try making a 30 second add of which 3 seconds is for the "I"m john Edwards and I approve this message".

which leaves about 26 seconds to get some points across.

how many things can the reporter message in one sentence?

a reporter asked why publicize the poverty center?

holly molly..  how else does the topic get attention?

It's bizarre because the ad does mention poverty.

Funny stuff

I like how they handled the questions about the NY Times article. Something along the lines of "Without this so-called controversy, there never would have been a New York Times front page article about poverty." They're clearly trying to turn the attacks that are levied against him into positives. Like on Leno last night, it was Edwards himself who brought up the haircut issue, making a self-deprecating joke about it.

by the way, I think the ad kicks Obama's ads' ass.

Looks to me typical Joe Trippi spin. Bad publicity = good for fundraising, Dean style.

Will Joe Trippi continue his 0 to 8, 9, 10(?) losing streak? He's closing in onto Shrum.

It's time to ask Americans to be patriotic about something other than war."

Not sure it's a good tag line. I have to read three times to comprehend the tag line.

Using attacks as a motivation for donations may work in the short run to raise money but it doesn't build your donation base.  

I'm not sure if this approach on the $400 haircut is a good idea.   John and Elizabeth now have a routine they are doing about it which rings phony to those who may be inclined to think that way going in.  It's not a strategy to turn people around on it.

That is such a good line: "It's time for Americans to be patriotic about something other than war."

Just wondering.

1. Dr Frank, made me laught out loud.

2. Blogger conference calls are much better.

It seems to me the amount of information available to reporters covering campaigns is greater than ever -- from the campaigns but also about them -- and yet reporters seem less and less informed. Part of that I understand that they are stretched thinner and thinner by cuts in newsroom budgets -- they might be following the entire race rather than one candidate (a dynamic that will badly hurt Edwards if it continues). Still, the questions you posted correspond to my experience watching local media up close trying to cover presidential campaigns. Even the smart reporters can't write a decent story or even ask a decent question; they simply don't know where to start.

So when a candidate appears, instead of asking "tell me about point 4 in your health care plan" they ask "what about the latest story I read this morning on Drudge".

My point is that I think, amazingly, a lot of professional reporters don't read blogs -- good, informative ones, like this one -- except when their work is mentioned. I feel like from simply reading a few sites sporadically, I seem to know more about both substance and process of this cycle than a lot of these reporters.

Am I being unfair? If not, it seems to me the campaigns (or at least the ones I want to win, like Edwards) need to spend more time laying things out for individual reporters, in effect micro-targeting their message to reporters they way they might to constituencies. I'm sure they do this within the press corps that covers the campaign but in terms of the local media, well, no one is going to get unelected overestimating their intelligence.

or overestimating my diction.

I meant "get elected"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlkPMdoTV Lw
John Edwards: "They're not going to kill this voice."    

"Sometimes I get reporters, they ask me, they say, `I don't understand why you're out talking about the poor. How can someone with your resources talk about the poor?'

"I don't claim to be poor. Does that mean I can't speak out for people who don't have a voice? Does that mean I can't stand up for the disabled, the disenfranchised, the poor?

"Listen, I'm here to tell you whenever you do that you're going to get attacked. Every time you do that you're going to get attacked. It's always true in American history because people who have wealth and power, they do not want to hear this. They want this message to be squelched and so they try to kill the messenger. In this case, that's me.

Let me say this very directly. They are not going to kill this voice. As long as I'm alive and breathing, I am going to stand up for people who need somebody to speak for them."

It's always good to get Jerome's incisive and clear-headed perspective on things.

And really seems to be exactly what the ad is about.

Seems pretty worthless I think.  But I think Edwards feels like he has to do something because the press on him hasn't been great lately and he is largely getting lost in the shuffle back in third.

I would like to see John Edwards mention and support more international affairs.  Problems like global poverty are affecting each and every one of us on a daily basis.  The U.S should not forget the commitment made towards the U.N. Millennium Goals (a pact of ending extreme world hunger by the year 2025) in 2000. According to The Borgen Project, an annual $19 billion dollars is needed to end world hunger by the year 2025. To my sense, it is almost unacceptable to have spent so far more than $340 billion in Iraq only, when we have more than war immunities to change the world and eliminate poverty.