MoveOn.org wants to run a 30-second ad spot during the Super Bowl. The ad, the winner of their Bush in Thirty competition (to make an anti-Bush ad), however, wasnt accepted by CBS. It is the policy of CBS, were told, that they dont run political or issue ads during the Super Bowl When I first heard this, it didnt really bother me too much. In my opinion, it was probably a good thing. If political parties could buy Super Bowl media, I thought, the Bush team could probably outspend the folks at MoveOn.org ten to one
This is how I think Karl Rove would orchestrate things:
During the half-time show, a helicopter would show up and President Bush would repel out. He would be dressed up like a Navy Seal, covered in modern weaponry, rippling with styrofoam muscles. He would hit the ground and then run around a bit, dodging fake explosions, while Billy Ray Cirus, or some other country music superstar, sings about patriotism and what it means to be a true American. At some point, Bush would stop in his tracks, as if his spidey-senses were tingling, hed drop to the ground and begin inspecting around the 50-yard line. After a few quick movements, hed plunge his hand forcefully down through the astroturf, yelling, Ive discoverated a spider hole! Then he would lift himself up to his feet, pulling up the broken shell of Saddam Hussein, trough the sod, by the hair. (And 3D holograms of the 9/11 attacks would be playing all through this in the background. )
So, I didnt worry too much that MoveOn couldnt get CBS to run their ad. I have, however, received several letters from readers who feel otherwise. This note came from a very precocious kid in Texas by the name of Dan Gillotte:
Hey there.. Did you hear that fucking CBS won’t play ads from MoveOn or PETA during the Superbowl? CBS Executive VP “explains” the decision with this bullshit… “We do not accept advertising on one side or the other of controversial public issues, partly because we don’t think the debate ought to be controlled by people with deep pockets.” That is such crap. As Erik Marcus from Vegan.com points out, “A commendable position, if this means the Super Bowl will feature no ads from McDonald’s and other deep-pocketed meat sellers; but that seems unlikely to be the case.”
Anyway, I wrote an e-mail to those assholes at CBS… actually I filled out a web-form with the following note; I am very disappointed that CBS will not air the MoveOn.org ad during the Superbowl. The claim that CBS has a policy against issue ads is false as there were anti-drug issue ads last year and it has been reported that anti-smoking ads are on deck for this year. Rejecting this ad is wrong and reflects poorly on the management of this network. You can feedback to them too. I think that this link for CBS should work.
The link does work. I just tried it out From my perspective, PETA has a really good argument, as the fellow from Vegan.com points out. As for the MoveOn ad, Im still of the opinion that it should probably only run if other political ads are allowed to air. My suspicion is that the very bright folks at MoveOn.org would agree with this. Theyre probably just pushing to have it aired during the Super Bowl so that people will hear about it and go to their website to watch it. Theyre getting great press mileage from this.
If you didnt see the winning ad, titled Childs Play, when I linked to it last week, you can still find it at the MoveOn.org site, along with the other Bush in 30 finalists.
While were on the subject of the MoveOn Bush in 30 competition, Id like to mention one more thing During their Bush in 30 awards ceremony, the folks from MoveOn were joined by Michael Moore, Al Franken, Margret Cho and other left-leaning celebrities. In the days after the event several websites, such as the one run by the right-wing Matt Drudge, reprinted excerpts from their statements. Margret Chos remarks were singled out by Republicans as being particularly loathsome. I havent read them, but I dont doubt they were in bad taste. She most likely said that our nation was being run by radical and impotent little men who were out of touch with the rest of us here on Earth. She may have even implied that they dressed up like Nazis and tickled each other for fun. I dont know. It was probably very offensive though What I did read, however, are the emails that were sent to Margret Cho by Bush supporters in the days following her remarks. Its pretty gross stuff, but it illustrates how vile the discourse can get on that side of the aisle Dont follow that link, by the way, unless youre prepared to see many, many uses of words like Cunt, Gook, Chink
The one cool thing is that whoever posted these letters to the Margret Cho site also included the email addresses of the senders. Most of these hate racist, homophobic messages were sent from peoples work accounts and one can only assume that there will be ramifications I cant imagine that employers like AG Edwards would condone their brokers sending out messages with subject lines like, Fat Chink Whore. (I just went back and checked and it looks as though theyve removed most, if not all, or the email addresses that were listed earlier. Sorry. I would have blogged this earlier, but Linette and I were busy cleaning house and trying on maternity clothes.)
