Bang bang bang
What we need is more gun battles:
A Republican Senate primary candidate in Arizona has been condemned for a “disgusting” campaign ad in which he shoots at lookalike actors portraying Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi and incumbent Arizona senator Mark Kelly.
Jim Lamon, an energy executive, shared the ad on Twitter, saying it would be aired at this year’s Super Bowl.
Lamon would face Kelly in a general election in the autumn should he secure the Republican nomination.
Kelly is the husband of former Democratic congressman Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, who was shot in the head in 2011 while greeting constituents outside of a local grocery store.
It’s Lamon’s pinned tweet.
Hur hur, good old-fashioned showdown, where people shoot each other. If only all of life were like tv westerns from the 1950s.
Criticism towards the ad has been swift, with many people pointing out other recent instances of violent imagery used by members of the Republican Party. Last November, Paul Gosar, Republican representative for Arizona, was officially censured by the House after sharing an animated video depicting him killing the Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking Biden.
Not to mention that little incident on January 6, 2021.
Be interesting to see a campaign between a former astronaut who comes from a solid base in Tuscon, and a rootin’ tootin’ ya-hoo who’s solid in Kingman.
The gun-folk in Arizona have this stereotype that liberals are ignorant on guns. There was a protest on the capitol grounds and the Patriot Movement was trying to bait me and a few others, but I surprised them with my knowledge of guns and the fact that I had taken safety courses (even though I don’t own guns it’s useful training to have.) But all this guns guns guns stuff appeals to voters there outside of Phoenix, Tuscon, and Flagstaff.
I’m a little suspicious that this ad was ever intended to air during the Super Bowl.
There’s a well-established PR tactic of making a “controversial” ad (usually it’s risque in some sexual way, but any kind of controversy will do) with the deliberate intent of having broadcasters say “no, this isn’t appropriate” so that you can then issue press releases about your “rejected Super Bowl ad” when you actually had no intention and/or ability to pay the massive fees it costs to air a Super Bowl ad.
Similarly, there’s a well-established political trick of preparing an edgy ad and then getting news organizations to run stories about it, thus getting you free air time.
Sounds to me like this may be a mash-up of those two techniques. Which presents a tricky question: should we ignore such things, and the media refuse to cover them, because it’s obvious cynical manipulation and the candidate clearly wants the controversy, or is it important information for the voters to have about what kind of person this candidate is?
Good point, I didn’t pause to think about what it would cost some obscure person to run an ad on the Super Bowl. I did consider just ignoring it though, but the impulse to document the evil won the struggle, as usual.
There are some ad slots reserved for local network affiliates — anyone who’s watched the Super Bowl can confirm that you see some ads for local businesses — and presumably they’re paying a small fraction of the eye-popping numbers that a national ad costs. But it still means that an ad on your local tv station will cost a lot more during the SB than on a regular evening.
So it’s possible that a Senate candidate could afford such an ad. But I’m suspicious that was ever the plan.
I’m just curious if he thinks someone makes it through Navy training, becomes an officer, etc., and has no respect for or understand of guns. There is no special branch of the military for liberals who want to take away your guns.