Here we have this week's Lady Chatterley's Lover, currently clocking in at around 1.2 million views on YouTube, and featuring the voice over woman who always makes me nervous for whatever reason:
The New York Times editorial board was not pleased, bringing the infamous Playboy Harold Ford Jr. ad into the conversation (see that ad below the jump). The Times, though, takes even greater offense to the McCain campaign's response:
"[Team McCain's] retort [to Obama's 'dollar bill' comment] was, we must say, not only contemptible, but shrewd. It puts the sin for the racial attack not on those who made it, but on the victim of the attack. It also — and we wish this were coincidence, but we doubt it — conjurs [sic] up another loaded racial image."
So, does the use of Britney and Paris have racial implications?
Jonathan Martin argues that Britney and Paris's insipidity reigns supreme:
"On the face of it, there does not seem to be anything sexual to their appearance. Fair questions can be asked -- why use two white girls instead of a male celebrity? -- but it seems clear that the point was to compare Obama to two of the most vacuous figures in pop culture."
I might also add that Britney Spears and Paris Hilton have moved far beyond any time they were seen as American sex symbols. Nobody wants to tap that, if you will. They really do, in fact, only exist within a context of their own superficiality and the cultural decay narrative that surrounds them.
The same, though, could probably be said regarding a Playboy playmate, which brings us back to this much derided 2006 spot:
Beyond the creepy sexual "call me," there's a substantial, inherent difference here, though: association vs. analogy. The Playboy ad implies a testimonial basically; something along the lines of "I know Harold Ford Jr., and I slept with him or would like to do so." The racial implication is mild to overt, depending on your perspective. With "Celeb," though, the ad visually compares Obama's celebrity status to other celebrities, who happen to be white women, whose appeal, I suppose, is sexual (ew).
Those white women, however, fit into (fake) guidelines Hot Air's Allahpundit announced about just who Obama can and cannot be pictured with:
"New rule: If you’re conservative, juxtaposing images of Barack Obama and white women regardless of context is racist per se. As, of course, is juxtaposing images of Obama and black men or women, lest you be accused of emphasizing his race by association. Juxtaposing images of him with white men? Iffy. Might suggest he’s gay. They’ll get back to you."
Hilarious, but true. What makes this ad different, and more and less effective in certain ways, is that the McCain campaign did the heavy hitting with this one, as opposed to the RNC, who was responsible for the Playboy ad in 2006. Josh Kahn makes this point at The Next Right, admitting the exchange of more criticism for far more punch:
"How to attack the opponent without looking “mean” is a classic campaign problem and there’s a classic answer – when possible, use surrogates. The RNC could easily have run the Celebrity spot instead of the McCain campaign itself and it would have shielded McCain personally from some criticism."
As Kahn mentions, some within the party, and even the campaign, think this decision was a mistake (from Marc Ambinder):
"Weaver said he's had 'enough.' The ad's premise, he said, is 'childish.'...He added: 'There is legitimate mockery of a political campaign now, and it isn't at Obama's. For McCain's sake, this tomfoolery needs to stop.'"
The criticism is not unfounded -- a friend's boss said it criticized Obama's strengths, in a way, which isn't something ideal. Nevertheless, McCain pulled even with Obama in the Gallup poll today, and was provided the opportunity to directly confront some of the race-driven peripheral issues of this campaign. And, if Obama will not allow this to be a policy-driven debate between this daily nightmare and the Townhall refusals, sometimes the childish tack is the one that must be taken. The ad was designed to get a little controversy going, but not racially -- Obama's a lightweight like a future trainwreck poptart, not a black man trying to sleep with one.
Comments