The Art Of Campaigning
June 6, 2008
Berkeley, California
With Hillary all but out of the running, I figured it was time for Scooter and me to support future President Barack Obama in some meaningful way. We met at my place for bong hits and brainstorming.
After several hours we were unable to think of a way we might help the Obama campaign, but had knocked off a plate of brownies, two cans of Cheez Whiz, and a whole pound of bacon. Finally, after discussing the fact we had seen no posters for the Obama campaign locally, we decided to use our gifts (Scooter's formal art training and my flair with words) to create a poster campaign for our neighborhood. While enjoying an incredibly moist Sara Lee bundt cake, we got to work.
Since Barack already has this whole "change" theme going on, we decided to work off that. Drawing upon W's only successful ad lib of his administration where he responded to someone's cry at the World Trade Center disaster that they couldn't hear him, I crafted the tag line "Change? - I hear you" for our poster. It was simple, direct, and worked perfectly with the idea Hussein was going to change something. Unfortunately I had to travel to Oregon for my niece's graduation, but left Scooter instructions on where to place the posters once he completed them.
Upon arriving back home, I was shocked to find my front yard full of Afro-American protesters being led by Al Sharpton himself! I was hardly out of my car before I was surrounded by reporters and camera crews yelling questions, and angry black people calling me the most hateful names. Only when someone thrust something into my face did I realize what was going on. After much pushing and shoving, I managed to get into my house and frantically called Scooter, only to get his answering machine with a message saying, "I've moved to China, please contact Peace Moonbeam if this call has anything to do with posters."
For the next three hours I sat on my couch staring in disbelief at the poster and fantasizing about killing Scooter or least his idiot art teacher, while the cacophony of angry shouts and chants grew louder outside.
Postscript to this story: I have since spoken to Scooter and he swears his rendition of Obama is simply a flawed best effort, and is in no way meant to portray the candidate in an unfavorable light.
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