Monday, December 07, 2009
Annals of advertising: Appealing to the verdict of history
Every president and prime minister worries not just about his or her constituents living today but the verdict of posterity, and most voters are glad for that because it means our leaders will occasionally worry about the long term. Perhaps that is what makes these Greenpeace ads so arresting.
A good ad -- makes you stop and think -- but if politicians will not apologize for destroying economic growth and making it harder for people to lead fulfilled, creative, and productive lives, it is hard to imagine them apologizing for a failure at Copenhagen. OK, impossible.
15 Comments:
By 
, at
Tue Dec 08, 12:59:00 AM:
We're in a war. But I don't know with whom or what. George Soros? Mass stupidity?
The turn into 1900 was so placid that many thought it harkened the "end of the time." So too, with the turn into 2000. The future is unwritten.
The US budget deficit for 2010 is now projected to repeat our astronomical 2009 deficit -- $1.8 trillion -- as revised projected tax revenues are coming in less than expected. The true private sector, and the working rich, aren't performing to expectations. Wonder why? On current trends I expect our budget will blow up in two or three years -- I had thought five. This isn't a bad thing -- the sooner the better.
I raise this here because I hope Global Warming and Copenhagen are a high water mark in the ongoing idiocy that I'm still trying to fathom. If AGW is real, nothing on offer in Copenhagen will solve it. WTF?
I thought absurdity would catch up to Obama by now, but he defies. He'll pick up a Nobel Peace Prize for no good reason while escalating in Afghanistan ... and then on to Copenhagen. Developing ...
****
Lately, ex-DJ Don Imus has been asking his frequent guests to name their five favorite songs -- he calls it a character test. As an ex-college DJ, "I" have been playing with my top 25 list for years for giggles. "Redemption Song" has always made my draft lists, but the specific version I really wanted has finally made it to youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZBaklS79Wc&feature=related
Duplicate: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGVSTsgcCvw
Worth a listen.
Johnny Cash and The Clash's Joe Strummer on a Bob Marley song. It's the arc of protest songs from the Celtic fringe to Appalachia to Woodie Guthrie to Bob Dylan to "People Get Ready" Curtis Mayfield to Jamaican reggae to English punk and back. I saw Bob Marley play "Redemption Song" the week before his very last concert of all time -- in a not big hall in Boston in September 1980. As I tell my kids, the audience was half college kids and half Rastafarians -- all of them had spliffs like cigars. It's hard to pick the best concert I've ever seen, but that Marley show always make my short list. So too the single show The Clash played in NYC at the old Palladium in March 1980 the month after London Calling came out, when drummer Topper was still at the top of his game.
By 
Mystery Meat, at
Tue Dec 08, 07:11:00 AM:
Scary picture. He really does look like a dusky-hued Jimmy Carter.
By Ed, at
Tue Dec 08, 08:56:00 AM:
I'm dismayed at the thought that he'd still have an audience in 2020.
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 09:39:00 AM:
Republicans criticized the EPA action yesterday, saying further investigation of CO2 is necessary in light of Climategate. When a reporter named Lester asked White House Press Secretarys Gibbs about this later yesterday he said:
"I think everybody is clear on the science. I think scientists are clear on the science ... I think that this notion that there's some debate, minus Lester, on the science is kind of silly."
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2009/12/07/wh_on_climategate_debate_on_global_warming_is_silly.html
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 10:48:00 AM:
So the science isn't settled, but they want us to embrace world governmental control on our lives based on that unsettled science. It's true, Obama and his administration really does think we are idiots.
No wonder President Obama has a fear of torches and pitchforks.
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 11:58:00 AM:
it is hard to imagine them apologizing for a failure at Copenhagen. OK, impossible.
Hard to imagine Obama apologizing? Where have you been the last 11 months?
By D.E. Cloutier, at
Tue Dec 08, 12:40:00 PM:
Cimate change? We already solved the problem. Spread the word.
Create the illusion and the fact will follow. That's how you do it in today's world.
By Don Cox, at
Tue Dec 08, 01:29:00 PM:
"destroying economic growth and making it harder for people to lead fulfilled, creative, and productive lives"
This puzzles me. Why do you think a transition to nuclear and renewable forms of energy would be bad for economic growth? There are vast profits to be made from building all that new plant, and it will encourage the US and Europe to retain their engineering skills, which are currently at risk of being transferred to China.
Even if there was no climate change at all, it would still be worth doing, if only to get the Arabs off our backs. (I do not support the idea of building a big solar plant in the Sahara, because it again makes energy an import for Europe.)
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 02:04:00 PM:
Everything puzzles you, Senor Cox, except for the religion of AGW. What's most compelling about your comments in thread after thread is that not a one has ever been accompanied by evidence, and when specifically queried you do not respond. You, sir, are full of it. Brian, at least, still cites authorities from the nineteenth century, having given up on the twentieth and twenty-first I suppose.
Anyway, you're a twit.
If the economic cost of society choosing to adhere to your juju beliefs was in fact only the cost of "a transition to nuclear and renewable forms of energy", especially the spectacularly high ethanol-type levels of government subsidy being talked about, then obviously every company even remotely close to the energy industry would be all over that particular honey-pot.
Sadly, the powers being sought by government in the name of a non-existent existential threat are just a wee bit more sweeping than the simple way you wish it were.
And, one might ask, "why"? Why do free people fervently support the determinism of the left so suddenly? Well, obviously, they don't like freedom.
In his WSJ piece today Bret Stephens pulls away the curtain, revealing the inner Stalinist in members of the AGW crowd today, and very effectively too. I guess every age sees it's zealots, and the modern age is particularly bedeviled by fascistic zealots. But these zealots are just the clone army of the self-seeking left.
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 02:49:00 PM:
Has anyone yet photo shopped these dumb ads to demonstrate the same folks apologizing for other things equally false?
And, isn't Obama the professional apologizer? Doesn't it annoy him that others are saying sorry for things that are certainly America's fault?
By Steve M. Galbraith, at
Tue Dec 08, 05:47:00 PM:
The "Lester" mentioned above is Les Kinsolving, a lovable but loony radio talk show host who has been covering the White House for several centuries.
Nice man and he can be very witty and funny but, oy...
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 09:29:00 PM:
At yesterday's press conference it looks like only Les Kinsolving asked about Climategate. The press conference before that it was only Major Garrett from Fox with Kinsolving doing a follow-up. Gibbs blatantly dissed Kinsolving this time. What's with the rest of the White House press corps. Are they being muzzled by their management? Or do they just have no balls at all?
I used to think that MSM was useless. After Climategate I'm now convinced they're a cancer.
By , at
Tue Dec 08, 10:32:00 PM:
Seriously, only two questions? The MSM needs to be replaced. This is just like their continued news black out on the negative effects of illegal immigration.
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Tue Dec 08, 11:08:00 PM:
Anon, Obama apologises for what other people have done, which is a dishonest way of accusing them while wrapping yourself in righteousness (see CS Lewis "The Dangers of National Repentance").
The Greenpeace ads would carry more weight if we hadn't already past the first dates that Bill McKibben predicted we'd be in catastrophe. In 2020, there will be no catastrophe, but it will still be predicted. The belief in catastrophe comes first, because this terribly unfair country doesn't value the Right People above all others, so we must obviously be headed for destruction. Greens out-Puritan Cotton Mather.
By , at
Thu Dec 10, 09:20:00 AM:
Wattsupwiththat piles on, this time blowing away the hockey stick (again).
