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Saturday, May 30, 2009

The Personals: Now a place where you can solicit assassinations!

A newspaper in Pennsylvania ran an ad calling for the assassination of President Obama was pulled early when it became clear what it was advertising--only after the editor received phone calls from people complaining about it. In case you're having trouble reading the above ad, it reads "May Obama follow in the footsteps of Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, & Kennedy!"

This article says of the publisher:

John Elchert of the Times-Observer in Warren also told E&P the ad -- slated to run for three days -- was stopped after appearing once Thursday. "It is unfortunate that it got past our classified people," he said. "My first call [Thursday] was to the police chief and I believe his protocol is to contact the Secret Service."
They apparently do not know who paid to run the ad.

What really bothers me about this incident is that the publisher, while having apologized, referred to it as an "oversight." Elchert further states:
The ad representative didn't make the connection among the four other presidents mentioned and mistakenly allowed the ad to run.
I'm not buying that. Even if you don't know Garfield and McKinley were assassinated, you cannot possibly miss the connection between Lincoln and Kennedy, since their assassinations are of the more infamous variety. Wouldn't this have made a "click" moment in the rep's head? Oh, and no one's lost their job over this "oversight."

I'm going to go ahead and file this under "racism," since it's quite obvious that Obama instills a certain fear, to the point where someone wishes him dead. I'm willing to bet the person that paid for this ad is white.

6 comments:

RonF said...

I'm not buying that. Even if you don't know Garfield and McKinley were assassinated, you cannot possibly miss the connection between Lincoln and Kennedy, since their assassinations are of the more infamous variety. Wouldn't this have made a "click" moment in the rep's head?I wish I could join you in this, but I work with grade school and high school kids a lot. I can well imagine that someone from the lower 50% of high school achievement could easily have failed to make that correlation - or have made the correlation of "great Presidents" instead and think that the person was actually wishing Pres. Obama well.

FilthyGrandeur said...

and i don't buy your explanation just because you work with high school kids. these people work for a newspaper, and thus (i would hope) have an education. it's the newspaper staff's fault for allowing this to go to print.

KatinPhilly said...

Bullshit, RonF. My 7th graders would have seen right through this.

Jesus Christ on a cracker, I just realized this ad was printed in a newspaper in my home state, where an all white jury recently acquitted some good boys from good homes (snark) for a murderous hate crime against a Latino man. And I STILL have people who argue with me that racism, if it exists at all, is an affliction only in the American south.

Renee said...

@RonF I find it hard to believe that a connection could have been missed. I am a Canadian and knew by grade 5 (ten years old) who Kennedy and Lincoln are. These are not minor figures in US history and therefore the person responsible was either being purposefully obtuse or willfully racist.

RonF said...

Filthy Grandeur, if we were talking about someone who works in the editorial part of the paper I'd agree with you, but we're talking about someone who puts classified ads in the paper - a clerk. It's not a job that requires much academic achievement.

FilthyGrandeur said...

again, RonF, ignorance is no fucking excuse for this. i do not believe the clerk didn't make the connection. i don't believe this is an "oversight."

the point is that this isn't the first time that Obama has received threats of this nature. this ad is a clear threat to our black president, and just because you think some of your students might be too fucking stupid to make this connection does NOT make it okay. EVERYONE knows Lincoln was assassinated. EVERYONE knows Kennedy was assassinated. if nothing else, people know about these presidents. so don't give me some bullshit that the clerk didn't know. they either didn't read it or just let it run anyway. in either case, this paper neglected a responsibility.