Over-the-top PR stunts by politicians
It's been interesting watching and reading the post-mortem on the stunt pulled by John Kerry the other night on the Jay Leno show, where he drove onto the stage on a Harley Davidson. From what I can see, the press has been overwhelmingly negative about the stunt. This reminded me of a similar move by the former Canadian Alliance leader, Stockwell Day, when he pulled up to a press conference in a seadoo dressed in spandex. That conventional wisdom is that that media disaster was the beginning of the end for Day. (He was, of course, dumped by the Alliance in 2001 in favour of Stephen Harper).
I'm not sure what the lesson to be drawn here is. The obvious is that these stunts are ill-conceived and more often than not, they backfire. But Bill Clinton parlayed his saxophone gig on the Arsenio Hall show into a trip to the White House. In Canada, Pierre Trudeau's many stunts -- the most famous of which is probably his mocking pirouette behind the Queen's back -- made him immortal. So what to conclude? I just don't know.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 9:23 PM
