Hillary Clinton Ad, Barack Obama Ad

 This ad watch examines two Spanish language advertisements, “Como Padre” created by the Barack Obama campaign, and “Nuestra Amiga” created by the Hillary Clinton campaign. Both were created days before the Austin, Texas debate January 2008. Each is 30 a second spot that emphasizes the importance of family. Neither displays the political party, but repeatedly shows Obama ’08 and Hillary ’08.

The Clinton ad features Hillary greeted by Latino voters at a rally, with salsa music in the background, followed by her visit to a Latino home. She is greeted by the family and is then seen sitting on their couch, holding a little girl. The house is well-furnished and the family is very well-dressed and of a whiter skin tone. She is affectionate, shaking hands and later accepting a kiss on the cheek from the little girl on her lap. The clip ends with Clinton at a rally, being hugged by an elder man, her campaign slogan and a little girl saying “Estamos contigo” (We are with you). Everyone featured is smiling. The ad does not feature any text and focuses mainly on Clinton and the family. The ad was sponsored by Clinton.

The Obama ad begins with a side portrait of Obama followed by a black and white picture of him and his family. After shown with one of his daughters, he is shown at a rally. The important points of the ad, including health care, economic help for college and new laws so that families can conserve their homes, are shown in white text with images that correspond. There are also several images of parents with a baby and a mother with a young boy who was riding a tricycle. There is wider diversity of Latinos with various skin tones, clothes and ages. The ad does not focus on Obama, but on the Latino families. While Clinton says that the ad was approved by her in English, Obama says it in Spanish. His ad was sponsored by his campaign, Obama for America.

Neither of the ads focuses on a specific issue, but on family as a priority to the candidates. It is generally believed that Latinos are extremely family-oriented and are very concerned about medical care, university aid and economics. While Obama focused on all three, Clinton focused on medical care and the economic crisis. Neither of the candidates explained their specific stances on any of the issues or how their positions would affect Latinos.

On the Hillary Clinton Web site, it says that she “has spent her lifetime as an effective advocate for parents and children,” and helping children has been at the center of her public life. Her health care plan would require that everyone get health insurance, subsidized by employers and the government and paid for by the tax cuts and savings in the current medical system. As part of her economic plan, Clinton proposed a 70 billion dollar budget to “jumpstart” the economy, in addition to repeals against the Bush tax cuts for households earning over $250,000. Obama’s health care plan would require that all children have health insurance, paid for by tax cuts, though he aims to provide universal coverage. He proposes to aid the economy by providing tax relief to middle and working classes and repeal the Bush tax cuts for those earning over $250,000. To help families, he would double funding for after school programs, expend the Family and Medical Leave Act, provide a refundable tax income credit to help with child care and encourage flexible work hours. Each of the candidate’s positions are therefore seemingly concurrent with the issues addressed in the ad.

There are certain bills that demonstrate the candidate’s positions on issues that are important to Latinos. Both Clinton and Obama support paths to legalization for illegal immigrants which include learning English and paying fines, toughening penalties for hiring illegal immigrants. While the ads are aimed towards the Latino community, both candidates voted for the fence along the Mexico-U.S. border. The DREAM act was supported and co-sponsored by Clinton and Obama. They also support bilingual education that would make the transition easier for Latino children.

Debates also help to decipher whether the ads are truthful. During the Los Angeles debate, Clinton said that job losses were the fault of “employers who exploit undocumented workers and drive down wages”, later dividing African-Americans and Latinos by quoting one African-American who had told her that he had a construction job until “the only people who get them anymore are people here without documentation.” In response to the same question, Obama said that unemployment rates among African-Americans were high before undocumented workers took many jobs and asserted that blaming immigrants for unemployment amongst African-Americans was scapegoating.

While the ads are ethical on a surface level, each of the candidates used the ads as a means to earn the Latino vote, using the Latino vote as a means to their end. Neither of the candidates had created Spanish language ads, and neither had actively sought to help Latino populations before they realized how important the Latino vote is in this election. The behavior demonstrated in Clinton’s ad is an inaccurate representation. She is not likely to visit Latino families, sitting around and talking to them on a regular basis. According to Kant, I believe this is using the Latino community as objects. The ads furthermore do not aim to help citizens understand the candidate’s positions on issues such as the DREAM act, or other issues that would be important to the Latino community.

According to Philip Patterson and Lee Wilkins in Public Relations: Standards of Advocacy, there are three principles by which ads should be judged; access, disclosure and truthfulness. As most voters have access to television and the internet, the ad passes according to the access principle. Disclosure, however, does not apply because the ads do not provide sufficient information to make a well-informed and rational choice. While it would be hard to do so in 30 seconds, if the candidates wanted to inform Latino voters, they could have created various ads focusing on different issues, such as those that exist in English. The third principle does not apply either because the ads provide an inaccurate picture of the candidate’s relationship with Latinos, especially the Clinton ad. The images are misleading because the majority of Latinos living in the U.S. could not afford the houses and cars shown. The ad should not have only shown upper and middle class Latinos.

Finally, I will use the Potter Box to analyze whether the ads are ethical. I will classify them under the same values, principles and loyalties because they are similar. The values they are attempting to uphold on a surface level are diversity and outreach to the Latino community. The principle is utilitarian because they might think that it does not matter that they are using the Latino community as a means to their end, as long as they win the presidency and can later help. Finally, I think Obama and Clinton’s primary loyalty is to their campaign.

While the ads are not unethical on a surface level, both Clinton and Obama are using the Latino community as a means to their end: the presidency. If the candidates wanted to reach out to Latino voters, they would create specific ads that focus on issues rather than creating ads that do not provide voters with any information that could guide their decision.

-At this time, I have not received a comment from either the Clinton or Obama campaign in response to my ad watch.

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