It was to be a 'Super Bowl Day' not a 'Politics Day'

You should have heard the commotion this silly political pitch created at the sports bar where we paid 20.00 to reserve our seats yesterday. The good news about the Census Ad was it made the thought of answering the door or reading their mailouts risky unless we wanted something in the form of a handout.
The thought police certainly controlled the ad campaign with Internet services offering sexually suggestive temptation for more info from Go Dad, Motorola sent us to their convoluted web site to see more bathtub action, Green Police come with each Audi vehicle, and even Tim Tebow knocks down his mom to prove his point.Face slapping, slam down and subsonic audio effects are our new industry buzz words and sound effects. Grunting on and off the field will be our next generation of message implantations.

Jim,
I totally agree with your CBS observation.
I stayed in New Orleans instead of going
down to Miami, and I switched when the
interview started. Totally out of place!
Hope you print the ratings when you get
them. Fire the exec who authorized that
dumb move.

At least they didn't do it at halftime.

I don't watch a lot of the pre-game fill stuff anyway. Once the game begins, no politics.

Oh, let's see how much inanity can be unpacked from all that:

[a] HE'S THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES;

[b] Last time I checked, "Super Bowl Sunday" was neither a Federal holiday, a Holy Day Of Obligation, or a High Holy Day;

[c] Yes, as we speak, I am dropping brown acid, and attempting to HALLUCINATE Jim Carnegie (or anybody else) whining with righteous indignation had a network anchor done an interview with then-president Dubya, on Super Bowl Sunday, two hours before literally any football fan was paying attention to the screen.

Surely you must have something better to do with your column, than to bash Obama... and if you want to do that over a valid issue, go right ahead. But this is right up there with "Obama's going to indoctrinate my kids!!" Puh. Leeze.

If CBS had done a better job of publicizing this, I might have watched it.

And for the record, Jim, there are many of us -- especially of the female persuasion -- who don't give any portion of a rat's anatomy about the Super Bowl or even the apparently holy sport of football. (For the record, I'm a former sports reporter myself, having spent several years covering MLB for local radio and network TV.)

On the other hand, I care deeply about my country. And if there's a chance to hear -- unfiltered -- what my president has to say about our current situation, I'm there.

My guess is that George W. Bush, or Bill Clinton for that matter, would have had the political smarts not to do a political interview during the Super Bowl pre-game. They would have gone on the broadcast for about two minutes, said how much they loved football, said something nice about Indianapolis, said something nice about New Orleans, wished everybody a good game and then shut up. You don't help yourself talking politics when it is not appropriate.
Jack Messmer
Executive Editor
RBR-TVBR

Jack:

You still haven't supported the case that it "is not appropriate". Who made this rule? I'm going to flip all the cards and say: Republicans (am I warm? :-)

I will fully stipulate that a bunch of beered-up white guys in a sports bar in Southie (the same people who listened to WEEI and WRKO and voted for Scott Brown, BTW... all under the radar of the painfully clueless Democratic Party) were probably pissed to the max (in the American sense) that they had to look up at the screen in their Budweiser fog, 2 hours before the game, and see The Other.

The day THAT becomes the criterion for whether or not CBS News airs an interview with a sitting President who most people voted for, you can put your Constitution (with its clearly-defined role for the Fourth Estate) up on frickin' eBay.

One more area besides the President in your screed, which I'd like to address: Jim expresses the well-known Outrage over "taxpayer money" (a fave buzz phrase of right-wing pundits everywhere, which miraculously is never applied to military adventures in places like Iraq), being used to mount an ad campaign for the 2010 Census.

A few inconvenient facts here: back to that annoying ol' Constitution, first of all. You need to do a Census. End of that discussion.

But in an age where we have a population of 350 million diverse people, and they ain't all a bunch of farmers along the Eastern Seaboard, there is only one way to reach them all and educate them, as to the criticality of answering the census: MASS MEDIA.

As your Supreme Court recently acknowledged with a smirk, I'm afraid that costs some D-E-A-U-X.

You currently have an actual United States Representative, telling Americans everywhere to disobey the Constitution, and not answer the Census. It's supposedly a Commie Socialist Plot to take away your privacy, or something. And she gets away with it. And she's ubiquitous (gosh, if only the Founding Fathers had had a chance to speak to Michelle Bachmann first!).

Now here's the most fascinating part.

What with the (very!) rapidly-shifting demographics of the United States... who stands to benefit, if our allocation of resources short-changes minorities, and your precious "taxpayer money" does not go toward raising the national response level to the census?

Oh yeah. REPUBLICANS. Funny how that works out.

I wish the two of you at least had the cojones to admit that your ignorant little editorial here is simply a product of your personal right-wing sensibilities, regardless of how many of your readers think it's just swell.

But then, Rush and Hannity and their 1000 right-wing clones have been pretty good to the ownership class in Radio... which I suspect is more of the target demographic for you fellas, than I am.

The politics don't matter. Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal, it is just counterproductive to inject politics into a major sports event. Stupid move for CBS. Stupid move for the White House. Both were hurt more than helped by this stunt.
Bill Clinton was smarter than that. He would not have done it.
Jack Messmer
Executive Editor
RBR-TVBR

Sadly, I think Dave Ross (a Bigtime Network Radio Commentator) disagrees with you.

Moments ago, I heard today's little commentary. Dave proposed that with all the eyes and ears on the multimillion-dollar spots on the Super Bowl, THAT'S where the Administration should have "sold" the idea of a job-enhancing stimulus package.

Note: not just an interview, hours before the sports event for which the day is known, but an AD for the Administration's policy, smack in the middle of Butch and Rick's 75th brewski, while the damned game is on!

You think they were pissed-off at what happened on such a sacred day, ordained by The Lord Himself, to be "politics-free"? Boy, the invective that would have flown from those barstools would have made the teabaggers look like the frickin' National Conference Of Christians And Jews!

And again, I simply have to call *Profound* BS at your alleged disdain for what you claim to be the "politics". Which, if I am to understand your premise, violated every sacred canon of American Sports, by virtue of the fact that the President had the bad taste to speak on TV; technically, on the same day as a series of violent Doritos comercials, and a spot for Folger's depicting a sexual threesome in front of a child.

I'm terribly sorry, Jack, but somehow, I just don't think Bush would have knotted your panties like this. And I doubt the lesser amount of time he might have spent on camera attempting to construct a sentence would have been the real reason (as you have actually suggested) that you would have found Bush's actions more appropriate than Obama's.

I have no problem with the Census Bureau buying an ad in the Super Bowl. That's a pretty efficient ad buy. But man, they sure should have spent some money on better creative!
Jack Messmer
Executive Editor
RBR-TVBR

Um, dude? "Creative"?

That was only the director and ensemble cast of most Christopher Guest "mockumentaries". I'm sorry "Spinal Tap", "Waiting For Guffman" and "A Mighty Wind" aren't "creative" heavies, in your view (?)