West-Chicagoland progressives, have you found yourself reaching for the mute button more and more during commercial breaks of your favorite tv programs lately?
Are you falling asleep with the tv on and waking up with unexplained heachaches and craving a sundae?
It's probably because we're drowning in new Jim Oberweis ads. And the ads say a lot about what this Walking Marshmallow (TM) thinks he has to do to prevail in November . . .
Recall progressive Democrat (and Obama chum) Bill Foster's exciting March 8th special-election win against Walking Marshmallow (TM) Jim Oberweis.
That campaign received national attention for two reasons. First, this WAS the long-held seat of wrestling coach-turned-corrupt warmonger Dennis Hastert. Second, the campaign got really nasty. But Foster prevailed, and I understand from close friends who worked on his campaign and now with his Congressional office that he's coming along very nicely.
So since it was a special election to fill the seat abandoned by Denny the Kook's, we've got a November Grudge Match Re-Match on our hands.
And for the last four days or so, we see Oberweis has started running boucoup ads on the television machine. The ads are pretty transparent, particularly if you know anything about Oberweis repeatedly coming up short in several bids to get elected because, well, er, he's simply unlikable.
Oberweis' strategy is to soften up his exotic far-right positions on every issue by concocting an image of a good ole' midwestern 'awe-shucks' fella that we can trust to carry out the people's business. It's bullshit, and it won't work. Not this time.
There are two ads out (www.jimoberweis.com/Multimedia.php) so far, and they're running very frequently.
The first ad is called "Burger". It shows Walking Marshmallow's (TM) two daughters sitting on a backyard bench talking to each other and us about how great their dad is. And the whole time they're doing that, there's a rotund figure in the distance manning a grill. Check out Marshmallow looking over his shoulder repeatedly -- it gives me the god damn creeps. There's no mention of any policies, any initiatives or any way he'll help families in the area who are struggling. None. Just the daughters saying that he'll be a great representative because he always does what he says he'll do (the irony of course being that, even if this were true (it isn't), it would mean he'll stay true to his promise to support legislation that comes right from the Hastert/Cheney/Bush Manual on Shitty Governance).
The second ad is called "Barber". It's a real dud. Here we see Jim's two sons getting fake haircuts while Marshmallow reads the paper next to them. The boys tell us again that he's a great dad, so he'll be a great Representative. Putting aside that it appears these are two grown men who still have their dad drive them to get fake haircuts, again there's no mention of any policies, any ideas, or really anything else that would help a voter decide whether Marshmallow should be elected to represent their interests. How do you know he's a Republican? Because he has absolutely no ideas.
So the job rests with Foster to run a campaign about issues that folks in Chicago's beautiful western suburbs care about, AND to define Oberweis as just another exotic far-right asshat.
We need to get behind Foster again this fall, folks.