This election season has really energized a lot of people who usually don't pay any attention to Presidential politics, or don't start paying attention until after Labor Day.  

As a result, I've found people more animated - and more willing to learn about the candidates and their positions - than I can ever remember.  This has provided me advocacy opportunities that I haven't previously enjoyed.  One of those forms the basis for this article.

I was at lunch about an hour ago, doing what I usually do for the daily hour of freedom I get from my Dilbert-like existence at work: eating a sandwich and watching TV.

Now, I must confess to being a sports addict. Really, it's as bad as politics with me. Throw in the Olympic coverage on NBC and USA, and I can stay glued to the telly for hours, learning about handball and the pommel horse and the fine points of synchronized diving.

I had the good fortune to be sitting near a group of people who were idly discussing Obama during lunch. They were talking about his lack of plans, how he doesn't ever say what he wants to do, and how McCain is so much more prepared to be President.

Now, I live in Pennsylvania, so we get all the "battleground" TV spots from the campaigns. As fate would have it, a McCain commercial (the "Life Is Grand" spot) came on. I asked everyone to watch the commercial closely. At the end, I asked them, "So, what is McCain saying he'll do to help you in that ad?"

One lady said, "Well, that wasn't the point of the ad."  I responded, "That's true. But tell me the last time you saw a McCain ad that actually talked about HIS plans and HIS ideas."  I was met with silence.

I wasn't sure if they were angry or thinking, but I decided to raise the stakes on this one. So I said, "Tell you what. Next time an Obama commercial comes on, stop and watch it." I returned to my sandwich, hoping that would happen within the next 10 minutes.

A minute or so later, up came Obama's "Hands" spot. This time, a lady at the table pointed out the commercial. All four people there stopped to watch it. I got out of my chair and walked over to the table, saying nothing.

When it was over, the only guy at the table said to me, "I never knew Obama wanted to give us a $1000 tax break. And what's this about 5 million new jobs?"  They asked me if I knew anything about it.  I got to give a 2-minute extemporaneous talk about Obama's energy plan, and gave them Obama's energy plan website URL to check out later.

As we all left, another lady at the table said to me, "Now that you mention it, all McCain does is talk about Obama. Why doesn't he ever talk about himself?"  I haven't stopped smiling since.

The point wasn't to get them to declare undying allegiance to Obama - but now, they have some irrefutable evidence of McCain's emptiness and Obama's substance, provided by the candidates themselves.  I consider that highly successful advocacy.

Tonight, I'm downloading both those ads to my iPod, along with the other two "Celeb" ads.  Then, I'm going to play them, back-to-back, for anyone I talk with about the election.  What I'm finding this year is that a really effective strategy is to just get people to think about McCain and Obama in terms of their plans and what they talk about.  From there, Senator Straight Talk does a heckuva job of hoisting himself with his own wrinkly patard.

In the meantime, if you're around a TV with friends, family or even strangers, engage in some Barackarate.  McCain's so lacking in substance that it's easy to flip his puerile attacks against him. And, best of all, it's fun to watch people who were ragging on Obama suddenly start questioning themselves on which prospective emperor really has no clothes.   

(Props to TPMer Bat Guano for coining "Barackarate".)