#BernieSoWhite!
I'm bemused by the people falling over themselves to praise this Bernie Sanders ad. Someone on NPR (Diane Rehm show? I think so) mentioned as politely as possible how it would not be shown outside New Hampshire and Iowa. Now that I've seen it, I know why.
I could throw a rock out my window and hit someone who could watch that ad and not see anyone in it who looks like them, or anyplace near them that looks like the places shown in that ad. Not that there's anything wrong with that. The "Willie Horton" ad wasn't a national buy, either.
But for a guy who knows he needs to appeal to more than white New England voters.....
I mean, he doesn't even get the message of the song right.
I know; I'm being churlish. Gonna go outside and shout at clouds now.....
(And when I get to the end, at least at YouTube, I get this message: "Up Next: Why African Americans are on FIRE for Bernie Sanders." Well, okay then.)
Busted. The three Northern New England states are, statistically, the whitest in the country. On the other hand, all three went for Obama whereas some states with large populations of non-white people didn't. On a third hand, we've got the emetically racist Paul LePage as governor.
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ReplyDeleteIt's just the imagery. Pictures, a thousand words,that kind of thing.
ReplyDeleteMorning in America - positively Reaganesque. Here's what I said at Charles Pierce's place.
ReplyDelete"Where did the ad run? New Hampshire? Iowa? Where are Bernie's black supporters? I see one brown person. The ad would not play well in other parts of the country. Sorry, I could not relate to the ad. I grew up in a diverse city, not on a farm."
And here was one response to my comment:
"June Butler Please why do old people pick stuff apart? It is a great ad...I'm 59 and how many blacks and ??? did not take away a thing,,,please God don't let me became old."
Ha ha. She's a supporter of Bernie Sanders. Perhaps she doesn't know Bernie is 74, and, if elected, he will be 78 at the end of his term, which is definitely old.
June:
ReplyDeleteI know, right? ;-)
I saw more than one brown--and other non-white--person in the ad. And yeah, he's focusing on the first caucus and primary states, go figure.
ReplyDeleteI'll note that I worked for Obama in NH in '08 in a very conservative county, which went for him--and the Northeast Kingdom of VT when 2:1 for him, despite being mostly the kinda people we're told wouldn't vote for a black Democrat.
ntodd, in all fairness, after I looked at the ad again, I saw a black girl, and I may have missed a person of color or two. The ad is still very white and unappealing to me. Who knows but that droves (to continue the bucolic theme) of folks in Iowa and NH will show up at the polling stations to vote for Bernie because of the video? Still, the ad is being viewed all over the country, and the campaign doesn't end in those two states.
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