How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
He needs a little help in the delivery department, but this guy is on to something:
I'd be willing to bet that the entire contents of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, which released its report a couple of weeks ago, could be replaced by watching that commercial a couple of time, and maybe this one, too:
And let's throw in this one, too, just to remind everyone that the real problem is entitlements. (The Rascal Scooters, which range from $1000 to $7000 apiece, are 80% covered by Medicare....)
There. Financial crisis explained. National debt crisis illustrated. No lengthy, partisan, and ultimately incomplete "inquiry commission" required. We borrowed too much. Banks lent too freely. And we pay for any old person who wants to ride around in a little electric cart.
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Aug '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Back in Boston, I used to hear incessant ads for Sokolove Law, these in particular being about how to keep your second home while the government picks up your nursing home bills. It was brilliant at how it managed to curry a sense of entitlement to "keep your hard-earned dollars". It's easy to convince people that they should be able to leave their cottage on Cape Cod to their children, instead of selling it to pay their medical bills. In fact, it's easy to convince people that they have a "right" to anything, if the government gives it to them for free long enough for them to get used to it--which takes about the time to cash the first check. That's what's wrong with entitlements. That's what's wrong with Obamacare: as soon as people get some part of their health care paid for by someone else, they'll immediately lose the ability to imagine paying for it themselves.
Dec '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Cannot this same argument be used against the way health insurance works now? Perhaps I should get on the horn to USAA and lobby to have the oil change on my car covered this weekend.
Jun '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Those darn scooters!!!! I have a cousin who I worry about because every time he sees these commercials -- "and it didn't cost me a thing !!!" --- his head nearly explodes.
Jul '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
I really like the debt relief advertisements, where I am instructed that the problem with credit card debt isn't abject consumer stupidity, it's bankers' greed and that therefor, I have every moral right to skip out on debt I incurred one foolish purchase at a time.
Edited on Feb 17, 2011 at 10:27amJun '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Yes, the scooter ones really got me, along with other medical products. In some, a guy comes on at the end and guarantees that you will pay nothing. I'd nearly scream at the TV. I've never seen the first one, but that was pathetic. Hindsight is an interesting thing. Whenever I heard all these no-down-payment, free this, free that, ads, I would make a quiet mental note to myself that something didn't seem right. Guess I was a genius.
Lastly, I love how average citizens actually take the time to create their own videos on YouTube. Of course, views I loathe fill the place, too, but there are some great ones out there that speak to me so well. And Rob, your suggestion to view the "How the World Works" series was a great one. I've watched most of them and really appreciate that guy. He's mad and he ain't gonna take it no more.
Sep '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Great mix of commercials. The first one was actually scary - the spousal unit and how she gets her way, not by reason but by appeal to authority and bullying. The whole approach says a lot about what's accepted in marital culture these (those?) days. He gets rewarded by affection - but from her? I guess it's better not to be on her bad side...once he can't say "yes" anymore, well, the divorce won't be pretty after foreclosure.
A brilliant 23 minute summation is this episode of South Park Margaritaville
Jul '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
I deplore domestic abuse. But that commercial had me skittering right at the edge.
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
And notice how she's skinny, and he's a fat slob in front of the fridge. Nothing is accidental in commercials. This is saying she's right, she takes care of herself, she's the winner in this relationship. He's just a fat slob who makes the money and doesn't know a good investment when he sees one.
May '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
How did you miss this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYTjiIm4h_Q&feature=related
(In case the link doesn't work, it's Matthew Lesko, the guy with the question marks on his suit who screams about getting free money from the feds)
Jul '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Has anybody ever noticed how many of those Rascal scooters there are in casinos and slot parlors?
May '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
There's a lot to this – thanks, Rob! – but one thing it doesn't capture is the way in which losses on the mortgage industry bled into the rest of the economy. To understand that, one must grapple with complicated financial instruments like credit default swaps, the abject failure of the ratings agencies, the unbelievably irresponsible gambles made by insurers like AIG, financial models at otherwise sophisticated investment banks that weren't even capable of showing what would happen if housing prices fell... If you read everything Michael Lewis has written on the subject, and listen to everything that Planet Money has broadcast, however, you'll be in great shape.
Nov '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
All we have to do is look at Wisconsin today and think about Greece a couple of months ago. The sense of entitlement is amazing.
Dec '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
So you folks have seen this now? This is every street, every sidewalk corner in Florida.
This is an Entitlement, on every street, in every grocery store aisle, coming to you.
Tramps on scooters are your new obstacles, in grocery stores. They cost you, roughly $600 per scooter, from Medicare or Medicaid. They are everywhere, down here. You can't walk around them, as they can't drive in a straight line, you can't get past them in a grocery aisle, as they park to one side,then scrutinze bargains on the other and, everything, from their scooter through their groceries, is paid for by you.
These folks number in the millions, and consider us suckers. In their entire experience, I am the only conservative they have ever met, and I bring firewood, food, and beer, but they bring, mostly, nothing. They have personalities that attract people to them.
They get stuck in the mud and people like me pull them out. Actually,there are no people like me; I pull them out. I have ropes, and chains, and winches and I pull them out. Then they attack me as a war monger.
After I pull them out.
Dec '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
Added, there are many people like me, but not for them; not in my neighborhood.
We hate people like this, just obvious people-users. But everybody in my area would pull them out of the mud.
Assuming they were stupid enough to get stuck in the mud. I have been stupid enough to get stuck in the mud and good people helped me out of the mud.
My point was about a lifestyle that gets you stuck in the mud. Some people just keep driving back in.
Jun '10
Re: How'd We Get In This Financial Mess? Old Commercials Tell Us. Official Reports Don't.
I recently met a woman whose hobby seems to be finding the "freebies" and handing out the applications to her friends. I learned from her about "free" cell phones with 250 local and long distance "free" minutes.
Here in NY we've got Medicaid programs with no resource limits.