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Saturday, February 02, 2008
Robert Knight :: Townhall.com Columnist
The NFL Playoffs: An Affair with Mr. ED
by Robert Knight
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Will the Dems' health care Christmas Present to America be an improvement or detriment to our health care system?


As for the Super Bowl, although the buzz on Madison Avenue is that the spots will be “nicer” overall than in 2007, parents may want to keep the remote closer than they did during the playoffs. Lingerie hawker Victoria’s Secret, whose store windows in malls have parents walking briskly by while redirecting their children’s attention, has bought a 30-second spot.

Likewise, GoDaddy.com, the Web domain provider with a taste for cheesecake, will be back for Super Bowl XVII. GoDaddy is repeating its ploy of offering an explicit ad to ensure that even Fox will reject it, and then offering a tamer version to drive viewers to the Web site to see the original ad. It’s the TV equivalent of the old publisher’s trick of stamping “Banned in Boston” on the cover of a lurid novel.

GoDaddy has lined up Indy driver Danica Patrick, who leers at the camera while unzipping her leather jacket. This probably won’t cost Miss Patrick a lot of racing fans down at Hooters, but it’s one more reason for parents to be wary.

It’s even got some network folks excited. During a January 24 interview on ABC’s World News with Charles Gibson, ABC ran a 5-second clip of the previous GoDaddy.com girl with her tank top strap falling down in the 2006 Super Bowl ad.

After reporter Bill Wier noted that GoDaddy’s “global market shared increased by 56%” a week after that game, GoDaddy CEO Bob Parsons smugly boasted:

“I knew that's exactly where every male would be looking. And I’ll tell you what, that decision [to run the ad] was as right as rain.”

Right doesn’t have a whole lot to do with it. Just ask Mr. ED.

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About The Author

Robert Knight is a Senior Writer/Correspondent for Coral Ridge Ministries and a Senior Fellow for the American Civil Rights Union.
 
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Reply # 1
Date: Feb 2, 2008 - 9:11 PM EST
LOL at the big governent nanny-staters
LOL at you all asking for more big government in the form of censorship and advertising restrictions.

"But there’s still ED, thanks to Cialis and Levitra ads, which populated the playoffs, sometimes twice a game. Do they really have to go into such detail? Is there a wild-eyed government goon in a raincoat waving fine print at them and ordering them to inform everyone about … well, you know."

Uhhh, yes, there is. That's why they have all the disclaimers. You all who want some big government (television censorship, Internet censorship including poker, etc), you have to accept the rest of it (too much information in the disclaimers). Trust me, they don't air the list of side effects because they want to.
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Reply # 2
Date: Feb 2, 2008 - 6:50 PM EST
We have ourselves to blame.
Pharmaceutical ads used to be illegal in this country. Lawyers were also prohibited from advertising.

Somehow, somewhere along the line the big pharmaceuticals and the ad industry bought off enough lawmakers to get this sensible arrangement repealed.

And I don't remember any upswell of indignation among the U.S. population-- a mob of passively self-gratifying couch potatoes who've been dumbed down by the public schools and Madison Avenue.

People who sell Febreze of course love living in a world of "consumers" who would never think of taking soap and a scrub brush to a carpet that stinks-- and believe that solutions to problems come in spray cans. The rest of us have to put up with a world that reeks of chemicals noxious enough to distract the human nose from its natural ability to smell-- and houses that reek of cat urine AND Febreze.

Passive, clueless consumers are unfortunately the same people that make up our so-called electorate-- a far cry from the "vigilant citizenry" called for by our Founding Fathers.

All these complaints about noxious and immoral crap that dominates the marketplace, including the marketplace of ideas-- sidestep the issue that the public demands exactly what is being deplored.

This public needs to be talked into a more sensible mindset, and schooled in its own self-advantage. Admittedly a tall order-- but critique aimed at complaining about obnoxious commercials is little more than preaching to the choir.
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