We interrupt this program to bring you ... yet another campaign commercial.

Haven’t we seen enough? Don’t we already know every misstep each candidate has taken?

The good news: We have to endure these ads for just a few more days.

The bad news: It is expected they will hit a “fever pitch,” according to researchers, who believe the last-chance campaigning will invade your favorite radio station, your smartphone and even the movie screen at your local theater.

What else do we really need to know about these candidates? Haven’t we already decided for whom to vote - or, in the likely case of this election, for whom we are voting against?

Political researchers say Dwight D. Eisenhower was the first presidential candidate to take his message to television viewers.

In 1952, he created 40 commercials, each 20 seconds in length, called “Eisenhower Answers America,” in which he gave responses to questions asked by citizens/voters.

The ads were positive in tone and content, not negative or controversial like those we watch today.

For those, we can blame Lyndon B. Johnson. In 1964, his campaign created a commercial called “The Daisy Girl.”

It showed “a young girl picking the petals off a daisy. After she finishes counting, a voice begins a countdown to a nuclear explosion. The ad ends with an appeal to vote Johnson ‘because the stakes are too high for you to stay home.’ The commercial used fear and guilt, an effective advertising principle, to make people take action to protect the next generation.”

The commercial aired just once.

The number of ads we see and hear every day, and the number of dollars spent on them, is astounding.

Researchers say well over 2 million political advertisements have aired on local broadcast stations. The money spent on 2016 campaigns is expected to exceed $4 billion.

In mid-October, presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump each dropped approximately $14 million for just one week’s worth of advertising.

Is it worth it? Campaign experts say it is. They say repetition drills in the message.

The repetition is also important, they add, because television viewers today have the option of using the remote control to change the channel - rather than having to get up and manually switch to another station.

Viewers can also use commercial time to check email, texts or social media on their cellphones, which are likely right beside them.

If the commercials contained more positive messages, rather than condemning and accusatory statements, perhaps this election season could have been more tolerable.

It’s unlikely that will happen in these final days of campaigning. But on a positive note, they are truly the final days.

I’m certainly looking forward to Nov. 9.

And now back to your regularly scheduled programming ...

Kelly Lutterschmidt

editor

Catasauqua Press

Northampton Press

Whitehall-Coplay Press