August 6th 2008

Ageism Alleged In New Obama Ad

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ollowing claims by the Obama camp that the recent McCain “celebrity” ad is racist, some media experts say the newest ad from the Obama campaign is ageist – playing on America’s fear of the elderly and worries about older presidents.

Like the lead? I’m the “some media experts” – a trick I learned from the New York Times and other liberal media outlets. Need a source? Create “some experts.” “Many experts” also works well if you’re going for some extra oomph.

Anyway, here’s the ad:

Now I’ll put on my Bob Herbert glasses and ear piece and proceed with my expert analysis.

You guys have seen the ad a number of times I am sure. First thing you see is some kind of piece of equipment with a screen on it, right? Do you remember any other startling images right there at the beginning?

All right. There are some lines going across the screen, like heartbeat lines on a hospital monitor. You look at the beginning of that ad again, and you tell me why those lines are placed right there – POW! – right at the beginning of that ad. I really wish someone would answer the question, I think it’s really important. Why are these heartbeat monitoring lines in this ad run against John McCain?

And as if that’s not enough, as the narrator starts, do you hear something soft in the background?

All right! It’s a heartbeat. Da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM and it gets a little faster as the ad progresses, as if the heart that monitor is monitoring is beginning to fibrillate. And somebody please tell me why, right at the end of the ad before it goes to the Obama signature, that heartbeat stops?

The Obama camp is playing the age card, and they’re playing it from the bottom of the deck!

There you have it. Someone should give me an op/ed column in the New York Times.

I’m sure now that C-SM has broken this Very Important Story, dino-media around the world will pick it up and continue my insightful analysis ad nauseum.

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August 5th 2008

Time To Fire Bob Herbert

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he NY Times would have a big problem on its hands … if anyone watched MSNBC.

On yesterday’s Morning Joe show, the NYT’s star op-ed writer and Obama devotee Bob Herbert showed just how far off the deep end he has gone – to the point where all perspective and clear-headedness is gone. Now we normally would want perspective and clear-headedness from a major national columnist, but the NYT is going to ask itself: Is he us or is he bonkers? (I think the answer is “us.”)

Here’s the passage:

You guys have seen the ad a number of times I am sure, and I know you have it here in-house. First thing you see are a couple images of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, right? [Wrong - Obama comes up first.] And we see an image of Barack Obama right after that. It comes quickly, right at the beginning of the ad, right?

Do you remember any other startling images right there at the beginning?

All right. There is an image right there at the very beginning of the Leaning Tower of Pisa and there is an image of the Washington Monument.

You look at the beginning of that ad again, and you tell me why those two phallic symbols are placed right there – POW! – right at the beginning of that ad. I really wish someone would answer the question, I think it’s really important. Why are these two phallic symbols in this ad run against Barack Obama, right after we see the images of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton?

See the whole clip here.

The images, of course, are of the the Victory Column in Berlin’s Tiergarten Park, which dominated the background of the Obama rally.

Whoa! Wait a minute! Is that a white chick on top of that phallic symbol? Stop the presses!!!

Either Herbert is blinded by GOP-hatred and Obama-love and is interjecting symbolism without rhyme or reason, or he spent no time watching the ad he has campaigned written so passionately about. Neither alternative is satisfactory for the writer of a prominent national column … at least it hasn’t been since the death of Hunter Thompson. Columnists like Herbert are supposed to be more studied and careful, heck, more rational and less prone to hallucinations than this.

The NYT and Herbert have a real problem on their hands. Will they even acknowledge this farcical yet insightful error? Will there be a terse correction or a Herbert column in which he attempts to explain or justify this truly condemning error? Will the thing pass as if it never was said?

Any option is unpleasant. My recommendation: Time to fire Bob Herbert, or at least put him on leave for a month or two so he can get the help he needs. My guess: The NYT and Herbert will both blow it off.

hat-tip: NewsBusters

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August 2nd 2008

Bob Herbert: Even Worse Than His Editorial Board

I

really didn’t think that thick-headed, close-minded hatred and bias could get any more pronounced than yesterday’s NYT editorial on McCain and the race card … but leave it to NYT op/ed scribe Bob Herbert to go even further, as he did today.

I swear, the man isn’t just totally confused about race and racism, he’s obsessed with sex, particularly white women sex, it seems.

Now, from the hapless but increasingly venomous McCain campaign, comes the slimy Britney Spears and Paris Hilton ad. The two highly sexualized women (both notorious for displaying themselves to the paparazzi while not wearing underwear) are shown briefly and incongruously at the beginning of a commercial critical of Mr. Obama.

The Republican National Committee targeted Harold Ford with a similarly disgusting ad in 2006 when Mr. Ford, then a congressman, was running a strong race for a U.S. Senate seat in Tennessee. The ad, which the committee described as a parody, showed a scantily clad woman whispering, “Harold, call me.”

Both ads were foul, poisonous and emanated from the upper reaches of the Republican Party. (What a surprise.) Both were designed to exploit the hostility, anxiety and resentment of the many white Americans who are still freakishly hung up on the idea of black men rising above their station and becoming sexually involved with white women.

Like most men, I’m more than a bit nuts about female physiology. Curves, legs, breasts … phew! But when I saw the fleeting snippets of Britney and Paris fly by in the McCain ad, the last thing that occurred to me was the, er, indelicate photos of them exiting cars. Neither is on the screen for more than a half second and both are standing, surrounded by crowds, and wearing normal red carpet clothing. The GOP could not have been more careful in their photo selection: The photos say “celebrity,” they don’t say “vulnerable white women about to be raped by black thugs.” There was nothing “incongruous” about their placement in the ad whatsoever. The ad is about celebrities with obsessive fans, not about sex, so the ad showed celebrities and excessive fans: Britney, Paris, Barack. That’s all it says and Herbert’s over the top response simply proves the point.

The Howard Ford ad is quite different. Unlike Britney and Paris, the woman in the ad is unknown to us in any context, so we must judge her by her appearance and behavior. Her hair is done in a porn star rat, no clothing is visible in the shot, and she has a bimbo voice. The conclusion is obvious … although she is hardly the innocent white girl who is the subject of the racial sex fantasies Herbert is writing about. It’s too bad she is in the ad at all, because it’s more effective without her and her presence does make the ad too much about black men and white women and sex, even if the intent was to make it about a Democratic candidate who was hiding behind a family man facade while partying with Heff and the Playmates.

What Herbert is trying desperately to avoid by focusing on racism and sex is the effectiveness of the ad’s message: Obama has too much ego, not enough depth and is not qualified to be president. Good points all, but to Herbert, they’re just more racism:

The racial fantasy factor in this presidential campaign is out of control. … It’s driving the idea that Barack Obama is somehow presumptuous, too arrogant, too big for his britches — a man who obviously does not know his place.

Really? It’s not that Obama is one of the least qualified presidential candidates in the history of the republic? That he surrounds himself with fake presidential seals and busies himself with fake international presidential tours? That he stands before 200,000 in Berlin and says nothing of substance? Could it be that we’re looking at his policies, his substance, his judgment and finding that he just comes up short, not that he comes up black? No, says Herbert, out of the question!

Mr. Obama has to endure these grotesque insults with a smile and heroic levels of equanimity. The reason he has to do this — the sole reason — is that he is black.

No criticism can be raised against Obama without it being about race. We saw this coming ever since he announced his candidacy, but we conservative bloggers didn’t make the campaign about race, nor Rush or the entire crew at Salem Radio, nor did the GOP, nor did McCain.

Bob Herbert and his fellow Democratic racists did and they will continue to make it about race for one simple reason: They have to. How else will they defend the flawed candidate they’re burdened with?

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With Obama winning the presidency by seven percent, we can't blame the media. Their laudatory coverage and refusal to extensively probe into Obama's background and [lack of] experience was at best responsible for five percent of his vote, the pundits tell us. Here is a compilation of over 100 significant instances of pro-Obama/anti-McCain bias during the 2008 campaign.

For all 'Media Bias 2008' – Click Here