Thursday, March 11, 2004

Boo!

Bushies go for the scare tactics already?

Kos relays this Ryan Lizza story about the 2nd round of Bush ads which Kos nicknames the "Muhammad Horton ad" (in honor of the famous Willie Horton ad of the 1988 campaign). Why? Because it flashes an image of a "dark-skinned man who is obviously meant to be a terrorist" while talking about John Kerry's alleged plan to weaken America from terrorist attacks.

I wonder what the Arab-American voters in Michigan will think of this?

The Bush campaign held a conference call for the press this afternoon to unveil the ads, and one reporter asked whether it was appropriate to use an Arab-American to depict a terrorist. Campaign aides said the actor in "100 Days" wasn't Arab-American. One official on the call insisted it was just a "very generic" image.

Yeah! That's the ticket!

Update: Here's a link to the actual ad, courtesy USA Today. It's actually not as ominous sounding as the description makes it out to be. For one thing, the use of a staccato female narrator softens the blow and the image in question flashes by pretty damn quick. It could have been made a lot worse with a deep baritone narrator, ominous music and a slow motion shot of Muhammed Horton (tee hee).

But hey, if they can be made to squirm over this one as well then all the better!

Update 2: You know, I agree with the comments over at Kos. Not only is this ad borderline racists, it just sucks on its message. I mean, really, who but the most rabid right-winger would buy the idea that Kerry deliberately wants to weaken America in the fight against terrorism? Yet that is precisely the message this ad attempts to convey.

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