Posted on 08/21/2007 8:50:57 AM PDT by DaveLoneRanger
The candidates for governor launched the television phase of the campaign yesterday with Democrat Steve Beshear offering a familiar message of changing leadership and Republican Gov. Ernie Fletcher promising to tell a story about the ills of casinos.
Both of the ads' messages echo the candidates' core arguments so far in the race.
Beshear started airing his ad, called Right Thing, yesterday morning on most network affiliates statewide.
"People are desperate for leaders, real leaders, who can bring us together to make Kentucky better," Beshear says in the ad, which is a standard campaign-type commercial that features Beshear first talking to a crowd of people, then directly to the camera with the state Capitol in the background.
Fletcher's spot, which begins airing today, is the first in what promises to be a series of episodic commercials about the governor's No Casinos Tour that will show what he's found in other cities that have the gambling establishments.
"It's a story without a happy ending," Fletcher says at the end of the commercial.
The governor's ad, produced by Fred Davis' Hollywood-based firm Strategic Perception Inc., seems more like a preview of a documentary than a campaign commercial. But Davis is known for his creative approaches, most recently creating the governor's famous bully ads during the GOP primary that featured children on a school yard yelling at a young Fletcher-look-alike.
The spot was meant to tell Republican voters that Fletcher held his course despite the bullying by opponents and critics.
This time, Fletcher aims squarely at casino gambling, which Beshear made a key part of his successful campaign during the spring Democratic primary.
Fletcher had been publicly neutral on casinos but, since June, has stridently opposed them.
Accompanied by dirge-like music from a piano and violin, Fletcher opens the commercial saying, "Most folks in Kentucky have never been in a casino. But it seems choosing between me and Steve Beshear is coming down to casino gambling. He wants it. I don't."
As images outside a casino are shown, Fletcher asks, "How bad could it really be? I've visited some towns and cities to find out, places casino gambling has laid a hand and I'm taking you with me. It's a story without a happy ending."
Fletcher's campaign press secretary, Jason Keller, said the ad was shot in several communities over four days.
He declined to say which casinos and cities Fletcher visited, how many more ads on the subject will air and how long this ad will run.
Fletcher said in a statement that follow-up ads over the next "several weeks" will be intended to show "how casinos not only fail to live up to the promises of politicians, but how destructive they are to our way of life."
Beshear has said that casinos could bring in as much as $500 million in tax revenue that could be used to boost Kentucky's health and education systems. And because allowing casino gambling would require a constitutional amendment, voters would have to sign off on it. Beshear says he wants to give Kentuckians that chance.
Beshear, meanwhile, has turned to broad messages for change that should ring familiar to voters.
"Unfortunately, some politicians care more about what's good only for themselves," Beshear says in his first ad, although he doesn't elaborate on who or what actions to which he was specifically referring. "I'm running to change that, to finally clean this place up and put the people of Kentucky first."
Fletcher used similar phrases such as "time for a change," "clean up the mess in Frankfort," "restoring hope" and "put Kentucky first" during his successful 2003 campaign in which he defeated Democrat Ben Chandler. Beshear said Monday, at a news conference about his programs aimed at helping families, that voters think Fletcher broke his promises from four years ago.
"They are very ready for a change. They believe change can come," Beshear said.
Both campaigns claimed that they are sticking to their own plans and unconcerned with what the other camp is doing.
But records show that Fletcher's campaign jumped to buy its ads 45 minutes after Beshear's campaign purchased its time on WKYT-TV in Lexington, according to information filed with the station.
Fletcher's campaign, however, bought far more ad time than Beshear, double in the Lexington market. For instance, on WKYT, Fletcher purchased 85 commercials between today and Aug. 27 for $26,260 while Beshear bought 38 spots through Aug. 26 for $12,375.
Notably, Fletcher accepted casino donations in the past.
Let the fun ‘n games begin.
I agree on keeping the casinos out of the state, but with so much money leaving the state for the casinos right across the river in Indiana, its hard to get people here in Louisville to see the downside of gaming.
It seems to me like that horse is already out of the barn, with riverboat gambling in Indiana and Ohio already sucking millions of dollars out of Kentucky with no commensurate return in tax dollars. I’ve been to the Caesars in Indiana and it is only 30 minutes from Louisville. I’m sure about 80 percent of the people there were Kentuckians. If they want to gamble it is stupid to keep sending their tax dollars to Indiana. And it also seems a bit rich for a state known for horse racing to be against casinos.
The republicans should have tossed him out in the primariesAgreed. But we shouldn't write him off yet. Unfortunately.
His actions haven't helped his image, but he has been better than he is depicted.From experience of a nature I regrettably cannot expound on, he is actually worse than he is depicted.
You’re right, a lot of casinos are just across the river, easy reach for Kentucky’s largest city. I don’t mind exporting gambling dollars if we keep the slums out. But I don’t like that it brings all the poverty back home to roost.
The thing I liked about Fletcher is that he wasn’t just one of the ole boys in Frankfurt. After forty years of Dems ruling the place. Any Republician would have walked into the lion’s den.
The Dems do not own Frankfurt, they just believe they do.
The thing I liked about Fletcher is that he wasn’t just one of the ole boys in Frankfurt.I don't think he was going in either. But the leopard didn't take long to change its spots.
KY has long been 2-1 Democrat in registration, and KY Republicans have a dismal turnout record.
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