Sanford’s Ad Gets Rave Reviews?

Last month, S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford hit the airwaves with a TV ad outlining his position on the small portion of federal “stimulus” dollars that he is currently attempting to exercise his control over.

In a move that surprised some people, we panned both the governor’s ad and the policy behind it.

Frankly, we think Sanford should have refused to certify any of these bureaucratic bailout funds. On top of that, his desire to see this money used for debt repayment (yawn) misses an important opportunity in our book to frame this debate around two much more important (and defensible) fiscal issues – tax cuts and spending caps.

Anyway, we’ve made it clear that we differ from Sanford’s position on these funds.

Also, we’ve also made it clear that we thought his commercial sucked.

“Sanford is flat and uninspiring,” we wrote at the time. “He looks tired … old even. His hand gestures are staged and stuffy – much like the ad’s elitist backdrop. Even the commercial’s ‘money line,’ when Sanford says ‘the easy thing isn’t always the right thing’ – comes off as canned and contrived.”

Obviously, we stand by our assessment.

Amazingly, though, this “canned and contrived” commercial has now been lauded and honored – heralded even – as the greatest thing since sliced bread by one of the foremost authorities on such things.

GOP pollster Frank Luntz, whose focus group dials have become the stuff of political legend, said this morning that Sanford’s ad was one of the most successful he has ever analyzed.

“We’ve not tested an ad that does that well,” Luntz said this morning on FOX News.

Here’s the video of the interview …

Not finished, Luntz goes on to say that “Governor Sanford is the most articulate Republican out there right now, and the other Republicans ought to pay attention – or if they don’t, their numbers will continue to languish.”

Pretty heady praise, indeed …

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