Althouse: "Betcha I can swing my gun around my finger 3 times like a cowboy," says the cop in the worst ad.

September 10, 2013

"Betcha I can swing my gun around my finger 3 times like a cowboy," says the cop in the worst ad.

From a French horse-racing bookmaker (via Bloggingheads):

22 comments:

TMink said...: Wow. That was really offensive and left me angry.

Trey; 9/10/13, 10:59 AM
Ann Althouse said...: 50 years... and it's still too soon.; 9/10/13, 11:11 AM
kjbe said...: Wow, they really went there.; 9/10/13, 11:22 AM
RecChief said...: so I clicked on the video, and when it was over, clicked on a couple of videos that Youtube feels goes along with the one I just watched.

What is with all these 'shape shifter reptilian' videos? do people actually believe that there are reptilian humanoids among us (who jsut happen to work in the media)? That level of tinfoil hat addiction is hard to believe.; 9/10/13, 11:24 AM
Darrell said...: They should have shown François Hollande surrendering. That never gets old.; 9/10/13, 11:27 AM
Lucien said...: That "magic bullet" theory is still controversial, huh?; 9/10/13, 11:30 AM
YoungHegelian said...: Our European betters are always so much more tasteful than we philistines.

PS: The ad relates to betting, uhhm, how?; 9/10/13, 11:34 AM
John henry said...: As an ad I didn't think much of it. What is it trying to sell me?

It did make me laugh out loud, though.

Ann said "Too soon" and I agree with that, too.

I think they should have waited til the beginning of November.

John Henry; 9/10/13, 11:43 AM
madAsHell said...: I don't understand why a French bookie is advertising with an event from American history....and in English.

I don't like the stupid cowboy premise either.; 9/10/13, 11:54 AM
Wince said...: I would imagine many French, particularly of the older generation, find this ad in incredibly bad taste.

In 1961, the Kennedy's made a very popular visit to France. Jacqueline was in her element as she could speak French and her sense of fashion and charm (especially her pillbox hats) endeared her to the French public and the French leader Charles de Gaulle. At the end of his visit, John F. Kennedy wryly remarked:

"I do not think it altogether inappropriate to introduce myself to this audience. I am the man who accompanied Jacqueline Kennedy to Paris, and I have enjoyed it."

Jacqueline had stolen the show, but, the visit was definitely helpful for the overall image of the Kennedy presidency.; 9/10/13, 11:56 AM
Michael K said...: I'm still laughing.; 9/10/13, 12:08 PM
MadisonMan said...: What are they selling?

Baffled.; 9/10/13, 1:00 PM
m stone said...: Definitely in egregious taste.

Yet, one enduring theory of who actually fired the "kill" shot in Dallas was a secret service agent who misfired.

Hickey; 9/10/13, 1:01 PM
southcentralpa said...: It's sort of like "Jackass: The Movie". No socially redeeming qualities whatsoever, but it made me laugh.

Problem with saying "it's too soon" is then everyone starts trying to protect their sacred cows. ("Oh, you can't have Mohammed cartoons! They're ... insensitive!" "You can't mock this and only this President. It's raaaaacist!") The freedom to make crap like this is also the freedom that protects David Chapelle's "Blind Prejudice" or the mock-documentary "CSA: The Confederate States of America"

Don't like the ad, write a letter. Bet with another company. FIDO.; 9/10/13, 4:47 PM
Paul said...: That was stupid. Who could have commissioned such a video not knowing or respecting what happened that day.; 9/10/13, 4:59 PM
The Godfather said...: Until those of us who were adults (I was 20) when JFK was murdered it will be too soon until we're dead. Even for those of us who didn't like him then, and have learned more reasons since to dislike him, it will be too soon. He was our president and the SOB killed him. It will never be a joke to me.; 9/10/13, 5:15 PM
jeff said...: Southcentralpa. Where do you see anyone demanding government censorship?; 9/10/13, 8:43 PM
Tibore said...: "m stone said...

Yet, one enduring theory of who actually fired the "kill" shot in Dallas was a secret service agent who misfired."

Not as cracked as the numbnut who tried to tell a bunch of us that the limo driver shot Kennedy. Nuts is nuts, and that jackass was a damn Planter's factory.; 9/10/13, 9:43 PM
buck smith said...: The ad is tacky, but it surprised me so much that I laughed out loud. The US has had four presidents assassinated and we keep having elections every two years. That shows something about the US. The idea that the generation that experienced JFK killing is victimized by history is silly and not flattering to those feel it.; 9/11/13, 8:24 AM
Mitch H. said...: What are they selling?

Degenerate gambling addiction?

I dunno, I thought it was funny. I wonder how many French viscerally react to disrespectful reference to de Gaulle's many, many close scrapes with assassination. Do French Boomers get as shirty about it as their American peers?; 9/11/13, 10:44 AM
southcentralpa said...: Jeff, Well, Dearborn for one ...

But seriously, name major publications in this country that printed the Mohammed cartoons. It is self-censorship backed up by cowardice masquerading as moral self-preening that is arguably worse than gov't censorship (and could open the door ("well, nobody does it anyway so what does it matter if we ban it").

You can't (well, yes you can but you ought not) to block unpopular stuff or stuff that simply makes you uncomfortable.; 9/11/13, 6:08 PM
Indigo Red said...: A joke I remember from that time went like this:

"Who fired the last three bullets into JFK?

300 CIA sharpshooters!"; 9/12/13, 12:46 AM