WHITE HOUSE PLACES ANTI-DRUG SUPER BOWL ADS

Continue Campaign's Marijuana and Terror Themes

WASHINGTON (AdAge.com) -- The White House Office of National Drug Control
Policy will run two ads during Sunday's Super Bowl broadcast, as well as
two on the pregame show on Walt Disney Co.'s ABC.

Two of the Super Bowl spots are new work from Interpublic Group of Cos.'
McCann-Erickson Worldwide, New York, for the Partnership for a Drug Free
America. The ads are part of a "negative consequences" campaign meant to
show that marijuana is not a "harmless" drug. In one spot, a 40-ish couple
is shown looking worried about a pregnancy, but it turns out it is their
daughter who is pregnant, who had unprotected sex after using marijuana.

Shift in direction

During last year's Super Bowl, the drug office debuted ads that suggested
illegal drug use supports terrorism. While new ads that debuted in
September returned to that theme, the campaign began a major shift in the
direction as the drug office put the bulk of its budget behind discouraging
marijuana use by young people. This is the first ad in that vein from
McCann-Erikson; prior anti-marijuana ads were done by Publicis Groupe's Leo
Burnett USA, Chicago.

In one of the other new Super Bowl spots, from WPP Group's Ogilvy & Mather
Worldwide, New York, a man riding on a subway car sees the ghosts of
victims of drug crimes who tell him the dealers were fighting about his
money. "Drug money supports terrible things," the ad says.

While the Partnership produces most drug office ads, the first
drugs-and-terror ads were produced by the drug office's own agency, Ogilvy,
without any involvement by the Partnership. The Partnership has declined to
produce terror-related ads and has questioned their success, and the latest
ads were again produced independently by Ogilvy.