War Is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength

"It's never been easier to save money, using your Bank of America Debit Card" we are told.

And here's a guy buying a cup of coffee at a Not-Starbucks, swiping his BOA Debit Card. "Every time you buy something with your card, we round up to the nearest dollar and automatically deposit the difference into your savings account."

Yep- so the more you spend with your Bank of America Debit Card, the more money you'll have. And while we are at it- the more fuel you add to the fire, the colder you'll get. The more you eat, the hungrier you'll get. And so on.

I keep waiting for the Queen of Hearts to show up, or even better, the Mad Hatter. Maybe Bank of America is planning a tie-in with Alice in Wonderland, coming to theatres in 2010. This Spend your way to Savings campaign would make a great topic for a conversation between Alice and the Hatter, wouldn't it?

Hatter: "The tea costs a shilling per cup."
Alice: "I haven't any money."
Hatter: "Why then, you must spend some. When you spend money, then you'll have money."
Alice: "How absurd! How can I spend what I don't have?"
Hatter: "Excuse me, I wasn't listening. My watch has stopped-there is too much butter in the works, and we must put the Dormouse into the pot."

Thanks for the free trip through the Looking-Glass, Bank of America. Now how about taking some of that bailout money we gave you and using it to lower your interest rates?

Audi One-Ups Cadillac's Sibling Rivalry Ad- Why Stop with the Immediate Family?

A guy stands on the lawn of his house, situated in some upscale suburban enclave where terms "Unemployment" and "Belt-Tightening" are clearly never mentioned aloud. As he looks around, he sees that all his neighbors are busy lugging their Christmas lights out of attics and two-car garages.

"Going to put some lights up?" he's asked by a male neighbor who is doing a pretty good imitation of Chevy Chase in Christmas Vacation, festooned as he is with what looks to be about five miles of electrical cord and colorful lights. "Gets pretty competitive."

Yep- gets pretty competitive. So if there's anyone in this neighborhood who is worried about getting laid off in the coming weeks or months, or has watched his 401(k) tank and dreams of retirement fade, or has seen his health insurance premiums double because his kid has been diagnosed with juvenile arthritis, he'd better just suck it up and drive the family Suburban to the nearest Home Depot to stock up on plastic things that plug into walls. Because it's all about showing well for the neighbors around here, buddy.

(Oh, and God Fucking Forbid Guy on Lawn just might be-- gasp!--JEWISH!)

Guy on Lawn gives this a few seconds of thought, then allows himself a slight grin.

That night- everyone in the neighborhood is standing around staring at everyone else's ostentatious light display when the garage doors open at Guy Formerly on Lawn's house. Two 2010-model black Audis emerge, headlights blazing and engines purring. Sure enough, the entire fricking neighborhood gravitates to the driveway of Guy on Lawn, to stare lovingly at his $100,000 car collection.

Come on- how sick is this? It's bad enough that putting up Christmas lights- once an innocent celebration of the season- is being portrayed as some kind of contest, an opportunity to show up your neighbors (which one takes the season more seriously? Well, which one has the largest plastic reindeer and is burning up the most Wattage? Which one is making the meter spin fastest?) Now Audi ramps up the Hate quotient by suggesting that all your neighbors really want to see is who is most willing to spit in the face of the recession by spending them most on flashy cars. Just flip on those lights, and they'll gather like moths around a candle, because it's not about the celebration of a Holy Day, it's not even about enjoying pretty blinking lights and plastic santas. It's about Stuff. Lots and lots of Stuff. Expensive, Showy Stuff.

Well, Merry Fucking Christmas, Audi. Your attitude sucks. Your philosophy sucks. Your insensitivity toward the real suffering and anxiety millions of Americans are feeling about the future this holiday season sucks. And this commercial really, really sucks.

Hubby is the Easily-Manipulated Dunce of the Family, Take 5,679

Wife hands her husband a list- "Oh, not the MALL!" he growns.

Wife offers a deal- "Ok, I'll do the shopping, you do the shipping."

Husband: "Shipping is a pain!" He grabs the shopping list and skips off to the car to hit the mall, thinking he's taken the easy task and plenty happy about it.

US Postal Worker comes up the walk with a package and reveals that while he's prohibited by federal law to open packages, he's perfectly free and willing to eavesdrop on private conversations: "You know, shipping is easy with the US Postal Service. We have boxes with one flat fee- if it fits, its ships."

"I know" smiles wife.

Groan. Of course you know. Just like you know that you married a dumbass you can con into doing the hard part of every chore imaginable. Because the guy you married

A) Doesn't watch television, so he has never seen any of these "If it fits, it ships" commercials.

B) Actually believes that shipping is such a "hassle" that he'd rather drive to the Mall, circle for twenty minutes looking for a parking space, go from store to store getting the items on the list, standing in one line after another with said items, cart everything back to the car (once he's found it) and haul it back to the old homestead- where it will need to be unloaded, of course- than address a bunch of boxes and carry them to the Post Office. Because shipping is a "hassle."

C) Is so predictable that it takes absolutely zero effort to manipulate him into doing what you want him to do,

D) won't remember until he's halfway to the Mall that if he had chosen "shipping," he would have had the afternoon off and to himself, since he can hardly do any shipping until you come back with the goodies.

The bottom line isn't the US Postal Service's convenient flat rates. It's the US Postal Service's willingness to use a flat, stale, cliche'd theme to sell it's services. Wife is the Smart One in the Family, Husband is the dumbass who can be tricked into doing pretty much anything in no time- been there, done that, bought the damn t-shirt already. Merry Christmas to you too, US Postal Service.

Oh Hell, Just Stay Where you are and I'll come get you, you helpless moron!

New I-Phone Commercial:

"Let's say you are on your phone, and your friend asks 'What time's the movie?'"

"You can tell him" (we see the owner of the phone- well, his hand, anyway- check the movie times on the I-Phone. Because there's an App for that. Of course.)

"Then let's say your friend asks "Where's the theatre?"

"You can show him" (I-Phone owner's hand presses a few buttons and sends a map to the theatre to his retarded, desperately needy friend.)

"Then let's say your friend asks "Want to go for Sushi afterwards?"

At this point, one wonders why the owner of this phone would want to spend any time at all with this pathetic child. But I guess he does- because he moves his finger around his lover--errr, phone-- until he can bring up a photo of a Sushi place. "Sure" he replies.

Sigh. Where to start? First- why didn't these "friends" figure out what time the movie was when they first planned to go? Oh, right- because doing that would have eliminated an excuse to use their fucking phones later on. Second- if the unseen friend's phone can receive a map from the I-Phone, why couldn't he have used it to find the damn theatre himself? Third- why does the owner of the I-Phone have to check out a photo of the Sushi place before deciding whether he wants to go out for Sushi after the film or not? Oh, right- because just like his friend, he can't move a god damned muscle without consulting his real best friend- the one with the back-lit panel and cool Apps.

Do we think that these two guys simply stayed at home, staring like frightened children out at the big bad scary world, before Apple started marketing phones that could provide the kind of information that used to be carefully hidden away on movie posters and in newspapers? Once these two guys meet at the theatre, how will they justify continuing to consult their phones instead of talking to eachother? Will the owner of the I-Phone be able to refrain from attempting to find a photo of the concession stand during the trailers? Is there any doubt that he'll be consulting the official site of one of the films advertised before the film he's actually there to see starts? Will these two idiots sit in different parts of the theatre so they can justify texting eachother (to confirm the Sushi date, etc.) before it's over?

So many questions. So little hope.

Let's Not Meet Again

Every Christmas, I take Amtrak from Washington DC to Vermont for the Holidays- it costs a fortune to fly up there, and the weather is too iffy for driving. I enjoy Amtrak for the most part, especially now that it's possible to plug in a laptop and watch films or play games to kill the time.

Unfortunately, not everyone on the train is capable of passing the time quietly. More and more often, I find myself distracted by people who are determined to use their travel to update pretty much everyone on the planet about what is going on with every fricking detail of their "lives"- and not by texting either. But by phoning. And phoning. And phoning.

Last year on the way up I sat across and several seats down from a middle-aged woman who called four different people over the span of two hours and regaled each with the story of how This Guy at Work keeps Stabbing her in the Back with the Boss. She used almost exactly the same words in each conversation, including the phrase "that's the society we live in, I guess." She also told everyone she called about the difficulties she was having with her digestive tract infection, and how she warned her family ahead of time that she wasn't going to be eating the Christmas Dinner they had planned, but was instead restricting herself to strawberries and yogurt.

By the time she was on the fourth telling, I was at the breaking point (so was the poor woman in the seat next to her, who was fidgeting and holding her head in her hands in bored despair.) I finally yelled across to her "We've HEARD this story already, it wasn't interesting the FIRST THREE TIMES!" The Middle-Aged yakker turned around sharply and barked "I don't give a shit!" (But within a few moments, she'd put her phone away, and it didn't come out again until she departed the train in Connecticut.) I got more than a few silent "thank yous" from the other people in the car.

Why am I telling this story? Because I think I know who this woman's name is now. Her name is Jen, and she's being celebrated in this most recent Comcast Commercial. We see a very animated woman with a cell phone glued to her skull blathering on and on about pretty much anything that pops into her otherwise empty head, while the narrator tells us "Here's Jen. She can take an hour to tell a five-minute story. But that's ok, because she has Unlimited Talk and Text from Comcast..."

Jen continues to yak about half a dozen unrelated subjects before pausing to say "Wait, where was I going with that?" Narrator: "It doesn't matter where you were going with that, Jen..."

No, it doesn't matter where you were going with that, Jen. I can only hope that you aren't going up North with that next week, or if you are, you aren't taking Amtrak. Because I had more of my fair share of your witless, clueless, selfish gabfest last Holiday Season. I don't want an update on your work situation, that guy who stabs you in the back, or your digestive tract issues which require your Strawberries and Yogurt diet. I don't give a flying damn about any of that, and my guess is, neither do my fellow passengers. Just because you CAN talk nonstop, doesn't mean it's always appropriate to do so.

Just the society we live in, I guess.

Best Buy's Pathetic Singing Ad, Part I

Frantic, frazzled-looking woman sees a group of blue-clad Best Buy employees standing in rows on the sidewalk outside the store. "Great, Experts!" she exclaims. "What do I get my Husband?"

(Ok, let's stop a moment. First of all, anyone who sees a blue Best Buy Shirt and thinks "experts" is seriously detached from reality. More like "Great, Underpaid, Undereducated Proles!" or, this time of year, "Great, Seasonal Employees who signed up to earn a few extra dollars and will be handed their pink slips on or around January Second!" Also- "What do I get my Husband? Seriously? You know so little about that guy you married that you need the advice of total strangers whose job it is to pimp for a big box store concerning the right gift for him? But I digress...)

Best Buy employees chant "Flat Screen TV, Flat Screen TV.." to the tune of "Jingle Bells." "He'll stare at it frozenly..."

(Let's stop again. "Flat Screen TV" I suppose is the Fill In The Blank Present for the Male in your House. Wonder why this idiot woman couldn't think that up herself, its so obvious! And what woman doesn't want to buy her man a gift that he will "stare at frozenly?" I mean, it's just so perfect!)

Best Buy employees conclude "He's gonna have a Cow!" And- God help us- one of them actually utters, "Moo." The guy hand-picked by the Ad Agency to say "moo" I hope is super-proud of his moment on TV. I also hope that his family, friends and neighbors assault him relentlessly with it. Because I'm not very nice, I guess.

"He's gonna have a Cow?" I'm old enough to remember when Bart Simpson used to say "Don't have a Cow, Man" all the time- he dropped his original catchphrase sometime in the early-90s. It means "Don't Get Upset." So the Experts are telling this woman that if she gets her husband a Flat Screen TV, he'll be upset? Total Fail, Best Buy. Next time, double check the script to make sure the "hip" language your actors use is both contemporary and accurate.

Better yet, stop trying to make money off of the sad "Christmas is the most agonizingly stressful, budget-rendering, pain in the ass time of the year, just tell me what to buy so I can get this misery over with" theme. It's depressing.

FU, BP

These British Petroleum "Just regular folks talking about America's Energy needs" ads REALLY piss me off. We've got witless morons who seem to be actually trying to share some level of knowledge about energy, where it comes from, and how they are just so gosh-darn positive that America has it and just needs to exploit the living shit out of it, and everything will be just hunky dorky, at least for the next hundred years or so.

Easily Bought-off Everyday Joes tell us "We've got lots of energy needs, and lots of energy. We've got wind, we've got solar...."

Ok, now that the prissy solar and wind fairies have been thrown their bone, lets get down to brass tacks- "we've got Natural Gas, we've got a LOAD of Oil, and we've got it RIGHT HERE."

"We've got to get at it, we've got to use it."

"We've got the know-how, we've got the drive, we've got the technology..."

And in case you've forgotten in the last few seconds, we've got NATURAL GAS and OIL. Lots and lots of it. Just waiting to be sucked out of the ground with a straw and converted to fuel. That stuff about wind and solar? One worthless BP whore tells us that's all fine and all, but "sometimes it's not breezy, and sometimes, it's cloudy." Yeah, wind and solar are all well and good, but when it comes time to get your Land Behemouth to the mall, remember what it's really thirsty for- good old fossil fuels. Unlike the sun and the wind, it's always available- all we have to do is get at it. Sure, that means knocking down a few trees, but after all, this is all about "preserving America's lifestyle."

Natural Gas, we are told, is "twice as clean as coal." Gee, that's good to know. And how many more times cleaner than coal is wind and solar energy. Oh wait, I forgot- those are "unreliable" because "sometimes it's not breezy, and sometimes, it's cloudy." Guess that explains why the comparison is never made in any of these commercials.

I'd think the worst person in these ads is that jackass Should Not Have Been Allowed To Breed Mommy who gushes to her infant daughter "we've got a hundred years of natural gas in this country! Can you count to one hundred? One....two.....this may take a while!" Except that the guy who REALLY infuriates me is the Matter-of-Fact, This Is So Simple Just Drill the Shit out of the Planet Why Didn't We Think of This Before putrid jackass who simply shrugs his shoulders at us and says "Eureka, Baby!" as a light bulb appears above his empty skull. "Eureka, Baby?"

Can we get back to the eight-year olds rolling their eyes at us and telling us to check out CleanCoal.com for "information," already?