NRCC Darkens Ashwin Madia's Face In Ads
By Nicole Belle Thursday Oct 30, 2008 12:44pmA Republican attack ad invites viewers to "meet the real Ashwin Madia," but the still photos featured in the spot present a noticeably darker version of the 3rd District DFL congressional candidate."At least three of the photos of Madia were obviously darkened, using one method or another," public affairs and media consultant Dean Alger told KARE 11.
The NRCC's statement:
Reached by phone in Washington Wednesday, NRCC spokesman Ken Spain replayed the ad on YouTube and told KARE, "We stand by the ad."
Ashwin's Campaign's statement:
"It's just deplorable that the national Republicans have chosen to sink to this level," Rosenberg said, "I've seen negative campaigns but nothing as deplorable as, or disgusting as this advertisement."
Tell the NRCC and Eric Paulsen that you won't stand for these disgusting and dishonorable attacks by dropping Ashwin some coin here.
The Republican Party: Not Even Trying To Disguise Their Racism. I guess when you've so completely screwed up the country entrusted to you, the only thing you have left is to sell the Fear of The Other.
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I do'nt know who Vet Voice is but I can sure appreciate them
He's another big, scary Knee-grow!!!!!!
It's desperation time.
Things will get reprehensible now. The GOP is populated with a whole host of vindictive little shits.
I fully expect the following:
Someone will drop the "N" bomb...accidentally on purpose.
The invoices for the $150K clothes is going to be leaked.
Behind the scenes warfare between Palin and McCain will increase, and it will into the Sunday punditry shows.
The Southern Strategy is still in play.
I have to say that I'm quite surprised this hasn't happened to Obama himself yet.
Fox has already played that card if you remember their interview.
And a big part of the GOP base is neo-Nazi.
Check this out:
Feds Fear a Neo-Nazi Insurrection by Militia Custom Built for the Talibunny
For the heart of darkness ready to be revealed as Talibunny gears up for a fascist run in 2012.
http://www.stinque.com/2008/10/30/feds-fear-a...
NRCC Darkens Ashwin Madia's Face In Ads
http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTUyMzI...
Political parties have been darkening candidates faces for decades. It makes them look more ominous. So people can darken candidates' faces in ads now so long as the candidate isn't a minority?
I agree that the whole practice of making the opposition candidate look more ominous is bottom-feeding. But unfortunately stupid people's votes count just as much as smart people's and the stupid people get swayed by ominous looking pictures.
Not racist. Pandering, yes. But since everyone does it all the time against black and white candidates, it can't really be called racist.
That's what I'd call it.
As for it happening to Obama, I have on my desk 4 or 5, full-color,
glossy, heavy stock flyers created and mailed by either the Republican National Committee, or the Republican Federal Committee of PA.
Every photo of Obama is specifically made to put him in a "bad light," as it were. He is in shadows, and his head is awkwardly turned with a nasty look on his face. The headlines always include:
"Obama. Not Who You Think He Is."
The mailer I received today, is entitled: "America's Economy in Crisis: How Did We Get Here??" The inside theres the line I mentioned above, plus a lot of crap about "tax and spend liberals."
And, on the back, is the headline: "Obama and Liberal Democrats Plan Higher Taxes" - flanked by the same dark image of Obama and a lightened photo of Nancy Pelosi - with Neon Orange Lipstick!
Classy!....???
Republicans are awesome ha ha! Classic.
Republicans are awesome classless.
America First! Destroy the country and then make voters afraid of their fellow Americans. Wow, this definitely is not the America that I learned about on Schoolhouse Rock.
Oh man, did I just date myself?
that's it. i'm not voting for him now. where does he live again?
this is the Marine that went to war right? I think he's the same guy....i saw an interview with him...he came across fantastic. I think he could be our second minority president.
The last line from the square-jawed, bubbleheaded mimbo (Thanks, Seinfeld) was the classic gutless journalistic line "sometimes politics is dirty." Such profundity on a serious issue but, then again, media for profit leaves no room for balance, fairness or even civility. If Obama doesn't reinstate the Fairness Act, then he will have a done a serious disservice to the electorate. Fingers crossed.
My God, someone DARKENED Ashwin Madia's image! The sad thing about that is that anyone should be offended. Not Madia, he and his people should be mad as hell; it's an act of egregious racism pandering to the very worst bigotry still surviving in our country. What is sad is that anyone should care about what colour he is.
It's the same reaction from McCain when that idiot woman said she didn't like Obama because he was an 'Arab', and McCain said, no, he was a decent family man. The inference being that an Arab couldn't be a decent family man. The inference that Muslims are bad, black people are scary, Arabs aren't nice to their families.
I don't give a damn what colour Ashwin Madia's skin is. What I care about are his policies and his actions. And that is what I so hope we as a nation will someday be able to attain - when some media scumbag 'darkens' someone's image and the rest of us can look at it in bemusement and say... 'so what?'
My mother's Doctor was from Northern India. My mother required a therapist, he was from Tamil Nadu, the Southern most state of India. Complexion wise, the Doctor was pale brown, the Therapist was dark brown.
They both were courteous, friendly and very competent. I liked them.
I was taking care of my mother because her infirmity and would attend her sessions with her Doctor. She was courteous and friendly to us but not to the Therapists. She made repeated negative statements about the 'dark skinned therapist'. NOT, because of any consideration of his professional qualifications, but because of his skin tone.
I have a friend who is, as he describes himself, Jewish. We talk about the Ashkenazim, which he also describes himself as. Then we mention the Sephardic Jews of whom the first thing he says is: 'they are the darker ones'. This without once mentioning the groups difference in pronunciation of Hebrew. I don't think he speaks Hebrew. I have many Jewish friends. Southeast Michigan is a great melting pot.
Here there is a large Jewish population, the largest Arab population outside of the middle east. Yugoslav, Romanian, Hindu, Hispanic, Polish, Italian and so on and so forth.
My next door neighbors are from Grenada, there is a small community from there. She is as darkly complected as any person I have seen. He is much lighter. I am very fond of them they are my good neighbors. We talk about the Ethiopian Highlanders who are medium brown, and call the Ethiopian lowlanders 'Blacks'. My neighbor says it is a matter of 'class' and not race.
That is an interesting observation.
What everyone should do is read some modern science. The concept of race should be banished from our thinking. Because of the genome project we know now that it has no scientific meaning.
Other than the meaning we imagine because of skin complexion.
We need to get over it.
Here by R.C. Lewontin, Professor Emeritus of Zoology at Harvard University:
Over the last thirty five years a major change has taken place in our biological understanding of the concept of human “race,” largely as a consequence of an immense increase in our knowledge of human genetics. As a biological rather than a social construct, “race” has ceased to be seen as a fundamental reality characterizing the human species.…
Read the rest of the article.
The people doing this ad are attempting to exploit the ignorant.
What has always been so interesting is that white people like me have been lying in the sun trying to get darker for years. Now that we know the dangers of overexposure to the sun we slather on self-tanners. I've always been envious of people with skin darker than mine. It has never been my belief that people with a particular skin color are better than those with another, it's purely what I find attractive. Kind of like preferring brunettes over blonds. I wouldn't vote for someone because of their hair color, so I can't imagine voting for someone because of their skin color.
re:
Can it be called despicable?
Thu, 10/30/2008 - 14:20 — Amitola
(I screwed up the reply function)
They do it to McCain as well. He gets darkened all the time in videos. As did Bush and Kerry and Gore. It's a (sad) political reality. That's what they do. I wouldn't call it despicable, unless you call all LCD pandering despicable. Since about 75% of negative ads include some form of "darkening" or making the other candidate look ominous, it's a bit too much "boy who cried wolf" to call it racism.
"Ominous" was the correct word to use here. The feeling is evoked in almost every political ad using shadows and light. I'm almost tempted to explain how F-stops work in photography and how, unless they are manipulated manually, the exposure of a camera takes the average of light and adjusts for the entire scene. Ok, I just did. In other words, darker skin almost always comes out even darker on film in a non-controlled situation.
Bottom line is, WHO CARES if his skin color isn't pasty white??? I sure don't. I envy it! I think it's beautiful.
This is OTT. If he were pasty white they still would have darkened the images. OK, so I'm not as cynical as some here, but that's my two cents.
And I support Madia 100% in case anyone takes this the wrong way!
This is all the GOP has to run on. The ad is a last ditch effort to spark those disgruntled Republicans to get off their butts and vote for Paulse even though they would rather just stay home given their pathetic choices.
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