Decades ago, there was a major ad campaign for New Coke. The problem was that people hated it and the campaign became one of the greatest flops in advertising history. Today’s 81-year-old president looks a lot like New Coke.
Biden is proving you can advertise a bad product, but you can’t sell one. Despite a massive March ad blitz, Biden barely moved his numbers. Arguably, this is as good as it gets for Biden, and good doesn’t look to be good enough.
March marked a “month of action” for Biden’s reelection campaign. It began with his State of the Union address. A scripted set-piece in a controlled setting before a national television audience, it was tailormade for Biden. Following it, Biden and his cabinet secretaries fanned out across the country. Simultaneously, Biden’s campaign was spending $29.2 million — almost five times the previous month’s $6.3 million — predominantly on advertising.
Biden’s March effort played to his strengths. Incumbency has its advantages, and few are as large as a SOTU. The same applies to having a cabinet’s worth of surrogate campaigners. And of course, there’s the money: Biden looks to have about $100 million more in his campaign chest. Not only did Trump have none of these, he faced weeks’ worth of courtroom hearings in New York that would require his attendance, severely limiting his chance to respond.
So, what did Biden get from his advantages? According to RealClearPolitics’ national average of Biden’s job approval polling, the president’s approval stood at 40.6 percent and his disapproval at 56 percent on
