Is The Michigan Superbowl Ad Really Racist?

Posted by Modern Day Machiavelli on February 18, 2012
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By now most of you are aware of the ad aired during the Super Bowl that most of America has been quick to label “racist”. For those of you that don’t know, a political candidate in Michigan, Pete Hoekstra, paid for an ad to run during the Super Bowl. The ad was directed at his opponent and suggested that the decisions made by congress affected the United States in a negative way (mostly a lack of prosperity) and that in return affected some countries, particularly China, in a positive way. The ad features a young, attractive Asian girl riding a bicycle down a road surrounded by what appears to be rice fields. The young lady stops in front of the camera and begins to speak. She states, in broken English which we will discuss in a minute, that the policy of spending what they don’t have and borrowing from China has hurt the US economy and in return benefited the Chinese economy. She thanks a Michigan senator in particular for her participation in the policies that hurt the US and allowed the Chinese economy to prosper. In the end she says “thank you Debbie Spenditnow”. First of all, as a person who has participated on several large statewide campaigns, I would have been totally against the airing of the political ad. For instance most ads of this nature target something more tangible that can be linked directly to the opposing candidate. Usually a particular stance or political idea, or even a perceived flaw in the professional or personal character. This ad does neither. One aspect I really dislike about this ad is the petty, almost “elementary playground” name calling. The “Debbie Spenditnow”, a childish spin on her last Debbie Stabenow, really rubbed me the wrong way and I think this is one of the most overlooked flaws of this ad. I could probably go on and on about what I don’t like about this ad but let’s get down to the point at hand. Is this political ad racist? Since it aired during the Super Bowl I have seen many posts, much commentary, and much talk making the general statement that it is in fact racist. A majority of the people who make that claim use the fact that young lady in the ad spoke with broken English, in a way that is offensive to Chinese Americans. That would be a good point to argue if she was in fact a Chinese American, but remember she is playing the role of a Chinese and it is common in TV and film to portray foreign languages in a broken accent. The only thing that the ad did was keep a tradition going that has been set and maintained by the most radical of entities in our country, the Hollywood elite. Another aspect I have heard time and time again is the accusation that the candidate is blaming china for the state of the US economy. That point is about as far from the truth as one can get. If you pay attention the ad overtly and explicitly blames the US Congress for the plight of the US economy and in a particular a senator from Michigan. It doesn’t say that china is responsible, only that it greatly benefitted. I haven’t heard this argument as much but some would say that the setting of the ad is somewhat stereotypical and racist. Would it be any more stereotypical or racist if it was an American setting and it involved a person of any numerous ethnicities walking through Manhattan with tall buildings and cabs in the background? How about a white man dressed in carhartt clothing or overalls standing in a wheat field in the Midwest? The bottom line is that I will defend you all day long when you say the ad was not well thought out, or that it was poorly planned, but I just don’t see the racism that people seem to shout, but provide no debate to explain the point of view. Another aspect of the discontent associated with this ad is the treatment and comments directed at the young Asian lady. This young lady holds no responsibility for the poorly planned, “not so smart” aspects of this ad. She is a young aspiring actress who saw an attempt to get much exposure. Even a statewide commercial during the Super Bowl would be a good break for any young acctress. So regardless of what you think about the ad, bashing her serves no purpose and is very distasteful. In closing, I will challenge anyone, anytime to show me a legitimate point where this ad was indeed racist, and I will be more that happy debate anyone, anytime using whatever means you choose to discuss the aspects of this ad.

GUIDE ON.

End The Drug War

Posted by Modern Day Machiavelli on September 13, 2011
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For years some have been calling for an end to so called “war on drugs”. Across this vast country you have a multitude of reasons why people think we should end it. First you have the argument that you can’t stop people from doing what they want to do. It didn’t work with liquor in the early twentieth century and it won’t work with drugs now. You also have people who say that the recreational use of most drugs is completely harmless and in some, if not most, circumstances is even less. Now you beginning to see a trend where libertarian minded individuals are calling for an end to the drug war based on individual liberty, or the notion that what doesn’t cause harm to others should not be illegal. Also they state that we, as a society, should not criminalize immorality. Also some say that we can only end the drug problem we begin to recognize drug abuse / addiction as a medical problem and not a criminal one. To a certain degree I can find common ground in all of these points of view but I actually agree the most with two two of the aspects. First and I think our homes are sacred and what we do in them is sacred. I believe as long as we cause no harm to another what we do in our home should be off limits. The second one will cause me some grief from my police friends (I was a police officer and police instructor fob the better part of my adult life), but I believe that we should start treat drug problems as a medical instead of criminal.

That being said I have another reason for ending drug war. Now I didn’t come up with this idea and I won’t attempt to take credit for it, but I will gladly take credit for being one of the few to seriously discuss it. Why are we wasting so much of our criminal justice system on something that is up for debate anyway. All the time you hear people complain that plea bargains are a black eye on our justice system or that some convicted violent offender was released from prison early because of overcrowding. I agree with these people and one easy way to rid our justice system of these is to decriminalize most drugs. If we decriminalized most drugs it would take the burden off of judicial system to process countless nonviolent, victimless crimes. As I was saying about “plea bargains”, how many times you heard about numerous cases being plea bargained because local and district prosecutors just don’t have the time or the resources to prepare and prosecute all of the caseload between one grand jury date and the next. Much of this could be alleviated with decriminalizing most drugs.
Another thing to consider is the crimes associated with drugs. Would it be presumptuous to ponder that decriminalizing drugs would also cause a sharp decrease in the violent and property crimes associated with the drug lifestyle. Most of the time when something is decriminalized it is removed from the black market and when that happens the price drops significantly. With a drastic drop in price would we see a correlation in property crimes? Would car radios be safe for the first time in 30 years? How about violent crimes directly and indirectly associated with drugs? A large portion of violent crimes in inner-cities can be be attributed to drugs in one form or another? Now I can’t say for sure, but I would be one bit surprised if we didn’t see a positive effect. Now I could be completely wrong but it is a chance we should all be willing to take. We won’t know until we try and one thing for sure; our currently solution to the “drug problem” just isn’t working.

That’s my Dos Centavos.

Another Angle on The Indiana Tragedy

Posted by Modern Day Machiavelli on August 15, 2011
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In my circle of friends and family I am the one known as the jerk. I speak my mind, most of the time saying very insensitive but true things about people, family, and events. Most of the time I say what everyone around me is thinking, I’m just the only one who has the fortitude to say regardless of the repercussions it may cause me. This morning was no different. As my coworkers and I gathered around the “water cooler” for the morning talk, of course the conversation turned to the tragedy at the Indian State Fair over the weekend. It seems as people gathered for an out-door Sugarland concert, the weather turned stormy collapsing the stage. It seems the strong winds and bad weather caused an outdoor, erected stage to topple into the crowd, injuring numerous would be concert attendees and killing five. Also, it seems as though another outdoor concert in the vicinity was canceled due to the weather and someone in charge at the Indiana State Fair should have done the same. It is a tragic story and I sure that between the media and the courts society will find someone to blame. And by blame I mean fork over money to the victims. It will be a big deal for a while and then appear briefly in the news from time to time, I wouldn’t even be surprised if we don’t see some “nanny state” legislator try to pass some legislation in attempt to “never let this happen again”. Unfortunately the above story is all over the internet and this is the only angle the reader will see…….not necessarily. I’m going to go out on limb and say that the attendees must share some of the blame concerning this incident, hell I’m even going to say that hold the “lions share” of the blame. There is an old saying that goes way back, even before my time that would be very applicable here. I’m not sure that even I am insensitive enough to say it but it is about human intelligence and the rain. Unbelievably hundreds of people stood in front of that flimsy stage, where just a few minutes earlier a severe weather warning had just been announced. According to people in attendance, the skies were thunderous and a storm was imminent, yet hundreds of people decided to stand out in it to see Sugarland. Yep, that’s right Sugarland. We are talking about a Country-Pop group, which are now mass-produced in Nashville like cheap cell phones. Am I saying that the fair and other organizers shouldn’t share some of the fault, no. Another point that seems to stick out in my head is the fact that Sugarland wasn’t out on stage. The reports that I read state that it was “prior to the performance”, but it makes me wonder if someone backstage exercised something the crowd didn’t, good judgement. What I am saying is that just because deaths are involved should we casually dismiss the fault of the people who chose to stay in the weather and made a decision, a bad one albeit, that led to their injury and death. If common sense would have prevailed, people could have taken shelter and waited a year or so and seen Sugarland at one of the many casinos on their irrelevant tour. All at the price of the bus fare in any major city’s transit system. Now don’t get me wrong this incident at the Indiana State Fair is definitely a tragedy, as a matter of fact there are two tragedies here. The first tragedy of course is the fact that several people are dead and more injured, but it is also a tragedy that people don’t have the sense of judgement to get out of bad weather over nothing more than a Sugarland concert.