This is not your father’s freedom rhetoric.  Gone are the soaring speeches and military pagentry – the new face of the free world features torture porn and techno.

I think NATO recognized the shifting terrain of political rhetoric, and made these ads to appeal to citizens in NATO countries that think and interract in radically different ways from 60 years ago.  Instead of talking about freedom as a clash of civilization between nation states, NATO is now talking about how and why freedom matters to individuals, in the most concrete way possible.

This is the type of messaging that progressives need to strive for: edgy, personal and concrete.  Even when working on a  campaign with sure-fire messaging (and who wouldn’t agree with freedom, right?), there’s a clear diffrence between stale appeals to principle, and the type of direct message that gets people fired up.

First, the DNC is using this ad as a format for their offensive against Republicans trying to stop reform.  The EKG heart monitor in the background is a nice way to think about what delay might to do our economy and American families-

This MoveOn ad jumps on some of the same GOP comments as the DNC, but turns it into a big ‘football’ metaphor:

The group Americans United for Change pushes back on the GOP talking point about taking reform too quickly, pointing out that this has already been at least a 15 year process (does this perhaps too directly link Obama to Clinton’s reforms?)

Last, Bold Progressives goes on the offensive for a public option, targeting waffling Dems with big check connections to the healthcare industry. This ad garnered some attention for its use of new technology to integrate Bold Progressive members’ names into the background text, and does a pretty good job of making a direct populist appeal along the lines of Howard Dean’s argument about the Democrats’ 60 vote majority.