Campaign AdWatch: Freedom's Watch Follies

Here at Campaign AdWatch, we see an awful lot of politically themed ads. And most of them are just awful, which stands to reason, since the people who make effective advertising are all too busy selling us Volkswagens and Axe Body Spray and Extenze and quick ways to pay off our subprime loans by signing up with shady ponzi schemes to sell classified ads to newspapers. But among this lesser class of political advertising, you are not likely to see a spot as poorly thought through as this recent bit of gaseous whimsy from Freedom's Watch.

Here's the back story: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recently went on Larry King Live, and during their conversation, the topic of high gas prices came up. Pelosi noted the deleterious effects that Bush White House policy has had on prices at the pumps. But, during the conversation, Pelosi briefly misspoke and said that the cost of gas was "almost three times what it was when Bush took office...it was a dollar something when he took office, now it's $2.56 on average." The transcript of the interview reveals this:

LARRY KING: "I think $3.50 they're saying now."

SPEAKER PELOSI: "$3.50, oh, down six cents. It's higher where I'm from in California, sad to say."

Now, in case you are too daft to understand that "a dollar-something" multiplied by three does not really equal "$2.56 on average," the Freedom's Watch spot drives it home, repeating "$2.56 on average...$2.56 on average." It's like a scene from Wes Craven's "Third Period Home Ec Class Protractor Massacre."

Oh, but it gets better. Leaping to the defense of President Bush with all the frenzy and stupidity of a recently-clouted badger, Freedom's Watch lowers the boom on the "out of touch" Pelosi by showing the viewers the actual prices of gas, revealing that the cost is actually...much, much HIGHER than "$2.56 on average."

Uhm...burn?

Comments

[holyhandgrenaid]

05:14 PM on 05/03/2008

I just did the math, this quote from Pelosi is obviously out of context and has stuff cut from the middle of it.... $4.00-$2.56 = $1.44.......$1.44 x 3 = $4.32
in short, she most likely said the $2.56 on average was the average increase in cost, not the current cost of a gallon of gas

silly conservatives, when will you learn?

[torrrep]

04:02 AM on 05/03/2008

Nice pic Huff Post. Maybe your editors should learn how to read. The sign says $4.15/gallon. FULL SERVE. It's pretty sad that I have to explain to you that full serve ALWAYS costs nearly 50 cents more a gallon. Nice try.

[iBgood]

09:04 AM on 05/03/2008

We know. bush shot the sheriff but he didn't shoot the deputy.

[distant mirror]

07:38 PM on 05/03/2008

The Gas sign prices are the commercial. Huffpo didn't put those prices in there. The point of this article is that whoever made this commercial clearly did not know what they were doing or saying.

[ROBOT8]

03:41 AM on 05/03/2008

"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, THE TRUTH IS THE GREATEST ENEMY OF THE STATE." -- Joseph Goebbels, German Minister of Propaganda, 1933-194

[Moxo]

05:16 PM on 05/02/2008

In a few years time I'm sure that the GW Bush Library will use this 'ad' to prove that gas prices during Shrub's rule was never higher than $2.56.

[SpoxLogic]

03:04 PM on 05/02/2008

At the end they ask people to call Pelosi and remind her what the actual price og gas is now. I wonder how many of the sheep will actually realize that she was quoting a price that is acually lower. I bet you 99% won't get it. The other 1% will be too embarrassed to speak for a week...hopefully.

[BillKen]

01:00 PM on 05/02/2008

I can understand the speaker being wrong on this issue. The fact of the matter is, gas in California is rising so fast that that it's hard to keep track. The real question is, why is it that the mor?n in the WH doesn't know what gas costs? FYI, gas in SoCal has gone well beyond 4 dollars per gal. I hope every fool who voted for numnuts suffers the consequences of their stupidity. Semper FI

[progresemulo]

12:42 PM on 05/02/2008

lmao

[sawdustinhershoes]

11:50 AM on 05/02/2008

The irony will be lost on most reichwingers

[izAriver]

01:34 PM on 05/02/2008

Riechwingers? That's very clever. Mind if I use it.

[SCharb]

11:16 PM on 05/04/2008

Catchy zingers are born to be spread, my friend.

[drblack]

11:39 AM on 05/02/2008

The US would have saved 2/3 of the gas used in the last 20 years if people had been smart enough to drive 4 cyl. cars instead of SUVs.
Reagan will be remembered for stopping the switch over to alternative fuels.
Gas will never again be as cheap as it was and it is time to do the intelligent thing and get away from it.
There should be massive tax penalties for anyone buying a gas guzzler, with some exceptions for business use and a few other things. (which must be proven)
Two things I knew 100% when if Bush was elected in 2000, the USA would attack Iraq and Oil would go sky high.
Bush, Cheney are Oil guys, their families and buddies fortunes are all based on oil and weapons and ripping off poor people in developing countries.
Anyone who voted for Bush has blood on their hands, voting for Bush was like an act of terrorism on the American people and on Human Decency and Freedom.

[Jess27]

11:07 AM on 05/02/2008

So silly. I couldn't even tell you the latest gas prices, and I can guarantee I make less than most of the people on this site. The fact is I only fill up my car once every two weeks. Driving a small, fuel-efficient car and limiting the miles that I drive, allow me not to be sweating the gas prices. If you have a long commute, maybe you should re-think where you live or work. If that is not an option, use public transportation. It is not difficult to limit your gas use it you actually try.

[vippy]

02:14 PM on 05/02/2008

Relocation is not always possible. Car companies could have made cars with more
mpgs and this would not be an issue. Remember the government always mandated
the fuel standard and the car companies had to follow this. Our technology has been
so advanced that they actually have cars that get 100 mpgs but for whatever reason
are not available. Someone is keeping them off the market. Toyota RAV4 comes to mind
when Chevron bought up all their batteries.

[scottyboi84]

08:48 AM on 05/02/2008

The representatives we elect get their gas paid for by us because it is a business expense, so why would they know how much it costs to fill up. This is what outrages me. I don't think we should be paying for gas as a business expense, they should cover their own transportation costs. Then, maybe they would feel the plight of the American people who often have to choose to only fill half the tank of gas, which lasts half as long, so that they can buy more groceries to feed their families. My new car was only $32 on average to fill the tank when I first got it in November 2006, now $54 on average, which is a vast difference in such a short period of time. When $5 used to get you a quarter of a tank, now you get 1.429 gallons of gas for $5. This is just sad. But, honestly, if I was using a charge card that someone else paid for to fill my gas tank, I wouldn't pay attention to gas prices either. This will catch up with all these bastards eventually when they're out of office and then have to pay for their own gas. You're faced with a choice, gas or groceries....an impossible choice to make that we are being forced to make more and more every day...

[Powderhound522]

11:31 AM on 05/02/2008

If you had read the article, you would realize it was a slip of the tongue; she said 2.56 when she meant 3.56.

I guess your being a product of the American public school system would explain your lack of reading comprehension, but I think it's more likely the product of willful stupidity.

[mikelartist]

08:01 AM on 05/02/2008

Rabid Bush supporters are so dense that they think the congressional record isn't availble to check the facts.

The facts are there is black and white. The GOP voted in lock step with big oil, with Bush, with Cheney and his "secret energy meetings" to get where we are today. They support Bush's decision to keep building the strategic reserve, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are the largest consumers of fuel on earth after India and China. The US is 4th largest. The US military is the 3rd largest. Add to that the falling dollar and you have the EXACTLY WHAT THE REPUBLICAN VOTED FOR.

See the congressional record also for the other records the GOP set. The most time spent in filibuster in the history of congress. The lowest approval rating in history. (single digits for Republicans) The the Bush veto pen didn't come out until the Dems took over.

So the 7-1/2 march to this mess didn't happen just because the Dems took over by a slim margin last session. This is another classic example of placing the blame elsewhere.

That is weak.

[beerguy]

07:39 AM on 05/02/2008

Hey Nancy. Where's the democrat plan to lower gas prices you promised.

[Brooklynindy]

08:03 AM on 05/02/2008

Beer, tell me why gas prices need to be lower.

[rubberstamp]

09:17 AM on 05/02/2008

Its not the price of gas thats up. Its the fact that it is an import and the dollar has devalued.
divide the current price of gas by the value of the euro/dollar exchange and what do you get?
Hummm?
HINT: $2.25 sound familiar.

[Brooklynindy]

09:40 AM on 05/02/2008

Actually, Rubberstamp, with the exception of Iran, oil producers price their petroleum in dollars, not euros. So the lower dollar has nothing to do with higher oil prices. The untold - or at least, ignored - story is that we don't have a tight oil supply. Speculators are driving the price higher, because the system is structured to allow their participation. Rich people who no longer know where to put their money, since real estate tanked, and the stock market is volatile.

[TheInsomniac]

12:02 AM on 05/02/2008

She obviously misspoke. Does anyone have a phone number for these idiots?

[AMJordan]

11:32 PM on 05/01/2008

Okay, you win. It IS time to go down the hill and shoot the survivors. lol.

How are they going to spin this? "Nancy Pelosi thinks that gas prices are lower than they are under President Bush. We think she's too optimistic for America."

Actually, we don't have to go down the hill, they'll shoot themselves.