NEW YORK—The use of footage from Sept. 11—including one shot of a flag-covered stretcher or coffin being removed from the World Trade Center site by firemen—in two of three new Bush-Cheney re-election campaign ads has sparked strong reaction and ample debate in the world at large and in the advertising and media community specifically. "I think it is despicable," remarked one New York-based advertising agency head of production who asked to remain anonymous. "It was the [first] Bush administration that at the start of the first Gulf War banned any photographs of our soldiers and their coffins being brought off the planes, and yet [the current President Bush] uses a flag-draped coffin when it benefits him."
Created and produced by Maverick Media, Austin, Texas, the :30 ads "Tested" and "Safer, Stronger" (which also appears in a Spanish-language version) briefly incorporate footage of the destruction at the World Trade Center, including a flag waving in front of the wreckage. The spots began airing on national cable television networks and selected local affiliates on March 4. They can also be seen on the Bush-Cheney ’04 Web site, www.georgewbush.com
Some relatives of the victims of Sept. 11—as well as some firefighters—have deemed the use of Sept. 11 footage in the ads exploitative. "I would be less offended if [Bush] showed a picture of himself in front of the Statue of Liberty. But to show the horror of 9/11 in the background-that’s just some advertising agency’s attempt to grab people by the throat," Tom Roger, whose daughter was a flight attendant aboard the plane that hit the World Trade Center’s North Tower, told New York’s Daily News.
Not everyone who was personally affected by the events of Sept. 11 agrees with Roger and other detractors of the spots. The press has quoted family members of Sept. 11 victims who feel the president had every right to use the images, and did so in a tasteful manner. Meanwhile, former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani has also defended the president’s decision.
Kathy Delaney, executive creative director/managing partner of Deutsch Inc., New York, didn’t have a problem with President Bush referencing Sept. 11 in his ads. "I don’t think anyone would have faulted him for referring to 9/11 in the context of all the changes that have taken place in this country over the last few years. But I think it’s the way that they did it that seemed inappropriate," Delaney shared. "I just don’t think that he needed to show the imagery [of the World Trade Center]. That’s what I would have advised him against. I would have said, ‘It makes total sense to reference the occurrence, but that imagery is so painful for people. You just don’t need to go there, and it’s going to be viewed as manipulative.’ "
John C. Tedesco, an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Va., who studied the use of war and terrorism in 2002 political advertising, termed President Bush’s use of the Sept. 11 footage "ethically suspect."
"To mention the tragedy is obvious. We need to mention it when we talk about homeland security and national defense. But there was such an uproar after 9/11 about showing this footage, and many stations actually agreed not to show the footage anymore," Tedesco related, noting the emotional trauma the scenes cause for some people.
Tedesco is especially concerned about children seeing the images. "With political ads, you can’t control when they air and what audiences are going to be exposed to the messages—children watching news around the dinner table with their parents [could see these ads]," Tedesco maintained.
Like Delaney, Tedesco would have advised President Bush against using the footage if he had been part of his inner circle. However, Tedesco’s colleague, Lynda Lee Kaid, senior associate dean for graduate studies and research and professor of the College of Journalism and Communications at the University of Florida, Gainesville, and former supervisor of the Political Commercial Archives at the University of Oklahoma, Norman, has a different take on the matter.
Kaid didn’t find President Bush’s use of the Sept. 11 footage offensive at all, and she would have encouraged the president to use the shots if she had been involved in the making of the ads. "I would have done that for two reasons," Kaid stated. "First of all, I think it is a justified representation of an important event in his presidency. Secondly, because I know a great deal about the research that’s been done on political advertising and on media coverage of political advertising—if I wanted to get my spot covered and get some free airtime for it, this is the way to do it."
If Robert Thompson, professor of media and popular culture and director of The Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, Syracuse, N.Y., was advising Bush on advertising matters, he said he would have erred on the side of caution and not shown any footage from Sept. 11, given that it has the potential to be contentious. "When advertising started coming back after Sept. 11, a lot of commercials were using patriotic imagery and flags and all the rest of it, and there were some people then that were saying that was going a little too far—the idea that you would use what had happened to sell a truck—and there it was quite distant. That was just a red, white and blue flag waving," Thompson said. "Here, you are actually seeing the images themselves."
That said, Thompson predicted that anything President Bush had done in his ads would have raised eyebrows. "This is the first shot across the bow for the [presidential] advertising season. Clearly, [President Bush’s] first commercial was going to get a lot of scrutiny no matter what," Thompson said. "It could have been a black screen that said, ‘Re-elect the president,’ and people would have talked about it."
Firefighters and relatives of the victims of Sept. 11 who find President Bush’s spots offensive have called upon him to pull them off the air. Bush’s re-election campaign chairman and former Montana governor Marc Racicot said that’s not going to happen. During a March 7 interview with newsman Chris Wallace on FOX News Sunday, Racicot stated, "No, we have not thought about pulling the ads."
Racicot termed the spots "an entirely appropriate effort on our part, we believe, to recall a memory and to recognize what it is that it’s going to take in terms of leadership to lead the war on terror. And that’s precisely what the ads were designed to do," he said.
If pressure builds, Tedesco said he could envision the campaign giving in and withdrawing the ads. "I could see them pulling them, particularly because of the statements from the families. I think that’s a strong enough reason to say, ‘We’re pulling these ads.’ "
SHOOT was unable to obtain comment from someone at Bush-Cheney ’04 or Maverick Media at press time.
