Either through good luck or good planning, the Edwards campaign put up its first television ad in Iowa today, just 36 hours after their man emerged as the consensus winner of the Democratic debate in Philadelphia on Tuesday night. The 60-second spot, entitled “Heroes”, uses clips of Edwards giving a speech as its soundtrack, with a montage of still images of “hardworking Iowans” as the visual. Using the speech excerpts, rather than a canned script, was very smart; Edwards comes across as natural and sincere. The ad starts with an eloquent reminder of what elections are supposed to be about (the voters) — “If you’re looking for heroes, don’t look to me, don’t look to Elizabeth….we have support, we have health care…”. And it ends with a call to arms — “It is time for our party, the Democratic Party, to show a little backbone, to have a little guts.”
You be the judge: