Wednesday, October 25, 2006

The crazy on this one goes to 11

In response to the Michael J Fox ad where he talks to the voters of Missouri about the importance of stem cell research for finding cures for many diseases, a group opposed to such research have put out a new ad. Apparently they're recruiting religious folks with some connection (sometimes) to Missouri to explain why it's a bad idea. And focus on the fact that science can't promise you a solution quickly. Yes, that's exactly the point, if it's going to take years to solve the problem, not acting today will not hasten the solution. It's not like God has sent a memo to the scientists promising them a cure in X years, and if we just wait till then we can save all this money on research. To say nothing of the fact that I cannot fathom an honest reason why any of these people care about this issue. Fox, suffers from Parkinsons. This seems to me a person invested. Why does Kurt Warner care? Oh right because he's incredibly religious and we're supposed to believe that somehow these embryos which are not life now, are being killed because they're being prevented from sitting around and not being life later. To me it's so painfully Ludditic that it makes me wonder whether or not the Amish look down upon them. Do you figure they say, "Man, I fear zippers, but Holy Shit Ephraim, that guy is the intellectual heir to Lucy."

And is it me or does it look like Kurt Warner is being interviewed in either a church basement turned comedy club, or a mimimum security prison. Really, you make an ad with all these "celebrities" and choose to film it in front of a background that makes the Westerville North AV Club Greatest Hits look like Crouching Tiger? That's certainly a strange choice.

Another thought, why on earth do I care what Patricia Heaton thinks. Newsflash, just because You Loved Raymond doesn't mean I care. First the notion that anyone, let alone everyone loved him is faulty. So let's not pretend you get to speak for, or in any way share a single opinion held in common by "everyone." Okay.

Mike Sweeney weighs in on this. I'm sorry if you don't have the requiste sense to quit any sport that forces you to play for the Kansas City Royals, then you have lost my respect. If you don't immediately start honing your bocce ball skills, and searching out strange Guinness records that you can achieve the very moment you are assigned to play for that team, you are definitionally lacking the basic sense to make let alone share anything resembling an informed judgement. You have to imagine that continuing to play for the Royals may well be one of the diseases for which stem-cell research promises a cure. Come on Mike, you're shooting yourself in the foot here. Also, and I realize this is, as so much of this rant is, largelry unrelated to the ad...but seriously, how are you going to be a DH and only hit 8 home runs. I'm taking political advice from a religious zealot batting .258 with 8 home runs. Has anyone contacted Sid Bream to see what he thinks?

Finally and most skull crushingly, neuron-assailingly, viewer-as-dog-with head-tilted-and-a-blank-expression-inducingly there is Jim Caveziel. I don't know of anything that Jim Caviezel has done apart from star as Jesus for Mel Gibson's flog-a-thon. And I'm sure for the target audience he's a good fit. "Hey, if Jesus is against this, then it's gotta be bad." Fair enough. But the ad starts with Caveziel speaking to the viewer in Aramaic. Are you fucking kidding me? Is there some huge enclave of long suffering speakers of Aramaic tucked into the Ozarks?

Is this some new faddish term created by Frank Luntz. Is this like Soccer Moms, and NASCAR Dads? Aramaic Advocates. Is this really a voting bloc that's not motivated. And if so, is there really any question of how they're voting? My head hurts just contemplating the moronic ideas that were rejected so that this little gem of idiocy could live out its life. I only wish that this idea might have been sacrificed to science instead of growing up to be what I can only, and too generously describe as full-on nuts.

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