Politics as of late have been dominated by online videos. The video of the “Dean Scream” tanked a presidential campaign, and the “macaca” video of George Allen destroyed a man’s senate campaign and helped push the Senate into the Democrats’ hands.
But this year’s presidential campaign has been affected by videos in a new way. No longer are they only used to catch a candidate slipping up in an effort to derail a candidacy. Instead, they have mostly been used to bolster a candidate.
Most famous of these was Obama Girl. Obama Girl, a seemingly confused young woman, is in fact the actress Amber Lee Ettinger who clearly has a knack for marketing herself. She has made numerous YouTube clips in which she is an avid Obama supporter, including a debate with other YouTube starlet Giuliani Girl. This has transformed Ettinger into a full-blown YouTube celebrity, racking up interviews with numerous media outlets.
But these videos were still at least a little in jest. More serious videos have been released by the campaigns; all of the campaigns have used web videos of their speeches in an effort to fundraise from loyal supporters. But a new type of video has emerged.
Will.i.am., the former member of the Black Eyed Peas, has created a music video titled “Yes We Can” that has paired Obama’s speech after the New Hampshire primary with music, featuring various celebrities speaking and singing the words along with footage of Obama. The video has been seen more than two million times on YouTube.
The reason this video is so fresh is that it blends so many different components: the celebrities so beloved by the TMZ generation, the appeal of a well-made music video and a politician’s speech.
The first two are hardly revolutionary; it has been more than 20 years since “We Are the World,” after all.
But rarely has a politician of any party been so embraced by the leaders of pop culture. This is the candidate that got Oprah to endorse him, but it is impressive that he can be in a music video made by a member of the Black Eyed Peas, and it doesn’t seem odd. It doesn’t seem pandering or youth-seeking. It somehow seems just right.
Part of the reason it works so well is because it wasn’t created by the campaign. There is no link after the video that brings you to a page where you can donate to his campaign. As a result, the viewer can detach the “Obama the candidate” image and think more about Obama the movement.
On the Web site for the video, dipdive.com, Will.i.am. put it well when discussing why he made the video: “I’m not trying to convince people to see things how I do… I produced this song to share my new found inspiration and how I’ve been moved.”
This is not so much an act of campaign propaganda as it is an artist being inspired to create something new.
The knowledge that this was also a concession speech, as Obama lost the New Hampshire primary, makes it even less about Obama the candidate. The video is much more about the ideas that Obama stands for: hope, change and a better tomorrow.
Although the video has been picked up by the campaign by now, with Michelle Obama sending it out to all supporters in e-mails, it remains refreshing in a pool of standard campaign videos.