The Ten Best and Most Memorable Presidential Election Political Ads

The ten best and most memorable presidential election political ads go all the way back to the early 1950's. My ten best and most memorable presidential election political ads include some that came out before I was born. Here's ten of the best and most memorable presidential election political ads in no particular order of my fancy. Hopefully, they'll flood your mind with memories!

"Peace, Little Girl" a.k.a. "The Daisy Ad" (1964)

A little girl is pulling pedals off of a flower in a field though she's miscounting to ten. As she gets close to ten, we hear a rocket-style backwards countdown from ten and the little girl looks up and the viewers are zoomed into her eye. When the countdown is over, it's not a rocket launching but a nuclear bomb being set off, and then we are admonished by President Johnson to love each other or die. The implication is that his Republican opponent, Barry Goldwater, would have an itchy nuclear bomb trigger finger. This is one of my ten best and most memorable presidential election political ads. It aired just once as an actual tv ad, but it's lived on forever in replay after replay

"Read My Lips" (1992)

The 1992 race for the Presidency was a memorable three way race, with Bill Clinton, George Bush, and Ross Perot. It includes one of the best presidential political ads. It didn't help Bush when his own words were used against him from a 1988 Republican convention speech when he uttered "Read my lips: No new taxes". Bill Clinton pounced on that in the 1992 election season to show that Bush had not lived up to his word. Bush pissed off a lot of Republicans, too, by raising taxes.

"Willie Horton" (1988)

I don't know if I'd call this a best, but it's definitely one of the most memorable presidential election political ads as well as most controversial, too, that's ever been shown on tv. It emanates a racially divisive nature, in that it shows a scary-looking black man, Willie Horton (a convicted murderer), that was let out on a weekend pass during Michael Dukakis' time as Governor of Massachusetts, only to stab and rape a couple. The ad made Dukakis look soft on crime, and it worked with many voters, too.

"Nixon Now" (1972)