Talk with Tom
Get the dispatches from the new world of work
Another Storm In Florida
Earlier this week, Tom mentioned that being in California means not getting to see the presidential campaign ads. Sitting in Ohio, I would have thought that was because both sides are spending ALL their money right here. Then I saw this fascinating page at cnn.com that shows a week-by-week, state-by-state account of who's advertising where. The folks in Florida are being hit with a hurricane of advertising ... a total of nearly 10,000 ads last week alone, compared to a paltry 7,500 in Ohio (and none at all in California). Kerry and various Democratic interest groups ran 6,700 ads in Florida last week, compared to 3,150 by Bush and GOP groups. That's at least a gale-force blast of hot air!
Perhaps if either side had done a better job of establishing a positive brand identity, they could have run fewer, more effective ads. You can watch the ads at the CNN site, so if you're feeling ignored by the candidates, take a look at how they're courting those of us in the swing states. (And then go to factcheck.org to see who's "stretching the truth" the farthest.)
ARCHIVES
Before blogging became all the rage, Tom was posting book reviews and Observations (essentially early blog posts) to this site. You can find the archives below.
What Tom's Reading Archives
OBSERVATIONS ARCHIVES
right now
What we're talking about
on the front page.