HOT
Communication Breakdown
When negotiating with other countries in times of crisis, sometimes a peacekeeper the other country doesn’t hate, like Jesse Jackson, comes in for some gentle diplomacy and succeeds. Maybe that was the approach taken by Bill Clinton when movie mogul Harvey Weinstein sent him on a mission… to get Led Zeppelin to reunite. Weinstein wanted Zep to play the 12-12-12 concert for Hurricane Sandy relief and Clinton agreed to ask them at the Kennedy Center Honors. Alas, the former president can charm the thong off an intern, but he couldn’t get the classic rockers to play. Gene Simmons (allegedly) asked, a former President has failed … wonder if Jesse Jackson is a Led Zep fan?
WARM
Just Dew You-ish
Mountain Dew’s heavy youth marketing has, in recent years, signed up Hip Hop artists to help sell their green swill. It’s not going great. In February, Lil Wayne’s lyrics, “Beat that pussy up like Emmett Till,” upset many, including the family of Till, a 14-year-old African American who was brutally murdered in 1955 for looking at a white woman the wrong way. The Dew was eventually pressured into ending Wayne’s multi-million-dollar deal just as another Dew rapper, Tyler, the Creator, was pissing people off with his bizarre Dew commercial starring a battered woman and her apparent abuser, a goat. After complaints about racism, sexism and goat insensitivity, MD quickly severed ties, perhaps adopting a zero-tolerance policy towards Hip Hop stars who might do something controversial. Isn’t that partially why they were hired?
Racist goat commercials are so 2009
COLD
Uncomfortably Dumb
The health insurance crisis in America is so bad, people are pretending to be legendary British Rock guitarists! A 53-year-old man in St. Cloud, Minn., last month checked into a hospital as David Gilmour, also (not coincidentally) the name of Pink Floyd’s guitar hero. After his first visit, he returned emboldened, showing a Lloyd’s of London insurance policy, signing autographs and saying Floyd was touring Canada and had some off days. The staff really cracked the case, comparing hospital video footage to photos of Gilmour on the internet. Though, while on the web, perhaps they could have used Google to find out that Pink Floyd hasn’t toured since 1994.
NOT David Gilmour:
David Gilmour:
