A few weeks ago, the campaign consulting firm FourTier Strategies called and asked if I would make a commercial for a guy running against House Speaker John Boehner. I thought, “Wow. I’ve already been blacklisted in Hollywood; let’s get blacklisted by the Republicans … there’s a career move.”
But after a call with JD Winteregg, I was impressed.
Winteregg is a millennial, educated, Christian, high school teacher who had lived in a Socialist Country for a year. He had personally experienced socialized medicine. It took him a month to get a chest X-ray. Back home in the States, his mom developed cancer, was in treatment within days, and lived. JD was convinced that if she had been residing in France, she would be dead. He couldn’t wait to get back home.
When Winteregg didn’t see Boehner standing up to the fundamental change that was currently happening in America, he decided to run for Congress.
Although Winteregg and his volunteers had knocked on over 20,000 doors, he wasn’t getting traction in the press.
I have a soft spot in my heart for underdogs. I believe in the free market. I believe in engaged discussion. I believe that the primary system makes our leaders stronger. It felt important that the people in Ohio’s 8th from both Boehner and Winteregg.
Thus was born “When the Moment is Right.”
Breitbart broke the video. It went viral. People laughed. There was now an awareness that Boehner had an opponent named JD Winteregg.
Within hours of the video being featured by radio hosts Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, Winteregg was fired from his university position. He answered back by releasing the B.E.S.T. Border Security and Immigration Plan.
Humor had given him an opportunity and a platform to present a common sense solution and be heard. That is a model that works.
Herman Cain has a great sense of humor and a brilliant mind for marketing. He soared from relative obscurity to become the Presidential frontrunner without buying one second of national TV time during the 2012 campaign. Cain knew that becoming part of pop culture was tantamount to succeeding in politics. The elite may not have dug Cain’s messaging but the youth did.
The fact is we live in a reality TV, YouTube world where a majority of our youth get their news from Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert on Comedy Central. The same political elite that didn’t laugh at Obama during his interview on “Between Two Ferns” has no idea why they lost the last election.
As Michael Reagan said in a recent Newsmax interview: “The Republican Party is doing classes right now in the use of smartphones because they don’t even know how to push the button…..”
If they want to win, they better learn because Colbert is about to become the next David Letterman. You can’t win the argument if you can’t speak the language. Winteregg and Cain understand that. Come to think of it Ronald Reagan did, too.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.