Iowa's ad war: Romney outspent, but Obama out-advertised (Obama by a touchdown 6 points)

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.omaha.com/article/20121125/NEWS/711259907/1685#iowa-s-ad-war-romney-outspent-but-obama-out-advertised

By Jennifer Jacobs
DES MOINES REGISTER

DES MOINES — In the final five weeks of the presidential campaign, the Mitt Romney coalition nearly doubled what the Barack Obama coalition spent on TV advertising in Iowa — only to lose the state by nearly 6 percentage points, which was double Obama's national victory.

Republican Romney spent more than $3 million in the Council Bluffs-Omaha market during the final weeks while President Obama aired only $144,000 in ads there.

Together, the campaigns and their allies averaged nearly $1 million a day in new TV spending in swing-state Iowa from Oct. 1 to Election Day. Several polls in the frenzied final weeks had shown a neck-and-neck battle in Iowa.

Romney and the outside groups backing him spent $21.5 million in the final five weeks, essentially matching their total spending in the preceding six months, according to a Des Moines Register analysis of TV station records.

FULL story at link.

[onehandle]

1. Total hubris from Empty Suit Moneybags. nt

[demwing]

2. Nonsense from deep in the article...

"“Romney's suddenly improved poll standing after the first debate suggests that if his campaign had moved to round out his profile earlier, the impact of these attacks may have been blunted, possibly to an outcome-altering effect,” wrote Elizabeth Wilner, vice president of Kantar Media's CMAG, which analyzes TV advertising.

“Yet even with scarcely any positive messaging, Romney nearly won,” she said in a blog post for Ad Age.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20121125/NEWS/711259907/1685#iowa-s-ad-war-romney-outspent-but-obama-out-advertised

Oh for fucks sake. in no way conceivable could anyone honestly say "Romney nearly won." Romney's loss to Obama was more significant than Kerry's loss to Bush. It was not close. Not in the national popular vote, not in the ECV, and especially not in the state of Iowa.

[BeyondGeography]

3. Knocking on doors

In addition to all the technical skill, they focused on closing the sale personally. What a great campaign:

First-time voter Marie Rimmer, 27, a child care provider in Des Moines, said she saw ads bashing Romney for his 47 percent comment and ads praising Obama for saving the auto industry and killing Osama bin Laden.

But more powerful to her were the multiple visits from Obama campaign volunteers.

“They kept coming to my house and I decided 'Why not?' Why not get into the issues that are important to me?” she said.

When an Obama worker knocked on her door on election eve, he took her marked absentee ballot and said he would turn it in for her. And like that, her vote was cast. “I was, like, 'Oh, my God, did I really just do that?' I was so excited,” she said.

Romney's criticisms of food stamps and Planned Parenthood stirred Rimmer to action.