Sarah Silverman, Israeli Production Team, Go To Bat For Obama
Barack Obama is getting an assist among Jewish voters from two different short films that couldn't be more disparate in message or nature.
On Wednesday, Sarah Silverman, wielding a restrained but still sharp tongue, launched "the Great Schlep," a video designed to persuade Jewish youth to visit their grandparents in Florida and persuade them to vote for Obama.
"If Barack Obama doesn't become the next president of the United States," she begins, "I'm going to blame the Jews."
The Great Schlep from The Great Schlep on Vimeo.
As Silverman was resorting to shame and sarcasm as a GOTV tool, an Israeli production team went after Jewish voters by addressing substantive issues. Titled "Israelis for Obama," the video they launched features prominent and regular figures from the Middle Eastern country praising the Senator as a friend of Israel and directly addressing the smears launched at his candidacy.
"I think all the attempts to try and frame him as some kind of threat to Jewish people and the people of Israel are driven just by fear," Itai Afghel, a senior correspondent for FACT -- Israel's 60 Minutes -- tells the camera, referencing rumors that Obama is a Muslim.
"Israel does not need another George Bush," says Amos Schocken, publisher of the paper Ha'aretz. "I don't think there is any doubt about this."
While the two shorts couldn't be more different in nature, the audience they are targeting seems to be much the same: elderly Jewish voters who may be on the fence about backing Obama.
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First Posted: 09-25-08 11:14 AM | Updated: 10-26-08 05:12 AM