ads that are particularly notable for you. We have a line for republicans and democrats. And independents. So its fair to say that both candidates in 1952, eisenhower and stevenson, had to be pushed to do advertising, correct . Yeah, so there was an advertising executive who is fairly prominent, Fairly Famous for his innovations at the time, ross reeves, he was hired by the eisenhower campaign to manage their advertisements. At the time eisenhower and his people thought it would be speeches. Reeves looks at one of eisenhowers speeches, i think it was his announcement speech earlier in the campaign and came to the conclusion, made two major conclusions, that eisenhower was a terrible speaker, and that these 30minute speeches were too complex, too long, people left the speech without having a single idea of what it was about, it was just a jumble of issues. He persuaded eisenhower to do the spot advertising and the major way that people were seeing eisenhowers spots was not this animated spot, this jingle you just saw, which was interesting and a lot of people enjoy watching it because it sort of recognizes the First Political spot, but most eisenhower spots were these 20second eisenhower answers america spots where eisenhower would just look in the camera and answer questions from average people off the street. And eisenhower thought it was humiliating. Stevenson thought his spots were a humiliating exercise that really degraded the candidacy and the office of the president. They were both sort of dragged into doing this. Two questions about the ads we just saw, one, the donkeys in that animated ad for thencandidate eisenhower, kind of a negative ad in that regard. And two, who is bob in the Adlai Stevenson . Okay. So the donkeys of at least in the animation of the door hes . Agency that we donkeys that in the othering grinding out of backwards gracious as you point out, is sort of a point, sold negative at agate to that is, john fortnight who was at least eight of john spiraling out of, senator Kamala Bannon in there somehow that asked us running natalie again anderson midway the. Secretary of state hundred three men who is much viral my violators and i public and it and adelaide stevenson the of the nominee events in the, other reality. Bob and i, i thought and i think if the bob was bob tapper epitaph to. Is marcus rather than, the leader of the conservative, the public is senator and serving from alqaeda silent of trial attached. Ten and its on tap before than eisenhower landing our staff was his side announcement, opponent for the nomination to negative nomination in 1952 hit to win tariffs. Support he winds went out and promised him that he would support taffs his fifth order of, agenda on the founders didnt even get tabloid hatred agenda and taff im patronage him. Across call that the restaurant are that tech eisenhower. Gone and surrendered house hat on and cenotaph is taff now controlling taff the momentum and on the point of spot is thats been at all in love we have found that in past and has captured taff irans action saying that. Power is actually going to hines however the behind the throne if biden hours lieutenant Alexander Cohen that. The kind of look at us and then cloudy things, than us and machinery. The days the look a look at how to. That added to the 1916. For us by the learned and shown ike invading johnson were followed and with adults and the power and water can be a multilateral pain. Here is a look. One, tier, over three, four ifour, seen guys, say six, say there. , 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0. [explosion] these are the , the, stakes to make a. Other or we must die. Boat for president johnson neither glow each other either love each or there are we much time for vote still president. Johnson all open preferred hasnt johnson and the stakes are too high a home. Yet that rainjuvenile delinquen crime riots . Has to say about our lack of moral leadership. The leadership of this nation has a clear and immediate challenge to go to work effectively and go to work immediately to restore proper respect for law and order in this land and not just prior to election day either. Americas greatness, its greatness of her people. Let this generation been making you mark for the greatness. Let this generation of americans said i a standard of this possibility that will inspire the world. In your heart, you know he is right. Vote for Barry Goldwater. Host there is a lot of there. Start with the daisy ad antenna less the tenor of the times. 1964, why that ad came about and tell us the tenor of the , 1964, and why the add came about. Guest the atmosphere in the country in that time, we were still in the shadow of the cuban missile crisis. We were still armed to the teeth , facing the soviet union which was also armed to the teeth with their weapons. People at the time were really cheerful that the soviet union in the United States, even though the cuban missile crisis had been resolved, that we would still end up going to war and it would not be a conventional land war, it would he a nuclear war that would destroy much of the world. In that environment comes along coldwater, a very prominent leader of the conservative wing of the Republican Party since the 1950s, republican senator from arizona, who is using a lot of the other close language. When kennedy announces them was when kennedy announces them whe the loan shark, he calls Nuclear Bombs just another weapon. He suggests that we should defol iate the ho chi minh trail in vietnam using nuclear weapons. He made a lot of comments like that a lot of the years that suggested he was reckless and was not serious about the responsibility of being president would it came to using nuclear weapons. So people already knew his position on that. That is why he takes advantage. It is clever because it doesnt mention goldwater. To. Idnt need people who created that spot realized all they had to do was give a story and let the viewers do the work. Let the viewers fell in the blanks with the information and the knowledge and the emotion spot. Hey brought to the that is what makes it so groundbreaking and so clever and i think so effective. Hey put the viewers to work it didnt give them a lot of information. It assumed they had a lot of information and used that information in a clever way. Host is it correct that the daisy ad only run once on television. Is only run once on the night of september 7, 1964. Were threeys there networks, so probably about 4050,000,000 people saw that ad the one time it aired. It wasnt unusual to run the spot a couple of times and move on to something else. The spot did air on several network news broadcasts it into in its entirety later week. Republican Party Officials told her to it, so it made news, which ensured it got a free ride in the networks for the next week. I am guessing between 70 and 100 Million People saw it by the in of the week. Host it is interesting, we always associate Richard Nixon with the law and order campaign. But in goldwaters ad, that is his message. Guest yes. That spot you saw there is a distillation of 30 minutes of a documentary that the Goldwater Campaign had created called choice. They planned to air it is a paid Political Program on National Television. Goldwater saw it and said it was a racist spots. He spotted from being stopped it from being run on National Television. It did get one on local Television Commercials and at house parties. This 32ndned into spot which was trying to take advantage of the anxiety in the public about civil unrest. Lyndon johnson had become president on the death of john f. Kennedy and was seen by a lot of republicans as having added to the and caused a little moral degradation of the country area and the civil rights movement, there werent a lot of protests over the vietnam war at the time. But all this unrest and unsettled environment was growing and conservatives were nervous and scared about it. s campaign was trying to take advantage of that fear and growing unease with a certain percentage of the population. We are looking at the history of president ial Campaign Advertising here on American History tv on cspan three, in a joint production with cspans washington journal. We will get to your phone calls momentarily. 2027488001 for republicans. 2027488000 for democrats. 2027488002. Of your said the American Culture was more conservative th. His observation. Guest from 1952 through 19 64, infancy is the right word to use. Doing thiswho were stuff for politicians were really expand menton. They didnt know what they were doing they were experimenting. They didnt know what they were doing. Today you can hire a company that specializes in producing political spots they, rely on Public Opinion research and focus groups. They didnt know anything about that. These are mostly technicians producing these spots. They were people who arranged the presentation of a 30minute there are really people who arranged a presentation of 30 minute speech or fortified minute distillation of a 30 minute speech on the air. It really was not until doyle, the madison avenue firm that got the account to do Lyndon Johnsons campaign that true Creative Advertising principles were brought president ial campaigns. The reason i wrote my book about this is because this really is, to me, the hinge moment in american political advertising when everybody saw, all, this is how it is done, this is how you advertize political ideas. This is how you create spots that are interesting, that are clever, that put the viewers information to work that involve the viewer not just a passive experience and if you look at the spots before 1964 and 1968 and forward, you can see this is the moment in time when everything changes. Lets hear from our callers. We first got a brand in jacksonville, florida. Good morning, you are on with professor mann. Good morning. Good morning. How are you doing . Good, thank you. I had a question about the modern day president ial commercials. , you said he ran for president because of the fine people comments by President Trump. Off rightms to cut after that line spoken that he condemned White Supremacists and neo nazis. That is always left out. You know what im saying . Host ok, brent. Professor mann, what are your observations of modern day 2020 adds, versus what were seeing 1964 . R in 1952 and guest it is a torrent of ads today and targeted in a way they werent in those days. 1964, the daisy ad, the goldwater ad we saw was meant to be in mostly on a National Television or the goldwater ad we saw was meant to be seen on National Television or in, you know, even then there were certainly swing states, more of them than we have today. But they were just broadcast. They were meant for almost everyone to see them. They were not targeted. Today what you see is a much more finally slice and Dice Electric based on the profiling and political polling that these candidates and our campaigns do. When you see an ad, especially if you see it online, you know, you are just growing through the internet on their website, you see an ad, that is huge an ad that was intended exactly for you, a person just like you. It was not meant for your neighbor. It might not even be meant for your spouse or your children, it was meant for you personally either because of your shopping behavior, buying behavior or registration, where you live. These ads are much more finally targeted to people. It does not mean they always hit the mark but that is the main i think that is other than the stylistic differences, that is the main difference in advertising today as opposed to 1964 and before the invention of the internet. Lets hear from john in mechanics bergh, pennsylvania. Good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I just and curious from doing the research. I remember looking at history in 1961 president kennedy did his speech at the waldorf historian called presidency in the press and then during that same era, he had the edward folks talking about the media and its value to society. Both speeches, both of those folks talk about how the media was not used properly to educate the American People about the issues of the day. I am just curious about the speakers thoughts. He has done a lot of research on these political ads. It was was kennedy and moral right saying we are not using television to educate but just amuse and entertain . Even that in the realm of political ads, it just seems that that is where we have gotten two as opposed to providing useful, helpful education to the American People. Just curious what the guest thinks. Thanks, john. That is a really good question. I would say they were not so much right but there were repression. I think in the early to mid sixties, the advantage that i think there was an advantage and disadvantage. You may not have had a lot of access to different sources of news over three major networks. You may be at a couple of local newspapers, some radio news, but there were generally agreed upon facts and every american understood if something happened, every american sort of had the same basic understanding of that. You may think that is good, you may think that is bad, but that was the way it is. Where we are now, obviously, and i do not have to labor at this point, but we are totally Fragmented Society depending on your political views or your lifestyle, you are getting a news one way, your neighbor is getting his or her news from another way. There is no commonly, widely agreed upon facts about anything and so we are in our silos. We do not talk to each other. We are not hearing the same thing. We are not talking about the same thing. Personally, i am not sure that is a good thing but it is what it is. I think kennedy and those were repressed. Maybe they saw was coming or maybe they were criticizing something that they did not mean. Certainly did not anticipate the internet but here we are. Lets go to tim in north chicago, illinois. On our independent line. Good morning. Good morning and thank you for cspan and mr. Mann. The question has to do with the rules and ethics of political campaigns, president ial campaigns. Historically and up until president day, is very commission or a set of rules that the Campaign Must follow to make sure campaign ads are done properly or slander . Excellent question. In the 1960s there was this federal commission, Fair Election practice commission. There was a nonpartisan commission that did not have a whole lot of teeth to it but it could make some judgments and pronouncements and declare this spot was unfair and, you know, maybe embarrassed a candidate into removing an ad or changing an ad. Sort of the prevailing the prevailing rules since television had been in a Elections Commission and the principles and shrine in our law and constitution that the political speech is the most highly protected form of speech. So, you know, candidates are generally been able to say whatever they want