Hillary’s Latest Viral Video Politics

Between Barack Obama twittering, John McCain MySpacing, and Ron Paul Digging, the media landscape of the ‘08 election has itself been the topic of much discussion. However, while the candidates themselves (or rather, the twenty-something year-old volunteers on their staffs) throw themselves into Presidential Campaigning 2.0, the online reaction has been, at best, lukewarm.

Reeling back and forth between criticisms of being too serious and not “loosening up,” Hillary Clinton has yet to achieve a presidential tone in her videos. In her most recent HillCast (embedded above), the latest in YouTube’s weekly You Choose series, Clinton asks you to help her with a serious dilemma — what tune should be her campaign song?

Even so, Clinton continues to be the most interesting candidate in the online video arena. The publicity generated by the “Hillary 1984” scandal thrust Clinton and Obama into the viral video spotlight. Since then, her videos have received far more views than competitors like Obama.

While political appearances on shows like SNL and The Daily Show have been a successful way for politicians to “humanize” themselves, similar success has not yet been found on YouTube. Part of the problem is that Clinton’s “I Need Your Advice” video, from its lackluster title and horrendous thumbnail, is not at all differentiated from her other videos where she discusses her political agenda, answers questions, and lays out her platform.

How can YouTube be both a respectable political soapbox and a place for teens to lip-sync with Fergie? Expanding YouTube’s political cred, the Democratic National Committee and the South Carolina Democratic Party announced yesterday that the July 23 presidential nominee debate will be in Charleston, South Carolina and that the media sponsors for the event will be YouTube/Google and CNN.