U is for Undecided…
So Big Bird is backing Obama?
Not so fast, Mr. President. Big Bird’s, um, handlers had this to say:
“We have approved no campaign ads, and, as is our general practice, have requested that both campaigns remove Sesame Street characters and trademarks from their campaign materials.”
My amateur take? I get what the Obama campaign is going for here. Romney could demand that Sesame Street pay back every dime they took from the government and it still wouldn’t make a dent in the deficit. Invoking Big Bird as he did was probably not the best tact for Romney. But if you asked me to guess whether this was a real ad or an SNL skit, I’d guess SNL skit every time. I could actually see this ad working on children, what with the scary music, foreboding voice, and threatening shots of the big yellow guy. But, even with many of the Republicans voter ID laws being shot down, I’m pretty sure they still can’t vote. And getting your ass handed to you by Sesame Street doesn’t look good either. Not only does it imply sloppy management (No one thought to secure the rights, first? Did they presume they owned them because of that federal funding? Yeesh…) but I can quickly see a meme arising around Obama getting taken to the woodshed by Big Bird and co.
…sigh…
Well at least Obama is willing to stand up for college graduates who got degrees in puppetry, like the OWS protester who complained that he couldn’t find a job after taking on tens of thousands in additional debt to get his masters degree in it.
On the other hand, Romney is showing the courage to take on society’s puppeteers instead of letting them pull all the strings.Report
The whole Big Bird thing is a monumentally stupid tactic from the Obama campaign, pretty much a textbook lesson in wasted bandwidth.
I don’t doubt that in the fullness of time, this issue might break for the libs but nobody believes that the availability of Sesame Street is in jeopardy without federal funding. If they did believe that nobody would switch their vote for it. Instead the whole issue just concentrates the voters’ memories on the debate, the worst event of the Obama campaign. It’s a real stretch to claim that 7.8% unemployment is the beginning of Morning in America, but that’s the only move the Obama campaign has.
And they had to do it quickly. Because even if the Republican momentum runs out of steam in the next day or so, we’re going to run up against the VP debate. Ordinarily this would be a nonevent, but coming on the heels of the Denver disaster it’s going to be a big deal. And I don’t think it’s going to be good news for the Demo’s.Report
The problem isn’t Big Bird, it’s propaganda like “Inside Washington”: 3 lefties and a biased moderator vs. Krauthammer. [A fair fight, but still…]
E.g., July 20, 2012: “Gordo, you’re killing me. This is a week when Obama makes the gaffe of the year, and you lead with the [Romney] taxes. I’ll be a good soldier. I’ll play along. This is an arm of the DNC, I know, but I’ll play along.”
https://ordinary-times.com/timkowal/2012/09/will-the-libya-debacle-cost-obama-his-job/
Big Bird is one of the 1%, and he’ll do just fine. The hacks on “Inside Washington” like Mark Shields, not so much. And don’t even get me started on Moyers. The threat to PBS funding in 2010 got him the boot, for a little while.* The barbarians need to be at the gates far more often.
________________
*”Mr. Moyers said he was unsure why PBS, where he has spent most of his career since 1971, declined the show for its main schedule. Some public television executives, who would not publicly comment on a sensitive issue, said they believed that PBS did not want to realign itself with Mr. Moyers, a longtime target of some conservatives, as it was fighting to keep its federal financing.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/arts/television/bill-moyers-returns-to-tv-but-not-with-pbs.html?scp=1&sq=elizabeth%20jensen%20moyers&st=cse&_r=0Report
If it’s wrong for Obama to use Big Bird for his campaign purpose then why does Romney use the name of a fallen Navy Seal? Why is the GOP saying that Obama knew about the need for extra security at the Libyan embassy? maybe he did and maybe he didn’t? How about when Bush was in office, word was that he was informed of a terrorist attack in our country U.S.A months before the attacks on the world trade center..The American people know today..Report