Branding ‘Retro Romney’
The idea that Romney would identify with or be sympathetic to the hard-drinking, philandering characters from Mad Men ought to be ludicrous to anyone who’s ever watched the show and who knows much of anything about Romney — whose private life is exemplary and who doesn’t even drink coffee, for goodness’ sake. But that’s irrelevant to the Obama campaign’s aim, which is to focus on Romney’s undeniable well-groomed and sleek good looks (and vague superficial physical resemblance to protagonist Don Draper), and thereby tie Romney to unsavory figures and policies from a bygone era. Their goal is to brand him as a hopelessly out-of-date character who couldn’t possibly understand American life in 2012 and is stuck in a time warp of the mind as well as a stylistic one.
Note that word “branding.” It is highly appropriate, and not only because the setting of the show Mad Men is an advertising agency. Got an opponent who’s almost impossibly telegenic, along with his entire family, and seems competent in a Father Knows Best way? Just rebrand him as negative, and hope that voters will buy what you’re selling instead.
But pushing the Mad Men/Romney comparison and the image of the out-of-date Retro Romney might not be such a winner for the Obama campaign after all. The show is tremendously popular and has given a great many people a wistful desire to go back — if only for a moment — to a time when men were men and women were women and we all got to smoke cigarettes inside buildings and wear those great (albeit restrictive) fashions.
And it’s not just among the boomer generation that Mad Men mania has taken hold. Perhaps most surprisingly, many young people have become fans, experiencing a love-hate relationship with its characters and a fascination for what must seem to them to be an exotic and drastically different time. Apparently it’s not necessary to have lived though an era — or to admire it — to feel some sort of nostalgia for it. If pushed, this Romney=Don Draper meme might even end up having the paradoxical and unintended effect of making the quintessentially “square” (to use a Fifties term) Mitt Romney seem kind of cool.
But the approach could backfire in deeper ways, too. Obama’s attempt to link Romney to the negatives of the Mad Men years runs the risk not only of upping Romney’s coolness quotient, but of having people connect him with the era’s positive aspects instead: stability, prosperity, optimism. These are qualities that have been sorely lacking in the years since the recession began, except for a brief surge of optimism at the very beginning of Obama’s presidency. Who wouldn’t be happy to elect someone who might help to restore some of these things? Nostalgia isn’t just for hairdos and fashion.
None other than Don Draper knew that, too. In one of the most well-known episodes of Mad Men Draper pitches an ad campaign for the Kodak Carousel and talks about nostalgia, which is the driving force of the invention. “It takes us to a place where we ache to go again,” Draper muses as he operates the slide projector and shows photos of his own family in happier days to the assembled group of ad men. Obama would do well to respect that ache, rather than risk invoking it.
As an aging boomer I will gladly indulge my false nostalgia by voting for someone with the acumen of the Mad Men. That someone is NOT Obama. I want grownups in charge again.
And what replaced the Mad Men era? Unwashed hippies, loud protests, college take overs, (seem familiar?) bombings and assassinations. No thank you.
Well, if Romney wants to “turn the clock back” to Mad Men, I’d rather have that than have Obama turn the clock back to the Russian Revolution.
We’ve already had as president one of the last grownups of Don Draper’s era. Does the name Ronald Reagan sound familiar?
Speaking of, “turning over rocks,” how about we turn over a few on 0? Oh, yeah, I forgot, our man about “transparency” issued an Executive Order on 1/21/2009 which sealed ALL of his records forever… Yeah, that set of rocks
White shirts, thin ties, Jazz, movies with actual fine acting, strong in the world and secure at home. Good times.
Yes, instead I will vote for unwashed people “occupying” the parks I pay for, and my POTUS bowing and scraping before the barbarian warlords of third-world nations, yep.
Yep.
Uh huh.
/something here about my head exploding
>>White shirts, thin ties, Jazz, movies with actual fine acting, strong in the world and secure at home. Good times.
If Romney were to adopt a jazz tune as his campaign song and go mad Don Draper in his styling and presentation (that means no Greek columns), it’d be awesome and Obama would be mute with regret.
When Axelrod made that quip, he simultaneously made Romney seem more cool by implying he watched Mad Men (although I’d be surprised if he did) and dissed the series itself. Mad Men is pretty far from a dull news program- of any decade. It would have made more sense if he said Romney thought he was watching an episode of Modern Family.
An Abbreviated Round-Up of Gross Incivility in Obamaland
We all want to be civil, right?
Just last year, with the deepest sincerity, our president implored Americans to engage in more civil discourse, to be more tolerant of disparate opinions and less confrontational, to “sharpen our instincts for empathy,” and to search our souls for answers to America’s disunity following the shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords.
Either many of Barack Hussein Obama’s rabid supporters didn’t get that civility memo or they interpreted it as a veiled call to arms since they immediately ratcheted up their uncivil, vile, mean-spirited invective after the president’s Tucson speech in total disregard of his heart-felt appeal.
Almost three years later, with a national election looming, Obama’s armies have taken to even more reprehensible rhetoric and, to supplement their words, have launched an unprecedented wave of deadly violence.
Cynics like Robin Leach foolishly think the president of the United States craves that gross incivility and mindless violence serve as tools to create civil unrest and a possible race war to help pave his way to a second term. He may be right.
A few selected instances reflecting the ratcheting but precious little soul-searching:
. A tourist in Baltimore was assaulted by a black man and, adding severe insult to his injuries, he was beaten, robbed, and stripped naked on a public street by a crowd of blacks who later boasted about the crime they had committed.
. Former world heavyweight boxing champion and disgraced, convicted felon Mike Tyson weighed in on the Trayvon Martin affair by opining that “It’s a disgrace that man [George Zimmerman] hasn’t been shot yet. Forget about him being arrested–the fact that he hasn’t been shot yet is a disgrace.”
. Obama buddy, black Harvard Professor Charles Ogletree, suggested on Al Sharpton’s National Network Convention that whites would be given preference had a black killed a white man instead of the half-hispanic Zimmerman killing Trayvon Martin. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=21516.)
I watch the way Mitt looks at his wife. Yes, it’s the 50′s look. He adores her. Can you imagine what he has gone through worrying about her and all the health problems she has and is still going through?
I bet most of the women would love to have a man who cares so much for them.
Sorry my coment went before I finished. Oh well, since I can’t see it yet, I’ll wait to finish.
TEAM ROMNEY – GAME ON! Many were concerned that if Romney were nominated, that the Seamus-on-cartop meme would bite him in the asset. I am thrilled to see that between Ann Romney’s Nuclear Response to “Rosengate” and the plethora of tweets, t-shirts,buttons related to #ObamaDogRecipes, Team Romney seems to have the “fire in the belly” to defeat the Once.
Expect a big load more of diaper diplomacy and over the limits insults as the presidential campaign heats up. In politics, the insults are test runs for future advertising appeal. The policy is known as “throw cr*p against the wall and see if it sticks.” Then, no matter how vile or ignorant the remark, the remark is considered sucessful if it becomes part of the narrative. This is how the real issues are dodged, real leadership is voided, hate is fomented, and the mob rules. American democratic elections can easily turn to blood sports. Calling for civility rates as a voice in the wilderness.
To liberals like Maureen Dowd, a young man (like Mitt Romney) who went quietly about getting an education, starting a career, and marrying and starting a family, is a “throwback” (her word). She thinks the counterculture is the real America now:
“When the Romneys got married and moved to Boston in 1971 so Mitt could attend Harvard, they set up house in a suburb, befriended other young Mormon couples and kept to their cloistered, conservative, privileged, traditional, white, heterosexual circle.
“Campuses were roiling with change — feminism, civil rights, antiwar demonstrations — but the Romneys were not part of that. They were throwbacks.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/opinion/dowd-phony-mommy-wars.html?_r=1&ref=maureendowd
Notice the inversion here: Mainstream culture is a “throwback”. Feminism, homosexuality, pacifism–that’s America today!
Well, at least she lays it on the line. Unlike Dems such as Obama.
Dowd is a sad joke. Nothing she writes is ever serious at all.
Great observation.
Dowd’s just pissed because she can’t get laid, even in Manhattan with an NYT byline.
Sure, Mitt Romney’s square. I’m fine with that. We’ve had nearly 4 years with the hipster-doofus-in-chief. Hasn’t worked out- in fact, it’s been ‘an unmitigated disaster’. Let’s put a real American Man back in the White House.
“Dowd’s just pissed because she can’t get laid, even in Manhattan with an NYT byline.”
It wouldn’t be too surprising if “getting laid” (or at least leveraging her “feminine wiles” [i.e., the suggestion of potentially doling out future lays]) wasn’t how Ms. Dowd secured that NYT byline in the first place — and, thus, became the Times’ resident shiksa. After all, Ms. Dowd’s pop culture-obsessed airhead schtick always seemed a strained fit for a publication that likes to think of itself as the torchbearer of the highbrow (or supposedly highbrow), intellectoid Manhattan smart set.
Accordingly, as the indignities of time and gravity began to chip away at Ms. Dowd’s ability to cloud men’s minds with her feminine charms (no matter how ageless she appears in her 20 year-old Times photo), she was forced to sink or swim on the merits of her intellect and writing.
And that’s when she became bitter and turned to penning mantras for her fellow deep-middle-aged, feminist “single girls.”
“Campuses were roiling with change”
You forgot drugs, drinking and sex. How did that work out for all of you?
Just take a look at the debacle of the secret service agents. Just who would you like to be looking out for your welfare a straight arrow, no nonsense man like Gov Romney or someone like obama who lets communists into the white house, associates with terrorists and lets his DOJ run loose without prosecuting gangs who threaten white people?
“The Retro Romney theme was also interjected into an Obama fundraising message that stated that Romney has “a social agenda from the 1950s.” ”
Bingo. During the last election I observed that the Democrats were trying to solve the problems of the 50s all over again. They always will accuse others of doing exactly what they are doing.
Um, have these political fashionistas noticed that “retro” is what’s hip now? That people are filling their houses with mid-century modern furniture, or else repurposed industrial ware? That young men are sporting effin’ fedoras?
Isn’t it funny that a man puts his nose to the grindstone, studies, gets superior grades, doesn’t do drugs, faithful to his wife, and he has to be criticized because he didn’t do drugs, didn’t associate with terrorists, didn’t participate in wild parties and learned how to run businesses and make money.
Remember back during the Democratic primary debates in 2008 when, at one debate, the candidates were asked about what drugs they did in their younger days? Most of the candidates proudly boasted of their past “mind expanding” drug use (maybe that’s Joe Biden’s problem) as the badge of honor drug use has become amongst the affluent, new ruling class liberal elite.
Each candidate was treated to raucous applause for saying things like, “Did I do drugs? … You bet I did!” … or, “I smoked weed … and I actually inhaled!”
But then it came time for Joe Lieberman to answer the question. Knowing his audience, Lieberman apologized, sheepishly saying (paraphrasing): “I know it won’t make me popular with this crowd, but I’ve never done drugs.”
It’s telling that Lieberman, a man who was heavily involved in the 1960s Civil Rights movement and who went to the South to march as a Yale undergrad, understood so deeply how much his lack of 60s “street cred” hurt him with the Democratic base (his Civil Rights involvement notwithstanding) that he appeared all but defeated when he admitted to never having done drugs.
There’s no room for Eagle Scout types in today’s Democratic party. Election year pandering to the fixed-income elderly aside, the modern Democratic party is the party of the Days of Rage and Woodstock (and their cultural offspring).
It’s the party of affluent Baby Boomers who cling to the glory days of the 60s, and the party of trendy young people (e.g., the Boomers’ hipster progeny).
That alone doesn’t make Democrats right or wrong on any particular issue. But it tells you a lot about who they are and where their values come from.
The Fifties: Let’s see–illegitimaticy rate of 6 %. Middle class values were paramount and toxic Leftism was underground. The American dream was widely believed in. The Black family was largely intact. The economy was growing by leaps and bounds and optimism was in the air. The US was the dominant power in the world. Crime rates were low and crimininality was considered, well, a crime. Taxes were low and proposerity was in everyone’s grasp or, at least, vision. Geez, what a miserable time. PS “common knowledge” about the era like Betty Friedan’s “The Feminine Mystique” and Carson’s “The Silent Spring” are just a bunch of lies.
Oh yes, to have an All-American competent, solid businessman with a charming well spoken wife in the White House next year, what bliss ! And please Mr Axelrod, continue to Draperize Mitt Romney, it will help him reach this goal. There is a huge nostalgia for the fifties in the west, and to have a Don Draper lookalike minus the vices in the White House, that will surely be great ! The Romneys can bring back good feelings, revive the respect for the country.
Romney is showing he’s not just going to roll over an play dead for Obama.
We love Don Draper and forgive his sins. I’m a Nobody But Palin guy, yet I’m warming up to Mitt, who seems to be hip where it counts. And, thanks to Rosen, I’ve becume very fond of Ann. The Marxists are desperate and it shows.
Now you are really talking about upsetting the apple cart! How wonderful.
Leftest have worked long (60 years) and hard to convince the American public that the hippie/beatnik/progressive culture is the only one that is ‘cool’. The only way to be with it and cool was to have a ‘colorful’ past. For those of you old enough (and if you watch Mad Man really closely) you will see when and how the switch occurred. Being mature and taking responsibilities seriously was SO uncool. The idea of doing anything as ‘grown-up’ person would or heaven forbid your parents was beaten down to the point we have children in charge of everything. Lord of the Flies. Like Peter Pan, growing up was no longer a goal, being cool was.
As for President Obama he was taught from the time he was knee high to hate all the Don Draper type men. Clean cut men in suits, boy scout types (whether they cheated on their wives and drank martinis is beside the point) were to be overthrown as the ‘establishment’. He was surrounded by people that felt just like he did and no one else. The very idea that the majority of Americans might not feel the same way would be shocking to him. Which is why you see he and his team keep ‘throwing stuff up against the wall to see what sticks’. They don’t really understand, and wouldn’t believe if you told them.
A good ad man, like the Don Draper character, knows that deep down the majority of any society is majority bourgeois not bohemian. We may have a boomer generation that tried to all be bohemian to one extent or another; but it is over. We’re tired, our children are tired, and we want some grown-ups back in charge to run things. We’ve had our little experiment; time to get back to work. Besides that bohemian lifestyle and being avant-guard is no fun unless you are rebelling against something traditional. It is no fun when you are in charge. Then you have to face the fact there is no Utopia and your ideas were just gripes. Think I’m joking. Ask yourself why with all the leftest in charge of everything from education, the churches even up to and including the White House they are still ‘raging against the machine’ still speaking as if they are the underdog; still rebelling. They are in charge of everything including the PR, movies, news; why are they still raging mad? This is what they know how to do. They know how to rage. They know how to complain. They don’t know how to build from scratch what they want, not even with the framework and money given to them. They can’t even maintain it.
I guess that’s enough. Give me a man (or woman) in a suit who knows how to organize things and thinks whiners are babies. I’ll take it.
um, let’s see: things worked. people had jobs. nobody was worried about the speech police. people found ways to indulge their appetites without upsetting the applecart.veterans ( roger sterling) get to be debonair, witty and honest, instead of jacked-up on PTSD. Old men have interesting lives ( bert cooper) Don Draper is fascinating as he works, rather than fascinating after hours.
sh-yeah, what’s not to love? adored by husbands, focussed on the kids, not worried about transfats? able to ride bikes all over town?
Given the turbulence of the times, people might instinctively flock to a “Father Knows Best” kind of candidate. When people are scared they seek safety. Obama is playing to Romney’s strengths.
All these people go on and on and on.
Bottom line: we needed a Constitutional Conservative to defeat Obama. We don’t have one. Obama wins. Get over it and start planning to get rid of House/Senate leadership so we can stop Obama’s program, by funding, Congressional investigations, etc.
If we need to we can impeach and convict Obama and get rid of him once and for all. As for the election, I’m not seeing it for Romney, Obama has to win so few states to win and most are a solid lock for fraud, I mean, victory.
So “we can impeach and convict Obama and get rid of him once and for all.”
MJS, meet President Joseph Biden.
—
The problem lies in the electorate that voted Obama in. If they repeat that ignominious feat this coming November, there’s very little, including impeaching The One, that will alter the trajectory the U.S.A. is now on.
R.I.P., U.S.A.
I would take Joe Biden in a heartbeat to finish out Barack Obama’s term. He’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he has no malicious hatred for America like the President does. The real danger to America is going to come when Obama realizes that he is going to lose the election. At that point he will be consumed with his hatred of America and have a dangerous amount of power at his disposal. This may be a terrifying fall and winter.
Nice take on the DNC machine’s frantic search for something to hang on Romney. So far its been comical. This looks like desperation to me.
– Mitt, Team Obama, and his team will hit back immediately. Also, they will have raised more than a billion to spend, more now than Obama raised in 2008.
hey please spread the truth about 9/11 inside job far and wide . war on terror is big lie