Pop culture: Obama girl wins big
2008-11-11 12:23
New York - Given the historic election that America has just experienced, it's hard to remember back to last week, let alone June 2007, when Barack Obama was a true underdog, polling way behind front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton.
That's when a 32-year-old ad executive came up with an idea for a new web video. Seeking something catchy to launch a new site, barelypolitical.com, he sensed that Obama, though well behind Clinton, had a huge following online because of his youthful appeal.
And so Ben Relles made the Obama Girl video, a racy paean to the candidate that's been seen millions of times on YouTube and other sites, spawned sequels, was picked up by mainstream media across the globe, and made bikini-clad model Amber Lee Ettinger a unique kind of political web celebrity.
Pop culture in political campaigns is nothing new. But it's easy to forget that in 2004, when George W. Bush ran against John Kerry, there was no YouTube.
If it seems like pop culture took a more prominent role in this election than ever before, it's largely due to technology that now makes pop culture such a participatory experience.
"People aren't just receiving pop culture from mass media anymore," says Montana Miller, professor at Bowling Green State University.
"They're agents themselves, producing mashups, videos, making T-shirts. It's difficult to tell anymore what's amateur and what's not."
So everyone was producing pop culture this election season: The media, the candidates themselves, their supporters, or just people with a computer and a little time.
Here's a chronological look at some of the top pop culture moments of Election 2008:
The power of O
In May 2007, Oprah Winfrey endorses Barack Obama on Larry King Live, the first time the talk show queen has ever endorsed a political candidate. "What he stands for, what he has proven that he can stand for ... was worth me going out on a limb," she says.
Oprah's endorsement - still viewable on YouTube, of course - leads to a media discussion of how valuable such endorsements are.
Most experts say not so much. But this is Oprah, and two economists later claim they've calculated that Winfrey's endorsement gave Obama about a million votes.
I gotta crush
The above-mentioned Obama Girl video comes out the next month, with catchy lyrics along the lines of: "You're into border security, let's break this border between you and me!"
Obama himself indicates he's not pleased. In any case, Relles estimates the video has been seen about 20 million times - 10 million on YouTube alone.
"The web, especially online video, has given us a way to participate in this election," says Relles.
"Something that's created in an afternoon can be seen millions of times across the globe."
Yes we can
This one, Obama likes. In February, rapper, songwriter and producer will.i.am brings together a star-studded cast for his own viral video, the song Yes We Can, based on the candidate's acclaimed speech after a second-place finish in the New Hampshire primary.
"It was as if he was talking to me," will.i.am says of that speech. The song features Obama's voice set to will.i.am's music and melody, plus vocalisations from Scarlet Johansson, John Legend, Kate Walsh, Herbie Hancock and others.
Dirt off your shoulder
When was the last time you saw a presidential candidate proudly displaying his hip-hop knowledge? In April, at a rally in Raleigh, North Carolina, Obama is bemoaning political attacks from the Clinton camp.
"You just gotta kinda let it ..." the candidate says. And then he brushes the dirt off his shoulders. It's a Jay-Z move, and Obama does it once, twice, three times, then brushes some off his leg, too.
"That's what you gotta do," he tells the crowd. They roar back their approval. Immediately, there are mashups galore.
An artful endorsement
Los Angeles street artist Shepard Fairey creates in May what will become a wildly popular poster of Obama.
Getting permission from the campaign first, he chooses a photo of the candidate gazing ahead, then uses colours of red, white and blue to create his image, underlined by the word, "HOPE."
The posters sell like hotcakes.
The anti-celebrity movement
"He's the biggest celebrity in the world. But is he ready to lead?" The words of John McCain's anti-Obama campaign ad are provocative, but the images really get the attention: Obama speaking to an adoring crowd in Berlin, interspersed with footage of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.
Does it work? Some pop culture analysts and humorists say the attack ad is silly and even passé, given that Spears and Hilton are hardly in the news anymore. But it certainly gets attention.
Then, to surprise us all, Hilton pipes up with her own video riposte, actually wittier than the original.
Sarah/Tina/Palin/Fey
It's Sarah Palin time! Some have called this THE pop culture moment of the campaign - certainly it's one of them.
In September, Tina Fey, who looks uncannily like the Alaska governor, launches her much admired impersonation on Saturday Night Live, getting the look and the accent - and the wink - just right.
The first sketch, with Amy Poehler as Clinton, comes after Palin's shaky TV interview with Charles Gibson on ABC, and includes the iconic line, "I can see Russia from my house!"
Katie's comeback
Katie Couric scores a viral video hit, and unfortunately for Palin, it's not a song but an actual news interview with the VP candidate - and one in which she stumbles badly, wrapping herself in tongue-twisters over foreign policy, unable to give details on running mate McCain's record, and in one segment, unable (or unwilling) to tell Couric what newspapers she reads.
For the anchor, though, it's a major coup, after two years of low ratings and negative stories about her tenure at CBS.
SNL summit
A great season for SNL gets even better - the shows earns its best ratings in 14 years when Palin herself appears on the show, appearing on the same screen as Fey for only a split second, but then bopping along during a "Weekend Update" segment as Poehler raps: "All the mavericks in the house, put your hands up!" "
McCain humour
Not to be upstaged by his running mate (well, not this time), John McCain makes his own appearance on SNL, just two days before the election.
The Republican candidate shows he has a sense of humour, announcing he'll pursue a new campaign strategy: "The reverse maverick. That's where I'd do whatever anybody tells me."
McCain is a hit; unfortunately for him, the ratings don't translate directly to votes.
- AP