Kennedy-Nixon First Presidential Debate, 1960 (war, JFK, origin, Vietnam)
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People watching it on TV thought Kennedy won. People listening on radio (not tv) thought Nixon won.
Still, I would have had a tough time deciding you to vote for back then as there wouldn't be as much advice from the celebrities to help me understand the issues.
The debate was the defining point for what televised politics would be. JFK fit perfectly with the image of a tv star, he was handsome, charming and cool, just like the actors people were used to on the tube. Nixon came across as someone from central villain casting...dark, sweaty, nervous. To a nation used to determining good guy/bad guy from stereotypical casting for tv programs, it was very familiar and easily recognizable. You didn't have to hang a sign around Nixon's neck for people to know that he was the evil one.
The content of the debate became subordinate to the medium with which it was presented.
Nixon learned from this. In 1968 he hired professional ad men who ran a very sophisticated tv ad campaign which used quick images of problems facing the nation, with a voice over of cuts from his nomination acceptance speech. In his ad which addressed the Vietnam War the viewers saw still photo after still photo of the fighting, the refugees fleeing, homes burning etc. In the background you heard Nixon condemning the war for having been long and expensive and without result. He never says what he plans to do to change matters, but the impression conveyed is that he plans to stop it.
In the original ad which aired for a week, the final image was a closeup of a forlorn looking GI squatting in a trench by himself. The camera zooms in and you see written on his helmet, the single word "Love."
That last image angered a number of GOP supporters who said that it seemed to be a tribute to hippie peaceniks and they insisted that it be changed. The ad men fought against this, they thought that it made for a poetic image, but in the end they yielded and the ad continued to run, but now with an ordinary GI as the last picture.
A few weeks later the campaign reicived a letter from a woman thanking them for having featured her son in the ad, and wondering why that picture had been replaced. It was signed:
"Mrs. Evelyn Love."
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