You would have to ask Biden how HE would define negative ads. But in the end, there are only 2 approaches to political advertising for any challenger. You either campaign on things you will initiate or improve or you harp on the missteps of the incumbent. From where I sit, it would be difficult for Biden to devise a more effective strategy than a mere recounting of the events from the past 3 years.

He can talk about solving certain problems without accusing Trump of having caused them. Biden did the right thing to hold off on negative ads while Trump is suffering from the virus.

I think it was a good thing that Biden said he was going to pull the “negative ads”. Both he and Trump have pushed too many negatives in this election. But the problem that leaves Biden is that he now has to push his vision. Unfortunately, that vision has been blurred for some time now. He originally went along with the radical left and the socialist agenda. Then he got the nomination, but now he is saying he doesn’t support that at all. So he is flirting with losing his most rabid supporters…or he is just lying through his teeth. But trying to sell the socialist agenda won’t win him votes. What I have seen so far from his ads is that he is demonstratively non-committal about everything. He is following Bill Clinton’s speech pattern…“My plan will do this and My plan will do that”...without ever actually giving details. And when he doesn’t take questions or interact with people, it is impossible to actually get an answer out of him.

@stanleybmanly You did not answer my question. Presumably, you do not equate “a mere recounting of the events from the past 3 years” and negative ads.

@LostInParadise Exactly which negative ads did Biden hold off on?

@seawulf575 Without negative ads, Biden’s campaign is nothing.

I believe they are just called negative ads because it just points out your opponents’ flaws. I will say I don’t understand pulling the ads. I know he doesn’t want to be perceived as a bad guy knocking a guy when he’s down but his team will have no problem putting their ads on air. I do agree it is what has always been done, and it’s not like he’s being disrespected after he died. He’s not dead yet. Pull the ads if that should happen.
That is the one problem with Dems. Always trying to play fair when the other guy is trying to drown you. But I guess it may be a strategic shot to win people who are on the fence about Trump, because if the ads haven’t persuaded people by now one way or another then it really is just a waste of money. He would be better off using ads for messaging.

@crazyguy I cannot answer your question. Only Biden can answer your question. I merely believe that Biden has a huge armory in merely playing back the unadorned transcript of Trump’s last 3 years.

@crazyguy , I don’t know which specific ads were pulled. I just heard that Biden decided to remove negative ads.

@Pandora, Biden is doing well in the polls. His best strategy at the moment is to appear diplomatic and not to look like he is overreaching.

@Pandora If Biden’s ads don’t point our Trump’s flaws, what else can they do – lay out his elusive policies?

@stanleybmanly If he sticks with doing that, I am not sure what ads he can pull. It is not like j=he can talk about his policy positions – if he does he will alienate half his supporters.

@LostInParadise The reason I asked my question was that one of his “negative” ads about social security was still running. Right now he is leading by double digits, so I see what you are saying.

@crazyguy “what else can they do – layout his elusive policies?”, It’s statements like this that make me believe you are just trying to be combative instead of really looking for answers. When you feel like Trolling please just go to your Facebook account or twitter. But if you don’t understand Biden than actually look up what his policies are and look up where Trump is on his policies.

Probably the same way Trump defines “fake news.”

There are different ways of classifying political ads. Broadly speaking, however, there are three types: positives ads, negative ads, and issue ads. Positive ads are about the candidate. Negative ads are about the opponent. Issue ads bring awareness to or educate about a specific issue without advocating for any specific candidate.*

Response ads—in which a candidate attempts to refute criticisms of them made by their opponent or other critics—are sometimes considered to be a kind of negative advertising, but they are sometimes considered a category of their own. I tend to consider them part of the negative advertising cycle. But again, there are different ways of classifying political ads.

Whether or not Biden endorses this taxonomy and whether or not he thinks response ads count as negative ads are not questions that I can answer. We will just have to see what kinds of ads he runs and infer his views from there. (Or we can just retreat into our partisan corners and assume that his ads do or do not count as negative depending on what side we are on.)

——————————
* In theory, at least. In practice, issue ads are almost always slanted in a fairly obvious way. There was a series of court cases litigating what was and wasn’t allowed until the US Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC (2010) rendered the issue moot.

@Pandora You can believe what you want about the motives behind my question. All I can tell you is that I saw the story about his ad on social security (the one in which he says Trump will run the fund dry by the middle of 2023) and wondered if Biden thought that was not a negative ad. As for his policy positions, I do think they are elusive.

@kritiper Are you saying that the honorable Biden has descended to the same level as that loathsome piece of shit?

@SavoirFaire How would you classify the ad (which I have not seen but have read about, where Biden talks about how Trump will wipe out social security by mid-2023)?

What could be more negative than a mere replay of actual Trump performances? I don’t believe Trump deserves the favor of either ignoring his missteps nor neglecting that his illness is so obviously the result of his cavalier regard for the “hoax” which hospitalized the “stable genius.” Nothing about Trump yields him worthy of civility. Biden should deploy the tactics of the Lincoln Project and grind the fool into the dirt if for no other reason than it is so damned simple to exploit the truth when it’s with you!

@crazyguy I have not seen the ad, either. In fact, I haven’t seen any television ads for anything at all since 2007. But if it is as you describe it, then it sounds like a negative ad. Even if what Biden says is true, and even if it is focused on an issue, the main point of the ad is to advocate for one candidate by criticizing another. That makes it a negative ad according to the taxonomy I outlined above.

But again, not everyone would use that taxonomy. And they have a point to the extent that “negative” has connotations for some that go beyond “being critical” or “being against someone.” Those who associate the term “negative” with mudslinging and attacks on the opponent’s personal character or reputation separate from their political positions and activities will not consider an ad negative if it focuses purely on policy differences.

For example, consider an ad that runs like this: ”[Opponent] is a decent person, but he supports [unpopular position X]. If you do not support [unpopular position X], then your interests are better served by not voting for [Opponent].” This would be a negative ad according to the taxonomy I laid out, but a lot of people would not see it as being particularly negative because it is neither aggressive nor insulting.

This kind of distinction is born of people taking what they consider most objectionable about negative advertising as it is actually practiced and defining negative advertising in terms of those elements. There’s no real problem with this, and we couldn’t stop people from doing it even if there were. But it does constitute a degree of linguistic drift. Nevertheless, it is a common way of conceptualizing negative advertising, so we couldn’t really hold it against a politician if they chose to adhere to the popular conception rather than the definition found in political science textbooks.

@SavoirFaire That is well expressed. I fully understand, and agree.

@crazyguy “Turn around is fair play.” Or so it’s been said…

@kritiper I fail to see the relevance of your message on this thread.

There are questions about @crazyguy using terms like “elusive policies”...indicating he might be trolling or looking to stir up hate and discontent. But let’s be fair here…what exactly ARE Biden’s policies? Does anyone really know what his proposals are? I’m not talking hot air answers about how his plan will fix all the evils in the world, I’m talking about specifics. What are they? At one point he was all for the socialist agenda that some of his counterparts like Bernie or AOC embrace. But when challenged during the debate, he emphatically denied supporting those goals or plans. So what exactly are his plans?

Joe Biden’s policies aren’t hard to find if one actually cares to look them up. But, it’s easy to say “the other guy has no plan” if you don’t bother to listen or look.

@seawulf575 I have asked before if Biden is for the Green New Deal or not. I have also asked where exactly he stands on Medicare for All.

@crazyguy

Why not look for yourself?

@Darth_Algar I have looked and don’t find the details that are needed. I have seen a lot of contradictory plans, but nothing that really ties it all together. Example: He is going to increase taxes on corporations and eliminate many deductions. He doesn’t address how that will impact the corporations, how it will impact employment, how many companies will just close up or leave the country. But on the next page he waxes poetic on how he is going to encourage manufacturing jobs. Huh? Again…no details. He talks about a lot of government giveaways to working people, but doesn’t explain how he will pay for it. He talks about giving pandemic relief to the country, but doesn’t explain what that looks like of how he plans on getting it through congress. Unless he is just planning on rubber-stamping whatever the Dems propose which will bankrupt the nation. That is the problem…he has a lot of campaign promises but very little detail.

@seawulf575 https://www.cbsnews.com/news/green-new-deal-joe-biden-climate-change-plan/ The problem with the green new deal is everyone keeps comparing ti to AOC and Bernies Green New Deal. It’s why he says, he for it but then not, because he has his own plans on how to tackle the environmental concerns. I have yet to see a President-elect layout all the fine details of any of their policies. It has always been broad strokes. Hell, Trump said Mexico will pay for that wall.

@Pandora Could I interest you in project that will cost next to nothing (except my $1 million finder’s fee) and will pay you thousands per month for as long as you live?

All plans cost a trillion. Except for the ones where they slash SS, and all kinds of aids that our taxes have been paying for for years. As of infrastructure. We will see. It probably 20 years of promising to do something about that and nothing gets done. But I have been saying for year that we should’ve been working hard to replace oil and coal and make our nation green. Not only because its good for the planet but it will be great for the economy in the long run, You have to spend money to make money. Crap just doesn’t fall out of the sky.
But honestly I don’t care if you like him or not. I know who I“m voting for and it’s not the guy stuck in 1700. when women did what you want , and black people didn’t talk back to their masters and men ruled the world with their penis.
.

@crazyguy You’ll just have to think about it some more.

@seawulf575

You’re attempting to hold Biden to a higher standard than any other presidential candid ever. Of course, I don’t imagine for one moment that you’re posting out of sincerity here.

@Pandora Of course, you will vote for who you please. That is the absolutely great thing about this country. And I’ll vote for whoever I want.

You bring up a good point about infrastructure. For 2009 and 2010, Obama and Biden had the trifecta: White House, Congress and the Senate. That would have been a perfect time for an Infrastructure bill. Instead they wasted it on Obamacare.

If Medicare for All cost just one trillion I might be all for it. But you and I both know it will cost a heck of a lot more.

@Pandora Unfortunately, Joe Biden says differently. “His” plan looks an awful lot like the Green New Deal proposed by AOC and bought into by Bernie. Yeah, he polished the words a little, but it pretty much is the exact same thing. The only thing he left off was the price tag.

@Darth_Algar only in your dreams am I holding Biden to a higher standard. President Trump stated his plan in 2016 for what he wanted to accomplish and how he would do it. He did many of those. Some of the details were that he wanted to get rid of NAFTA and recraft the trade agreement so it was more fair to the USA. That was done. He said he wanted to normalize the trade tariffs with other countries so we could be more competitive around the world. That was done. He wanted to get rid of regulations that were strangling our ability to produce in this country. That was done. He said he wanted to get tax cuts to the people and to industries so that the economy would be jump started. That was done. He pretty much laid out everything he wanted to do along with how he wanted to do it. The detail was there.

@seawulf575 “The detail was there.”

It was not. I remember, as I poured over each candidate’s campaign site, like I do with each election. What responsible voter would not?