Online Public Relations Thoughts

Reading this story a couple of days ago put me in mind of this long-departed queen about whom I saw a documentary recently. The radical cartoonists of her day tarred her reputation by portraying her as a "pornographic princess" who bedded every male that visited her. It became conventional wisdom among the French that she was as randy a royal as ever was when, in fact, she was a devoted mother. Marie Antoinette ignored the charges for too long then when she moved to knock them down, she did too little. People are always ready to believe the worst of another.

There is scarcely a political candidate who hasn't had to deal with some charge that is off-issue and off-target but effective in moving voters to the opposition. Most political advertising this year is negative. It's the same old things over and over. Unfortunately, it's the same old things because it works. Honesty and issues have nothing to do with it.