I guess for me it started with Kim Campbell's Campaign portraying Chretien's facial deformity prominently in one of her ads. I, like many Canadians, was shocked. Campbell went on to lose all but 2 seats, including her own, so clearly that was one Ad that did not work out.
Pollsters though will tell you that negative ads do work and they probably do, but not for me. I find them offensive and see them as a ruse to avoid dealing with real issues.
A recent example is Harper's ad that purports to prove that Michael Ignatief cannot be trusted simply because he has lived outside of Canada for a good portion of his life. What precisely does not having lived in Canada to do with whether or not a person can be trusted?
In fact, I do not really care if our politicians comes from Mars - as long as they demonstrate good common sense, values - like honesty and integrity, and promote the private sector over governement - while reducing taxes. You get the idea - a Humane Libertarian.
If I was Ignatief, I would run the Harper ad, in its entirety, changing the ending tag line to say:
'Can you the voter really trust Mr. Harper - as Prime Minister - the author of such a vacuous, negative ad?'
As I see it.
"Galagher"
