The Audacity of Ambiguity

I heard a Barack Obama ad on the radio this morning. Texas will hold its primary on March 4 and Sen. Obama was encouraging his supporters to turn out. In the ad, an announcer, who sounded like a college student, made three claims:

1. That Sen. Obama was against the war in Iraq from the beginning;
2. That Sen. Obama supports "change;"and
3. That Sen. Obama "gets us."

The first claim is a legitimate attempt to differentiate himself from his challenger, Sen. Clinton. However, what of the other two claims?

It seems like all of the candidates, both Republican and Democrat, are in favor of change. However, promising change without more does not convey any useful information. Declaring pudding to be the national dessert and replacing the national anthem with a polka would constitute change, but would not be a good reason to support a candidate. Here, the message assumes that the listener already knows what type of change is favored by the candidate or else trusts the candidate to implement good changes rather than bad or meaningless changes.

The claim that Sen. Obama "gets us" is even harder to evaluate. Who is the "us" that he gets? Is it college students? Is it people who listen to the radio on their way to work in the morning? What does it mean to "get" someone? The statement is either meaningless or is a shameless attempt to pit Generations X and Y against Sen. Clinton's Baby Boomer generation.

I realize that it is expecting too much for a 30 second radio spot to make an intellectual analysis of the important issues in the race. However, useful information would have been nice.