Rick Santorum has attempted four very distinct ad campaigns.
My count has Santorum with five ads; two are attack ads against former Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton, one is aimed at Senator Rand Paul and former Governor
Mike Huckabee simultaneously and one is addressed at Senator Ted Cruz.
None of
the ads are targeted against Republican front-runner mainstay Donald Trump. In
fact, in one debate Santorum insisted that personal attacks amongst Republicans
only helped Hillary Clinton.
In his latest ad, released on January 20th
Santorum implored that voters join him so that together they may, “… take back
America from the Left, the special interests and the DC Establishment!”
Santorum uses his Facebook mostly to chronicle his journey
through Iowa and New Hampshire. Occasionally a letter to the editor from the
Union Leader or an interview on Fox News Radio is shared along with the
occasional video from C-SPAN, but mostly the Senator seems to want folks to
know that he’s working hard in the early states to earn votes. The other
important component of Santorum’s Facebook is the repetitive posting of his
victory over partial birth abortions. As a part of that Santorum includes
pictures of him and his family holding up pieces of paper, all with different
statements written on them, but all with the hashtag #WhyWeMarch.
The two rhetorical appeals Santorum uses most often are accumulation
and antithesis. Santorum said in one debate, “We’re a country of laws, Bill. A
country of laws, not of men […] But the reason America’s a great country, the
reason is because our compassion’s in our laws.”
Accumulation has not worked for Santorum to persuade or
mobilize voters as evidenced by his place in undercard debates and his sustained
low poll numbers (His highest polling in the 2016 cycle was 11%).
No comments:
Post a Comment