Bush in 30 Seconds -- CCed
MoveOn.org has announced a "political advertising contest" for the best ad that "tell[s] the truth" about President Bush. I take it that "the truth" could be for or against the president, but all submissions must be CC.
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Comments (10)
How about, "Should presidential candidates have to take a test?" superimposed on his visage...
I find that "the truth" tends to be MoveOn.org's second-highest priority. But at least their stuff will be CCed! Putting political ads in the creative commons is progress... I suppose.
Yeah, it looks to me like when they say "tells the truth about George Bush", they really mean "says George Bush is evil." I have serious doubts that any ad supporting Bush, no matter how demonstrably true, would get even a moment's consideration in their contest. Nevermind that Bush, like anyone else, has good and bad points. Intellectual dishonesty like that always really irritates me.
With all due respect, Professor Lessig, I find it rather improbable that MoveOn is interested in anything casting the administration in a positive light.
For example, the tenor of the organization's own press releases, and indeed, the entire web site, reflects a marked hostility to the current administration.
Another example is the judges involved. I'm not familiar with the positions of all the judges, but the inclusion of Michael Moore (who has his own problems with factual representations), Michael Stile, and Katrina Vanden Heuvel is hardly grounds for optimism.
It seems to me that MoveOn is looking not for truth, but for Pravda, as the old Soviet-era pun goes.
When they say "the truth about Bush" they are supposing that he lied us, and not that "bush is evil".
Saying on the TV that the world is safer since he is president (or something along this lines) shows how dull he is no matter if the world is safer today, or not. One person can not be responsible of the world peace.
Tony writes :
"It seems to me that MoveOn is looking not for truth, but for Pravda, as the old Soviet-era pun goes."
Well Pravda surely carries a controversial name. It depends on what the situation is. I say the current situtation in the USA under the Bush Administration is controversial in itself. At this very moment people are living below the minimum economic, physiologic and psychologic level which i would find justified to call a DEMOCRACY. They are so tired, fed-up and fighting everyday to get their costs payed, their medicare costs covered, they don't have the time or energy to fully grasp whats going on. The funny part is that Bush wants to feed $80 billion into Iraq when actually USA needs this hard cash themselves. I say its fully justified for moveon.org to create a movie called "Bush in 30 secs". So even people who are almost knock-out, like in the 8th round of a boxing fight againts Mohammed Ali, can still understand what the Bush Administration is all about.
Robert
So, stripped of rhetorical devices, your contention is that the country is worse off under Bush. That's all well and good, but your assertion doesn't really address my contention that MoveOn is not interested in entertaining spots contrary to the organization's point of view.
Let's assume "truth" is the presentation of facts. Advocacy is the presentation of those facts in support of one's own position. I suspect MoveOn is confusing the two.
Regards,
Tony
On the following url:
http://www.bushin30seconds.org/aboutbush.html
there appears the following statement:
"Here's a short list of the top 7 reasons we're running this ad campaign against President George W. Bush and his administration. We hope this informs your own commercials, and inspires you to look further into the policies of the Bush Administration and their effect on the American public. "
I therefore ask Prof. Lessig to retract his statement that:
"I take it that “the truth” could be for or against the president"
This is all rather silly. MoveOn doesn't make any claim to be neutral on the topic of GWBush. Nor does the Bush in 30 Seconds contest. If you don't know who you're talking to or what perspective they have, then find out.
There's no trickery or intellectual distortion here, any more than there is in any statement by someone with a political viewpoint.
And there's nothing Soviet about expressing your point of view...at least not last I checked.
"More Muslims have died at the hands of killers than — I say more Muslims — a lot of Muslims have died — I don't know the exact count — at Istanbul. Look at these different places around the world where there's been tremendous death and destruction because killers kill." —George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Jan. 29, 2004