"There is a bear in the woods. For some people, the bear is easy to see. Others don't see it at all. Some people say the bear is tame. Others say it's vicious and dangerous. Since no one can really be sure who's right, isn't it smart to be as strong as the bear? If there is a bear."
That was the copy from one of the television commercials put out by Ronald Reagan and the Republican Party in the 1984 presidential election. I was too young to remember watching it on TV, but the commercial has real significance.
The ad is very symbolic - at that time the bear represented the Soviet Union - and the purpose of the ad was to convey to voters that Reagan was better suited to dealing with the threats from that country and global stability overall.
What is interesting to me is how different political ads are almost 30 years later. The Bear in the Woods ad is quite abstract and its message is wrapped up in a metaphor. These days I think ads are a more direct and straightforward to attract the attention of all voters, no matter how knowledgeable they are about politics.
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