The message is simple: Your next senator could be as nondescript as a side of hash browns, a ceramic rooster, a yappy dog or even a battered relish packet. You won't know unless you pay attention.

One of the 30-second political TV ads begins with soft piano music followed by testimonials.

"I believe in Old Relish Packet," a young man in flannel says in a Southern drawl.

"Old Relish Packet and I were trapped 50 miles behind enemy lines," says a man with a thick, gray beard. "He saved my life."

Narrated with the grave voice-of-God tone common in campaign ads, the Pay Attention public service advertisements began airing nationally on television last month. Each ends with a young woman asking, "If you're not voting, then who are you electing?"

Such humor-based advertising is on the rise, according to Darrell West, professor of political science at Brown University and author of the book "Air Wars: Television Advertising in Election Campaigns."

"I think voters appreciate a softer touch," West said. "We have all been beaten over the head, and people are sick of that."

Politicians are catching on to the humor approach. In Connecticut, Democratic Senate candidate Ned Lamont's campaign advertisements included a commercial making fun of the attack ads by his opponent, Sen. Joe Lieberman. The sarcastic commercials berated Lamont, the winner, for being a bad karaoke singer and someone who makes bad coffee.

"Satire is a great way to reach young people because it's entertaining and engaging. It's a way to get people involved in the political process who typically have not been very active," West said.

Young voters in particular are cynical about politics, West said, and so experimental methods are being tried to reach them.

"There is generally about a 30 percent differential point between [voter turnout of] young people and senior citizens," West said. "In an area of close elections, people think, 'If we could just mobilize young people, it would make a big difference.' "

News meets fun

In the Pay Attention campaign, the missing piece is the real candidates. The campaign, like Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," teams entertainment with information, said Ad Council campaign director Michelle Hillman. The use of inanimate objects as candidates has a tone similar to "The Daily Show," which the advertising developers were well aware of as they brainstormed for the project.

"For young people who think 'What's the point?' if they were going to see a typical ad that said 'Go Vote,' they might ... think of a way to counter it," said Dannagal Young, assistant professor of communication at the University of Delaware. "If their attention is grabbed by a joke, that might at least get through the first wall [of resistance]."

How it works at ECU

Jody Baumgartner, assistant professor of political science at East Carolina University and author of the coming book "Laughing Matters: Humor and American Politics in the Media Age," uses a similar approach.

In a political science course he teaches, Baumgartner includes Jon Stewart's "America (The Book)" as one of the principal readings, with the hope that Stewart's humorous approach might make the students want to learn more from the real textbook.

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