"Hillary 1984" Attack Ad Creator Revealed

An email from TechPresident to the "Hillary1984" Vote Different ad creator under the username ParkRidge47 (Hillary Clinton was born in Park Ridge, Illinois in 1947), led to this disclosure:

"The idea was simple and so was the execution. Make a bold statement about the Democratic primary race by culture jacking a famous commercial and replacing as few images as possible. For some people it doesn't register, but for people familiar with the ad and the race it has obviously struck a chord."

Arianna Huffington followed-up and sent out a challenge to the HuffPost team asking them to put their ears to the ground, and learned the video was the work of Philip de Vellis, an employee of Blue State Digital, a company created by members of Howard Dean's Internet Team--that now advises the Obama campaign.

What was he thinking? Did he consider his stealthy creativity might damage Sen. Obama's presidential campaign philosophy once it got out that he was an Obama campaign consultant? Apparently not: Proudly he declares,

"I made the "Vote Different" ad because I wanted to express my feelings about the Democratic primary, and because I wanted to show that an individual citizen can affect the process. There are thousands of other people who could have made this ad, and I guarantee that more ads like it--by people of all political persuasions--will follow.

This shows that the future of American politics rests in the hands of ordinary citizens.

The campaigns had no idea who made it--not the Obama campaign, not the Clinton campaign, nor any other campaign. I made the ad on a Sunday afternoon in my apartment using my personal equipment (a Mac and some software), uploaded it to YouTube (on March 5th), and sent links around to blogs.

The specific point of the ad was that Obama represents a new kind of politics, and that Senator Clinton's "conversation" is disingenuous. And the underlying point was that the old political machine no longer holds all the power."

Well, the ad has now cost him his job: Here is Blue State Digital's statement on this situation.

Statement from Thomas Gensemer, Managing Director, Blue State Digital:

This afternoon, an employee at our firm, Phillip de Vellis, received a call from Arianna Huffington of "The Huffington Post" regarding the "1984" video currently circulating online. Initially, de Vellis refused to respond to her requests. He has since acknowledged to Blue State Digital that he was the creator of the video.

Pursuant to company policy regarding outside political work or commentary on behalf of our clients or otherwise, Mr. de Vellis has been terminated from Blue State Digital effective immediately.

Blue State Digital is under contract with the Obama Campaign for technology pursuits including software development and hosting. Additionally, one of our founding partners is on leave from the company to work directly for the campaign at headquarters.

However, Blue State Digital is not currently engaged in any relationship with the Obama Campaign for creative or non-technical services.

Mr. de Vellis created this video on his own time. It was done without the knowledge of management, and was in no way tied to his work at the firm or our formal engagement [on technology pursuits] with the Obama campaign.

I have spoken with David Plouffe, Sen. Obama's campaign manager, to inform him of this action and am appreciative of his understanding and ongoing support of our work.

In any event, like Geffen's gaff last month, Mr. de Vellis may have created new storm clouds to block out the clear blue sky of Obama's pragmatic political idealism that he so admires. Many will wonder: Could anyone on Obama's staff not have known about the ad before it was uploaded? Zack Exley of TechPresident believes,

"This was a funded project, involving lawyers and an ad agency or at the very least a professional video person who's time is worth hundreds of dollars an hour.

This brings up an interesting possibility. In primary campaigns--where viral ads like this can influence game-changing numbers of voters--will privately-funded creative like "Vote Different" become a major factor? It might not be such a pretty picture. Think ahead to what ad agencies, with checks from Republican political donors, would produce against Hillary, Obama or Edwards in the General Election.

This could really change the way politics are done, at least in this cycle, and probably will bring regulation of this kind of thing soon."

What if de Vellis was a mole? Was the hidden agenda to create another situation to smear Obama? Who would have hired him? There still is a mystery: Who made the cheap imitation "Barack 1984 ad?"