I couldn't git it to go.....was it funny?
... Lulu
Dear Lulu,
The commercial was not funny. It featured somber-faced kids - say, 6 to 9 or 10 years old - doing grown-up style general service-job-type labor (dishwasher, mechanic, etc.) with the tag line "Guess who's going to pay off President Bush's $1 trillion deficit?" CBS refused to air it....
The commercial is titled "Child's Play" (if you can't get that link to work, try one of the other links at bushin30seconds.org).
As you are finding out, it is causing quite a little brouhaha. In addition to the MS/NBC article cited in the original email, Salon has an article (you have to sign in or read an ad to read). Googling it (cbs + commercial + "Super Bowl" + moveon) returns a list of lots of Internet people who have something to say about it, as well as a bunch of articles.
Most are like the Ad Age article....
Reacting to the winning ad, Republican National Committee press secretary Christine Iverson said, "They should have called the contest 'Twenty seconds of fear and loathing of George Bush.' It proves what we have said all along: The Democratic presidential candidates have a message of protest and pessimism but bring no positive ideas to the debate."The RNC press secretary ignored the fact that neither MoveOn.org nor its pet, bushin30seconds.org, is affiliated with any Democratic candidate, presidential or otherwise. (Yes, the bushin30seconds panel of judges for the commercials does read like a Who's Who of Liberal Celebrities.) Iverson is pretending that the whole thing is a setup... a little FUD factor element, GOP style.
(That's "Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt," the most favored rhetorical tool in any would-be free-world oppressor's kit. It's how Bill Gates gets people to buy his fat, buggy products and it's how Bush II et. al. sold the Invasion of Iraq to the American people.)
Since it's all a conspiracy, we can just go back to our beer and cigarettes, folks. Nothing to see here.
A MarketingWonk article explains:
The CBS release cites the company's written policy: "CTN will sell time to political candidates, to those authorized by candidates to purchase time on their behalf and to political parties. CTN also sells time to groups supporting or opposing significant ballot propositions."And also...
The CBS press release, taking a clear swipe at MoveOn's successful campaign to stir protest against CBS, says, "In recent years, a cottage industry has arisen among groups that submit advocacy ads that they know will be rejected. They then resort to press releases and Internet diatribes about the rejection to reap considerable free media attention and financial contributions to support their cause. Editors and potential contributors beware."Yeah, sure. The spokes-writer apparently didn't know (or care) that this ad was selected by an Internet poll rather than by cottage industry moguls. Hey, the GOP doesn't go for "popular" stuff anyway, but farting horses, graphic violence, inter-species sexual innuendo, and male virility make great ads.
The reaction has been a mixed bag. Child's Play could be seen by more people than it would have been if it had aired without controversy. The stinky part of the mix is that CBS also refused to run an ad from the nutcases at PETA, who wanted to hawk vegetarianism by sexual innuendo (e.g.., those who eat meat are impotent); it would have fit right in with many of the ads that did run (Viagra et. al.). Unfortunately, Child's Play is now part-and-parcel of the "shunned by CBS" 2K4 Super Bowl ads. Their take on the issue shows that Republicans understand just how juxtaposition muddies the human mind, particularly if helped by a little muddy writing....
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