Politics is a strange business. Addictive, corrupting, alienating and inspiring, being even a small part in the campaign leaves you asking yourself any number of questions. I’m currently enjoying a break from frontline politics, and reflecting on what might be next. Then I stumbled across a video. Not just any video, but Dale Peterson’s.
In the last general election, campaign videos were barely noticed. While WebCameron has achieved a large audience, it’s unlikely to change the outcome of an election any time soon - and for individual candidates, few saw them as a good use of time or resource.
So, let Dale Peterson be both a warning and an inspiration to anyone attempting to propel themselves to political stardom with a video. He’s achieved national media coverage and more than 1.5m views on YouTube for his video ad for his campaign to be the Republican nominee for Alabmama Agriculture Comissioner.
Yup - more than 1.5m views of a video made to win the nomination of his party. The election for real hasn’t even started yet.
Can you imagine someone making an advert for an open primary in a constituency in this country? It would be brilliant. Just think: Rory Stewart reciting his experiences in Afghanistan while conquering a hill in the borders, or Ed Balls strolling down Morley high street at night, lamenting why antisocial behaviour means a poor politician can’t visit town without being heckled. It’d be gold!
Then you’d have the ambitious ones - the candidate who rides a horse into the market sqaure, or the hopefull soul marching through a town centre dressed as St George. Oh wait, both of those things actually happened - although only after selection.
If the golden rule of TV is to keep it short and entertaining, and leave the audience in no doubt of what your message is, Dale’s got a bright future in showbiz if politics doesn’t work out.
One Comment
1 Gareth Allen wrote:
Well he’s wearing his policies on his sleeve and his rifle on his shoulder. You can’t accuse him of hiding his intentions.