Steamd

A few days ago, I caught a story about a man who got caught keying a Hummer:

I understand why he did it: because Hummers suck! If I saw a $50,000 Hummer H2 sitting in a high school parking lot, I might considering keying it to. It’s bad enough that the father who owns the car let his kid drive it to school. Even worse is the fact that he installed surveillance cameras because (get this!) his last three Hummers were vandalized. Umm, gee, you think maybe you might consider a different type of vehicle?

Granted, what this man did was wrong. There is simply no justification to damaging someone else’s property just because you don’t approve of it. I would never condone the act of vandalizing a Hummer…but I understand.

So, why all the animosity over the Hummer? Why should anyone be pissed about a car like this? I mean, it is a free country. Anyone can drive any kind of car they want, right? Well, yeah, but let’s face it: when you drive a Hummer, it’s very clear that you don’t give a shit about the environment or energy conservation.

Let’s examine the average Hummer for a second:

According to the GM Fleet and Commercial website, a Hummer H3 gets around 14 MPG in the city and around 18 MPG on the freeway. By comparison, even the most fuel efficient full-size pickup trucks get around 15/20 MPG.

Thanks to federal fuel efficiency regulations, GM is not required to report the fuel efficiency of the Hummer H2 since it’s gross weight is over 8500 lbs. However, owners have reported that they get a whopping average of around 10 MPG in the city! Yep, it’s a gas guzzler!

On top of that, the Hummer H2 has a huge carbon footprint, gushing out an average of 3.4 metric tons of carbon emissions per year. That’s twice what an average sedan spits out!

But the bigger slap in the face is a tax loophole, known as the Hummer Tax Loophole, that allows business owners to get up to a $25,000 tax deduction for buying large SUV’s like the Hummer or the Cadillac Escalade. By comparison, according to the IRS website the highest tax incentive for a hybrid vehicle is around $3,000 for a Ford Escape Hybrid! Pisses you off, doesn’t it. 

Regardless of how high gas prices have skyrocketed, Hummer drivers just keep sucking up all that gas simply because they can afford it. They simply don’t care that so many Americans are having a hard enough time as it is to keep fuel in their tanks. If they did then they would consider trading them in for hybrids and other more fuel efficient vehicles. I’m pretty sure GM could find a way to make the Hummer into a smaller carbon footprint by taking the trade-ins and using them as scrap metal.

So, with all this in mind, it’s no wonder that some people feel the need to key a Hummer. Again, I’m not saying it’s right…but I understand.

A while back, I talked a bit about Microsoft’s efforts to boost their image through a series of upcoming ads featuring Jerry Seinfeld. Well, they came…

And then they went. What happened? Well, if you’re a Seinfeld fan, the commercials are quite humorous here and there. Otherwise, it seems most people found them to be awkward and, quite frankly, they didn’t do a damn thing to boost Microsoft’s image.

So, where does Microsoft go from here with the rest of their $300 ad budget? 

Now they’re aiming to redefine what “I’m a PC” really means with a new series of ads that attack Apple’s own ad campaign head-on:

And, here’s another version:

So, what’s the problem with this? Why will this campaign ultimately fail? As John Gruber of Daring Fireball pointed out, the characters in the Apple commercials are just computers personified. They don’t actually represent real computer users:

They’re not dressed as computers, they’re dressed as people. It’s postmodernism taken to a very silly and profoundly unserious commercial end.

Microsoft would have you believe that Apple is trying to put a stereotype on the average PC user. The reality is that Apple isn’t trying to stereotype the average PC user…just the average PC. And there in lies the problem with Microsoft’s campaign, that they still haven’t talked about the very thing that is causing all their problems to begin with: their product.

Seriously, do any of these commercials really make you feel that their products are any better? Do they? Do any of these ads make you feel like Windows is indeed better than the Mac OS? No? Why not? Because they don’t want to talk about Windows, that’s why. There’s nothing to talk about.

Just like the Seinfeld ads, there is absolutely no mention of Windows at all. Nothing. They don’t even talk about the very issue that is at the core of Microsoft’s problems, the fact that people are losing faith in Windows due to the abysmal reaction to Windows Vista. But rather than dealing with it, they’d much rather tell people that the problem isn’t with their product. No, the problem is you, the customer! It’s all in your head and it’s Apple’s fault because they put a stereotype in your mind!

Is it me or do you get a feeling like they’re just placating the viewer like a McCain/Palin ad? Strange how these things parallel. Wonder what a “Hello, I’m a Democrat.” “And I’m a Republican.” commercial would sound like? Hmm…

More “I’m a Mac” political parodies on YouTube!  :)

It’s been a while since I last did a blog post. Much has happened and a lot has been gelling in my mind. There’s been a lot on the political front, so much that I felt I should take the time to draw it all in, research everything, and write a highly constructive entry rather than just regurgitating my initial gut reaction. That’s pretty much what I’ve been aiming to do with every new blog post I write. Granted, I can’t get away with avoiding any emotional reactions but I can at least stay as constructive as I possibly can and not ignore the facts. Lots of writing to come, but for now let’s talk about something I’ve been thinking about this week:

I regularly watch Bill Moyers Journal on PBS. Bill Moyers is among some of the greatest journalists of our time. His factual, non-biased approach usually leads to some highly thought-provoking pieces that reveal many answers and often lead to more questions. I had the privilege of meeting Bill back when I was in school. It was around the time when his book, Genesis: A Living Conversation, came out. I told him that I looked forward to reading it, for which he replied, “Please do…and when you’re done, let other read it and talk about it with them”. He encourages others to engage in conversation about many of the topics he reports about. That one little take-away says a lot about the man and as such I gained a lot of respect for him. Since it was a book signing, I asked him to sign his book for me. He signed it as “For Jeff - a kindred spirit. Bill Moyers”. 

Last week, I watched an excellent story on Bill Moyers Journal entitled Rage on the Radio. I highly encourage everyone to watch the video and/or read the transcript of the program (the video is also available on iTunes). The program details the nature of “Shock Jock” media and what kind of message that personalities like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Michael Savage are spreading. The message it seems is one filled with lies, hatred and intolerance.

Due to our First Amendment rights, I would never encourage any program to be forced off the air. However, I would ask that personalities that do engage in conversations of hatred and intolerance think about their message, the lies, and the consequences of them. There are consequences, a fact that we can not ignore, some of which even lead to hate crimes.

Case point, one of the talking points in Bill’s piece was about a man by name of Jim David Adkisson who shot and killed two adults and wounded seven others at a church in Knoxville, Tennessee?  The reason? According to reports on both MSNBC and CNN, Adkisson did it because he was frustrated with not being able to find a job, was on the verge of losing his food stamps, and blamed Liberals for it. Since he couldn’t attack any known Liberal political figures, he attacked a church with known Liberal teachings instead. According to his affidavit, Adkisson felt that the Democrats had tied his country’s hands in the war on terror and they had ruined every institution in America with the aid of major media outlets. The question is though: Where did he learn this?

… police found in Adkisson’s apartment, books by popular right-wing talk-radio personalities who berate and denigrate liberals. One of the books police found in Adkisson’s apartment was Michael Savage’s “Liberalism is a Mental Disorder”. In it, Savage calls liberals “the enemy within our country;” “an enemy more dangerous than Hitler”; “traitors” who are “dangerous to your survival” and who “should be placed in a straightjacket”. Like Adkisson, Savage accuses liberals of “[tying] the hands of our military”.

Now, I’ve talked about Ann Coulter a number of times on my blog. A couple of days ago, Ann posted a new blog post called Obama: Lucifer Is My Homeboy.  Like many other posts made by Coulter, the title alone is controversial and hateful enough. Now, I’m not going to go into too much detail here, rather I would encourage readers to read it and decide for themselves.

In her post, Ann talks about how a nutty Al Gore inverted a Christian parable into something nearly satanic, about Democrats attacking Sarah Palin for being a Christian, while comparing Obama to Jesus Christ, and about what the Pledge of Allegiance is really all about and what all this ”under God” stuff really means. In a nutshell, she is saying that if you are a Democrat and/or a Liberal then you are not a true Christian. Doesn’t matter that Barack Obama is a devout Christian. Doesn’t matter that his running mate, Joe Biden, is a devote Catholic. Nor does it matter that no one in the Obama campaign, not one person, has attacked Sarah Palin on her religious beliefs. Doesn’t matter. All that matters is that she and others hate all Liberals no matter what. So, basically, if you are Liberal, don’t have a pro-life stance, and don’t believe in God the same way she and other right-wing neo-Conservatives do then you are the devil incarnate and you will be hated and scorned. So I guess love your enemy and turn the other cheek doesn’t mean anything to Ann and her devote followers. If this isn’t a message of hate and intolerance then I don’t know what is.

For all intents and purposes, Ann Coulter is inline with Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage, and other right-wing extremists in her message. As such, she is just as responsible for the actions of Jim David Adkisson as Michael Savage. Although it wasn’t Michael Savage or Ann Coulter that pulled the trigger, their words have power and those words encouraged Adkisson and many others to think a certain way.

Back in April, Ann compared one of Barack Obama’s books to Mein Kampf.  The irony is that by this association she inadvertently associated herself with Hitler. Why? Think about it. Hitler spread a message of hate and intolerance by singling out Jews, calling them “traitors”, deeming them as dangerous to the country and suggested that they all be locked up. What do you think that Ann and other right-wing whack jobs have been talking about? That Liberals are to be hated, that they are dangerous and are bad for the country.

Folks, this kind of message is poisonous and just bad news all over. For anyone to presume that their religion is more correct and that everyone else is wrong is bad enough. But to go even further and deliberately denounce a group of people based on their political beliefs with a message of sheer hatred and intolerance, that’s just madness. Jesus Christ was about love and tolerance, not hatred, intolerance and lies. This kind of message is a distortion of what it means to be a true Christian. True Christians don’t lie. True Christians don’t hate. And true Christians are tolerant of others that may not share their beliefs.

So I challenge Ann Coulter with this question: What would you say and how would you defend your message to the people whose lives were change by Jim David Adkisson, a man who listened to others like you who have a similar message?