<human>: Can you summarize the given text in a few sentences?

As I read through the reactions of friends/family to the Rick Perry ad this week, all I can think is that this is the most Machiavellian/Rove-ish attempts seen in this election cycle so far. 

The ad is clearly **not** aiming to convince any of the people it will offend that they should vote for Perry, on the contrary it's unlikely any of those people are registered Republicans eligible to vote in primaries anyway. 

On the other hand, what it does do is bring up a completely irrelevant argument that has nothing to do with the real public policy issues that we as a country face, and focuses people's emotions on that. 

I hope very much that Americans on the whole do not let utter nonsense like this crap dominate the national debate. At the same time, I see the incredible backlash that was created over this ad, and I wonder if the people shouting how bigoted/hateful the message is have taken the time to think about whether or not it even warranted a response. I think, to be honest, that the progressive side has already won the argument over gays in the military, and so... why feed the trolls? 

I think also that whatever the ad cost, it's paid for itself in the amount of exposure it gave Perry, even if it ends up killing his campaign.
<bot>: The aim of the Perry ad to me seems to be exploiting people's emotions to polarize people and generate buzz as a result.