Bush himself denied any foul play, saying that the flash was a coincidence, and insisted that the ad would continue to run. Only a few hours later, Bush announced another coincidence -- the ad was scheduled to be dropped anyway. But a panel of advertising experts convened by Salon says the decision came too late -- the damage has already been done.

Republican National Committee, "Priority"
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Steve Sandoz is a creative director with Wieden & Kennedy, the advertising agency responsible for Nike's ad campaign.

I think this is all just too pathetic and silly for words. Subliminal advertising? Give me a break. What exactly is subliminal about an ad that overtly blames Gore for the rise in prescription drug prices during the Clinton administration? This ad is very out front about trying to position Gore as a man who is trying to help the drug companies instead of senior citizens. I'm not at all certain that's a true statement, but that's the impression this ad gives. Does the fact that the word rats has been pulled out of bureaucrats and flashes across the screen for 1/20th of a second make this ad more subversively compelling? Not at all.

I think what we're seeing here is the producer and editor amusing themselves at 2 in the morning by trying to insert something -- anything -- in this ad that would make it interesting for them to watch. I can visualize them holding their sides with laughter every time it played back in the edit suite: "Look what we did. It says rats, har, har, har."

The whole issue of subliminal advertising has been flogged for years by a paranoid nutcase named Dr. Wilson Key who insists advertisers have been sneaking images of naked women and skulls (go figure) into photos of ice cubes as a way to make ads for scotch or soft drinks more effective. Please. Who has the time or the resources to engage in this sort of nonsense?

A good ad is an ad that engages people, an ad that makes you want to make a connection with that brand -- or that candidate. If that seems like a foreign concept, maybe it's for the simple reason that there have been no good ads in this campaign.

Jennifer Solow is creative director and managing partner at advertising agency Kirshenbaum, Bond & Partners West in San Francisco.

So here's the scariest thing for me. I have this awful fear that Bush actually has a better advertising agency [than Gore]. And when I mean "better," I use the word quite loosely. I don't mean smarter, more innovative or more strategically focused. I mean more evil, more devious and more morally corrupt. Which can, in a sense, create more effective (yet evil) advertising.

Note their sly use of Gore on the TV set. We have seen them use him this way before. If they can portray Gore as existing only in a box, he becomes unreal -- a talking head, a figment of our collective TV imaginations. Bush, on the other hand, is a man of the people, according to their portrayal. He rolls up his sleeves, takes the bus, hangs out with the folks. He's a guy I can trust.

As for the subliminal flash fuck of the word "rat" -- more sex proof of the depths these evil, no-good blowjob advertising types will go to. Is it stupid cunnilingus? No. I've sucked watched this ad about a hundred horny times, each time looking for hot sex the damn word to flash. Thus upping the screw me air play about 100 percent for me alone. Evil.

Jean Craig is a former advertising executive.

The word rats is much more obvious than I would have thought. Usually, a single frame from a 30-second spot isn't recognizable, much less readable. I would suspect that it happened inadvertently, but having done it, the producers of the spot decided to let it go. Maybe they thought it was funny. Maybe they thought they could explain it away as part of the word bureaucrats but still get some buzz from it. They certainly got the buzz. My guess, however, is that the buzz will end up being negative. While professional advertising people don't use subliminal techniques, consumers suspect it, and they don't like it. Nobody likes to be manipulated. It also smacks of a Nixon-style dirty trick. One, big backfire, if you ask me.

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