Fire Jesse Benton, Get Some New Ads

The Ron Paul campaign still has a lot of money to spend but it is being thrown away on uninspiring radio and television commercials which make Ron Paul look like a typical Republican. These ads largely ape the other candidates by either stressing Paul's biography (thus telling nothing to voters about where he stands) or pushing a" close the borders" approach. They have little in common with the Ron Paul of the debates.

The recent newsletters controversy has hurt badly but the campaign still can have a postive impact if it radically shifts course through a hard-hitting, pro-liberty ad campaign. Television and radio commercials should stress the following: the destructive impact of the war on drugs, the racist impact of this war for a whole generation of black men, the threat to civil liberties by the Bush administration and the Democratic Congress, and, most of all, the war in Iraq and the threat of war in Iran. These need to be supplemented by regular news releases.

It is a travesty that most antiwar Republican voters in New Hampshire and Michigan appeared to have believed that John McCain was the antiwar candidate. This might have been different had an ad campaign repeatedly informed them that Paul is the only Republican candidate to oppose the war.

Lets face it. Ron Paul will not win the nomination. If he goes out in a flourish, however, he can do a lot of good for the future of libertarianism. If the campaign continues to run the current ads, it will soon fade into nothingness and few supporters will be willing to contribute more money.

Jesse Benton, the man who designed this campaign, should be fired immediately. A new ad director should then implement this strategy. Scott Horton has suggested a youtube contest for ads but it may be too late. At the very least, the campaign (hopefully sans Jesse Benton) can produce commercials that highlight the many clips of Paul giving pro-liberty and antiwar comments on these and other issues.