Double-Negative Campaigning

[4thofeleven]

I don't mean to keep picking on Mike Huckabee - he's hardly the worst candidate running for the US Presidency - but his latest stunt needs to be commented on.

See, he's announced he's not going to run an ad attacking other candidates - and by 'not going to run' I mean 'has shown ad to a large group of journalists in order to show them what it is he's not going to show'. And as I mentioned in my last post on him, he has a bit on his website about what a great guy he is that he didn't leave his wife when she was diagnosed with cancer. So there seems to be a "Look how much worse I could be" theme going here in his campaign, and I thought I'd offer some suggestions along the same lines for him:

• He could announce terrible policy proposals that he doesn't plan on implementing, making his real policies look more appealing by comparison!
• He could lock in the religious vote by, for example, providing detailed descriptions of hypothetical orgies that he wouldn't be interested in participating in!
• He could distribute fliers listing all the rumors about other candidates that he won't be spreading!
  
• He could go door to door brandishing a shotgun, and inform potential voters that he doesn't plan on hunting them for sport before the election! This would be very reassuring, and would make it clear that although he is capable of being an insane gun-wielding mass murderer, he doesn't plan on doing that.
  

It's a brilliant campaign strategy, and my hat's off to Mr. Huckabee for his creative approach. Lots of candidates try and paint themselves as the lesser of two evils compared to their opponents, but only Huckabee is cunning enough to paint himself as the lesser of two evils compared to himself! Once voters have seen how terrible Hypothetical Evil Huckabee could be, they're sure to vote for Real Life Not-Evil Huckabee!

Comments

[lyore.livejournal.com]

Well, it's certainly a unique strategy...

[4thofeleven.livejournal.com]

I'm hoping it doesn't catch on elsewhere - it's entertaining to read about, but I wouldn't want to try and decide who to vote for in an environment where everyone's emphasising what they're *not* going to do... ;)

[lyore.livejournal.com]

You could always fall back on this method of rating villians, I guess *g*