Daisy Petals and Mushroom Clouds: LBJ, Barry Goldwater, and the Ad That Changed American Politics by Robert Mann (review)

Daisy Petals and Mushroom Clouds by the journalist and historian Robert Mann is a thoughtful and engaging account of the television advertisement that made a huge splash in the U.S. presidential election of 1964. That advertisement showed a little girl counting (often non-sequentially) the petals on a daisy as she pulled them off, and it then shifted to an ominous countdown that culminated in a nuclear blast. It concluded by declaring that the stakes were too great to stay home and asking viewers to vote for Lyndon B. Johnson rather than Barry Goldwater in the forthcoming election. Mann, who holds the Manship Chair in Journalism at the Manship School of Mass Communication at Louisiana State University, provides the background, the strategy behind the advertisement, and the impact it had on the election itself and on campaign advertising in the future. The book provides a crisp assessment of an important issue that merits our attention today.

Mann begins with a chapter on “The Atom Theme.” He notes the fear and anxiety that were a pervasive part of American life in the 1950s and 1960s, and he reveals that a public opinion survey in 1963 indicated that 90 percent of respondents believed that nuclear war was possible, and 38 percent thought it was likely. He quotes a letter from 10-year-old D. G. Green to The Nation magazine in 1981 recalling the pervasive threat of the mushroom cloud: “I remember going Christmas shopping with my mother who naturally asked what I wanted that year. I don’t remember what I said, but I remember what I thought. ‘What’s the difference? We’re not going to live till Christmas anyway’” (pp. 12-13). Green feared that Barry Goldwater, the Republican presidential nominee, would be a trigger-happy nuclear cowboy who would risk an all-out war.

The next chapter amplifies perceptively on Goldwater and his liabilities. In a ghostwritten book, The Conscience of a Conservative, Goldwater criticized what he called “a craven fear of death” (p. 17), which he said compromised the struggle against Communism. In 1960 he told colleagues in the Senate that the United States should not rule out a preemptive strike against the Soviet Union. His speech accepting the Republican nomination in 1964 only underscored his approach when he told listeners that “extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice” and “moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.” (p. 27)

Mann lucidly explains how Democratic strategists worked with the advertising agency Doyle Dane Bernback (DDB) to craft a campaign to attack Goldwater. The firm, which had produced enormously successful advertisements for Volkswagen, now turned its attention to politics at a time when television was becoming increasingly important in American life. President Johnson and his staff wanted to exploit Goldwa-ter’s inflammatory rhetoric about nuclear weapons. The daisy petal advertisement was the result. When Johnson and staff members, including Bill Moyers and Jack Valenti, watched the advertisement, they were delighted, even though they knew it would cause trouble. Johnson said simply, “Good job, boys” (p. 61).

Mann shows how Democratic leaders justified their use of negative advertising by arguing that it never mentioned Goldwater. Knowing the backlash it would cause, they were prepared to respond to protests by pulling it—after it had already aired. Hence it was broadcast at 9:50 p.m. (Eastern Time) on 7 September 1964 during NBC’s popular Monday Night at the Movies. At a time before cable television and an inordinate number of different channels, tens of millions were tuned in. By one estimate, as many as 50 million viewers saw the daisy petal advertisement. The response was precisely what strategists had expected. The White House switchboard found itself inundated with calls of protest. Furious Republicans highlighted the advertisement, which had already been pulled, and the major networks played it over and...