A teacher asked her 6th grade class how many of them were Obama fans. Not really knowing what an Obama fan is, but wanting to be liked by the teacher, all the kids raised their hands except for Little Johnny.
The teacher asked Little Johnny why he has decided to be different, again. Little Johnny said, "Because I'm not an Obama fan." The teacher then asked, "Why aren't you an Obama fan?"
Johnny said, "Because I'm a Republican." The teacher asked him why he's a Republican. Little Johnny answered, "Well, my Mom's a Republican, and my Dad's a Republican, so I'm a Republican."
Annoyed by this answer, the teacher asked, "If your mom was a moron, and if your dad was an idiot, what would that make you?"
With a big smile, Little Johnny replied, "Well, that would make me an Obama fan."
Showing posts with label lipstick. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lipstick. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Little Johnny
I've been caught in the cross hairs of this email more than once. It provided some welcome relief to the barage of anti-McCain nonsense I've been receiving.
Friday, September 12, 2008
The Lipstick Loom
The job of the media in our society is an important one - it is expected to shine a light on government, forcing it to do the will of the people.
Today, though, in the age of affluence, we are a people without a will. The newspapers go unread, the news departments have been merged with the entertainment divisions, and journalistic standards have given way to ratings. The unemployed bright light of the media has been retooled into a disco ball, offering flash and excitement, scattering the national consciousness rather than providing clarity.
To win elections, campaigns have adjusted to the environment. In order to gain control of the fast moving flashes of light from the ball, they have learned to provide the news machine the fuel it requires. This is not a world in which facts survives, as it is a world where facts are not relevant. It is a world of messages and impressions - using subtle positioning to divide people into camps. Are you Dunkin' Donuts, or are you Starbucks?
The short attention span of the era means that perceptions are absorbed by the accumulation of snippets. Not from 30 second commercials, but from portions of them - not from their entire messages, but from momentary messages within. The "truths" that campaigns seek to communicate are assembled out of scraps of data grabbed from the political universe. The data is the paint on the pallet of the message crafters - it doesn't matter if the cause of a candidate's statement may have been severed from its effect! The creators of the message are the starving artists of the time - fully prepared to externalize the truth of their inner eyes at any cost.
The McCain messengers are not bothered by nattering nabobs who run in circles complaining that we shouldn't be talking about lipstick. Lipstick covers up Change, and Change is the word that the Lipstick artists must keep from being spoken.
They can't know what Barack's intention was when he spoke of lipstick and pigs - what's important is that the linkage to Palin was too strong to ignore in the minds of viewers. The Hillary message is reinforced - Barack doesn't behave well with women.
The Barack messengers aren't hemmed in by their parties’ long commitment to fight discrimination - they disparage McCain for being old, proving the point by noting that he doesn't use email.
It doesn't matter, in their world, whether McCain does or does not use email - or whether such a detail is worthy evidence of presidential preparedness. What matters is that the feeling evoked by the very accusation - McCain is too old, too out of touch!
This is the how the tug of war of politics is fought today. For the past year, Barack got a free ride from the media, which promoted his message of change and hope with a free media campaign unrivaled since the development of the PR industry. For the past two weeks, Sarah Palin has taken over Barack's endless summer, riding the wave that has gone, in a moment, from promoting Barack to pounding him.
A year ago, John McCain's campaign was in shambles. He had been buried under the weight of the contempt his own party felt toward him for his practice of reaching across the aisle and forging compromises with the Feingolds and Kennedys. Taking great personal risk to affect change, he has climbed back from the drubbing to win his party's nomination.
Now, McCain faces a candidate who has always put personal ambition above policy - he has never risked his career for any goal, and he has never affected change of any kind.
If the media was doing its job, it would be shining the light on the truth that McCain is the candidate of change, and that Barack's lack of experience should really disqualify him from serious consideration for the presidency.
While we wait for that to happen, we'll have to be content to enjoy the craftsmanship of the spinmeisters, pumping away at their looms, weaving the truth as they see it – no matter how hokey.
Today, though, in the age of affluence, we are a people without a will. The newspapers go unread, the news departments have been merged with the entertainment divisions, and journalistic standards have given way to ratings. The unemployed bright light of the media has been retooled into a disco ball, offering flash and excitement, scattering the national consciousness rather than providing clarity.
To win elections, campaigns have adjusted to the environment. In order to gain control of the fast moving flashes of light from the ball, they have learned to provide the news machine the fuel it requires. This is not a world in which facts survives, as it is a world where facts are not relevant. It is a world of messages and impressions - using subtle positioning to divide people into camps. Are you Dunkin' Donuts, or are you Starbucks?
The short attention span of the era means that perceptions are absorbed by the accumulation of snippets. Not from 30 second commercials, but from portions of them - not from their entire messages, but from momentary messages within. The "truths" that campaigns seek to communicate are assembled out of scraps of data grabbed from the political universe. The data is the paint on the pallet of the message crafters - it doesn't matter if the cause of a candidate's statement may have been severed from its effect! The creators of the message are the starving artists of the time - fully prepared to externalize the truth of their inner eyes at any cost.
The McCain messengers are not bothered by nattering nabobs who run in circles complaining that we shouldn't be talking about lipstick. Lipstick covers up Change, and Change is the word that the Lipstick artists must keep from being spoken.
They can't know what Barack's intention was when he spoke of lipstick and pigs - what's important is that the linkage to Palin was too strong to ignore in the minds of viewers. The Hillary message is reinforced - Barack doesn't behave well with women.
The Barack messengers aren't hemmed in by their parties’ long commitment to fight discrimination - they disparage McCain for being old, proving the point by noting that he doesn't use email.
It doesn't matter, in their world, whether McCain does or does not use email - or whether such a detail is worthy evidence of presidential preparedness. What matters is that the feeling evoked by the very accusation - McCain is too old, too out of touch!
This is the how the tug of war of politics is fought today. For the past year, Barack got a free ride from the media, which promoted his message of change and hope with a free media campaign unrivaled since the development of the PR industry. For the past two weeks, Sarah Palin has taken over Barack's endless summer, riding the wave that has gone, in a moment, from promoting Barack to pounding him.
A year ago, John McCain's campaign was in shambles. He had been buried under the weight of the contempt his own party felt toward him for his practice of reaching across the aisle and forging compromises with the Feingolds and Kennedys. Taking great personal risk to affect change, he has climbed back from the drubbing to win his party's nomination.
Now, McCain faces a candidate who has always put personal ambition above policy - he has never risked his career for any goal, and he has never affected change of any kind.
If the media was doing its job, it would be shining the light on the truth that McCain is the candidate of change, and that Barack's lack of experience should really disqualify him from serious consideration for the presidency.
While we wait for that to happen, we'll have to be content to enjoy the craftsmanship of the spinmeisters, pumping away at their looms, weaving the truth as they see it – no matter how hokey.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
The Great Lipstick Caper
Did the McCain campaign over reach with the Great Lipstick Caper?
They weren't off-base with the concept. When you see a clip of Barack using the lipstick line, the reaction is - "he's talking about Palin!" That's how it feels, and that's why the crowd reacted with such excitement - it wouldn't have been a standing ovation line without the linkage to Palin.
By hitting him so hard on it, McCain's campaign gave Barack the opportunity to cry, "old school politics," while raising the ire of the mainstream media - which doesn't want to be embarrassed for it's willingness to focus on the sensational.
On ABC News, Lipstick was the lead story. But the Jake Tapper report focused almost exclusively on Barack as victim, and McCain barely made the segment. And CBS had Youtube pull the ad because it didn't like Katie Couric being used in it.
The idea of chasing a theme like this for the McCain campaign is to 1) control the conversation, and 2) reinforce the negative feelings that women voters might hold for Barack. But it could be pushing this sort of tactic out of the fun zone and into the cheap politics realm - potentially reaching a tipping point that could create a backlash against McCain.
The tone of this campaign could change and the momentum could shift - over lipstick.
They weren't off-base with the concept. When you see a clip of Barack using the lipstick line, the reaction is - "he's talking about Palin!" That's how it feels, and that's why the crowd reacted with such excitement - it wouldn't have been a standing ovation line without the linkage to Palin.
By hitting him so hard on it, McCain's campaign gave Barack the opportunity to cry, "old school politics," while raising the ire of the mainstream media - which doesn't want to be embarrassed for it's willingness to focus on the sensational.
On ABC News, Lipstick was the lead story. But the Jake Tapper report focused almost exclusively on Barack as victim, and McCain barely made the segment. And CBS had Youtube pull the ad because it didn't like Katie Couric being used in it.
The idea of chasing a theme like this for the McCain campaign is to 1) control the conversation, and 2) reinforce the negative feelings that women voters might hold for Barack. But it could be pushing this sort of tactic out of the fun zone and into the cheap politics realm - potentially reaching a tipping point that could create a backlash against McCain.
The tone of this campaign could change and the momentum could shift - over lipstick.
No Mas Lipstick!
National elections are fights over news coverage. When the media is talking about Sarah Palin, for example, that means it isn't talking about Barack Obama. When Sarah was selected the day after Barack's big convention speech, that put a damper on his potential bump by taking him out of the news.
Speaking at a high school in Norfolk, Obama took a few moments to address what he calls "the made-up controversy" of the day...Since the announcement of Palin, Barack has been struggling with how to get some input into the campaign narrative. He's tried attacking Palin (bad idea - that keeps her the focus), he's tried not talking about her (doesn't matter, everyone else wants to, and the truth is, when you're up against a rock star, it can be frustrating.
Obama said the McCain campaign moved to "seize an innocent remark and take it out of context because they knew it's catnip for the news media."Yesterday, the McCain campaign seized another gift from Barack, and turned it into another tool for controlling the news cycle. That gift is, of course, Barack's use of the old expression about putting lipstick on a pig.
"See, it would be funny, but the news media decided that would be the lead story yesterday. This happens every election cycle. Every four years, this is what we do. This is what they want to spend two of the last 55 days talking about...Enough!" he said.The media loves this sort of controvery, even when there's not much to it - they're pretty happy if they can lead a newscast with, "Was Barack being sexist - you decide!" It doesn't matter what the answer is. And of course, it's not good for Barack to have people questioning if he's a sexist, because there's that leftover tension with Hillary.
Obama called the attacks "lies, outrage and swift boat politics."Barack is correct. But on the other hand, what McCain is doing is innocent compared to making up a fake position on the war on Iraq to win the nomination, then dumping it when you get the nomination, or promising never to vote to reauthorize FISA, but then voting to do so once you've secured the nomination.
"These are serious times and they call for a serious debate...spare me all the phony outrage. Spare me all the phony talk about change," he said.
McCain spokesman Brian Rogers responds: “Barack Obama can’t campaign with schoolyard insults and then try to claim outrage at the tone of the campaign. His talk of new politics is as empty as his campaign trail promises, and his record of bucking his party and reaching across the aisle simply doesn’t exist.”That's true to.
Lipstick
Barack had best leave the lipstick jokes to the women. He got in a bit of trouble yesterday venturing into unfamiliar territory.
Not a nice way to talk about a woman.The point Barack Obama was making today is that John McCain is not about change. Rather he and running mate Sarah Palin are about more of the same - no matter how they package it.
“You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig,” Obama said. “You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called ‘change,’ it’s still going to stink.”
The McCain team is saying that’s mockery gone too far. They say Obama called Palin a pig - drawing a parallel to Palin’s well-used remark that the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull is lipstick.
“It’s clear to me — as I’m sure it will be to fair-minded Republicans, Democrats and independents across the country — that Senator Obama owes Governor Palin an apology,” said former Massachusetts Governor Jane Swift, the chair of the newly formed “Palin truth squad.”
Citing historical president, the Obama team disagrees.
In fact, you can Google it. Exhibit number one comes from Vice President Dick Cheney four years ago - also on the campaign trail.
”As we say in Wyoming, you can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig,” quipped Vice President Dick Cheney in a stump speech yesterday, with reference to John Kerry’s claims he would be a credible war president.
Exhibit number two comes special delivery from the Obama campaign pointing out that Senator McCain himself used this phrase almost a year ago describing Hillary Clinton’s health care plan.
“I think they put some lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig,” he said of her proposal.
Just further evidence that Barack is off his game a bit.
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