The Phillies may be down 2-3 in the World Series count, but Macy’s is apparently feeling optimistic. An ad congratulating the Phillies on back-to-back World Series wins ran in today’s Tegucigalpa Daily News (per the Macy’s Marketing Director) and, closer to home and perhaps of more interest to the locals, in the Philly Inquirer.
While Yanks fans derisively laugh at the baseball version of “Dewey Defeats Truman,” the question being asked by Philly Phans is why the ad is such a laughable concept. Sure, it ran early – but Philly residents will tell you that the Yanks don’t have this nailed down yet.
Every once in awhile, we run across an awesome artistic feat that reminds us to celebrate art and artists everywhere. Today is one of those days.
This is video of the “Ukraine Got Talent” winner, doing an 8-minute sand animation performance. (An upside of this medium: sand is a lot cheaper and more ubiquitous than paint. A downside: it gets into places it shouldn’t be.)
It’s well worth the 8 minutes of watch time, so sit back, turn up the volume and celebrate the creative in all of us. Enjoy…
In a decision that surprised many (including Obama himself), the President received this year’s Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel committee noted that their decision to award the prize to a President just 10 months into office was based on his efforts to boost diplomacy and co-operation.
Said the Norwegian committee, “Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future. His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world’s population.”
Obama, for his part, seemed humbled by the award and expressed that this prize is a call-to-action, saying “I know that throughout history the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievements. It’s also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes. And that is why I will accept this award as a call to action, a call for all nations to confront the common challenges of the 21st Century.”
Of course, the decision is not without its critics. The Taliban, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Republic National Committee Chairman Michael Steele have all made statements criticizing the committee’s decision. Other world leaders (and John McCain, departing from other GOP members) were more supportive of the decision.
The merchandise being designed thus far is more celebratory than derogatory, which isn’t a surprise; Obama was from the beginning a candidate that inspired a lot of peace-themed T-shirts.
And so we congratulate the President today on bringing American leadership to recognition on the world stage, and award him a Fantasy T-Wearer Award with the Obama Peace Sign T-shirt, seen above at right.
In the latest installment of off-color political statements, Barack Obama made his opinion of Kanye West’s VMA grandstanding public by calling him a “jackass.” Which is to say that Obama made an off-the-record remark which was then immediately shared with the world by ABC employees, thus teaching the President the Jesse Jackson/Rick Perry lesson that nothing is off the record when your mic is on. Or when a reporter with an active Twitter account is sitting there with a Blackberry and some twitchy fingers.
This time the public apology came from ABC, source of the leaked audio clip and employer of reporter Terry Moran, who Tweeted the comment despite the President noting clearly that it was off the record. (The tweeted comment has since been removed from Moran’s timeline, but his million followers means that the comment wasn’t exactly a lone tree falling in a deserted forest.)
The incident has provoked a lot of debate about journalism ethics, what off the record means, and Twitter’s impact on journalism. Funnily enough, the incident has not provoked debate about whether or not the President’s assertion was true or appropriate, making this one of of the few Obama utterances of late that seems to be embraced by all Americans.
And so we acknowledge Kanye West today for doing what lately has proven difficult: providing America with bipartisan fodder that has allowed folks of disparate political viewpoints to reach across the aisle, slap a high five of agreement and chat it up merrily at the water cooler. To that end, Kanye receives his second Fantasy T-Wearer Award this week with the “Proud Jackass” T-shirt, above. Wear it with pride, sir. If only the healthcare debate were this easy.
Joe Wilson might breathe a sigh of relief today, with Kanye West capturing the headlines in this week’s Inappropriate Outburst/Public Apology.
Kanye disrupted the VMA’s – and more specifically, Taylor Swift – by interrupting her acceptance speech for Best Female Video with the sole purpose of telling the world that Beyonce deserved to win. *Wince*
Beyonce, for her part, looked openly shocked (indeed, her expression brought back memories of Mike Meyers’ reaction when Kanye went on a rant about George Bush and black people during a live Katrina fundraiser). Beyonce later invited Taylor Swift onstage during her own award for Video of the Year.
With celebrites all a-twitter about the incident, it would seem that those publicly denouncing Kanye in 140 characters or less are almost as big a story as the outburst itself. And yet, we wonder if the even more pithy canvas of a T-shirt would be somehow more effective in staunching the twitics than Kanye’s ongoing blog apologies. (He DOES NOT HAVE A F#$%ING TWITTER, after all.)
In a move that’s been widely approved across party lines, President Obama took a vacay break to announce that Ben Bernanke would be reinstated for a second term as Chairman of the Federal Reserve.
Bernanke has been cited as being instrumental in the economic recovery efforts, by both the President and financial analysts, and his reinstatement is viewed as a safe and wise move for both political and economic stability reasons. For the T-shirt designers ’round these parts, though, Bernanke is synonymous with “bailout” – a trend that started with the $700 billion Paulson/Bush/Bernanke Wall Street bailout of 2008, continued through the auto bailouts, and is still relevant given the Obama stimulus package – which of course included bailouts for Main Street residents in danger of, you know, having to leave Main Street due to impending foreclosures.
Indeed, a look back at the catalogue reminds us that Bernanke was the subject of the “S” word long before Obama showed up to earn like-minded design work.
Given the flavor of the designs about Ben Bernanke, we award a Fantasy T-Wearer Award to him today on behalf of our design community with the “Get out of Debt” card mousepad, at right.
It was the Russian tourist, in the Salle des Etats, with the mug…
Perhaps it’s all the reality talent shows that has led the everymen to embrace their inner critics. Fans of “American Idol” know this phenomenon well – the sage nodding during/after a performance, where you look at your TV-watching partner to say things like “she’s pretty pitchy” or “this seems like something I’d see on a cruise ship” or “wow, this should be on his first album.”
Indeed, being an armchair critic (or quarterback) is a great American pasttime, and it would seem that the Russians are moving into the art world with the technique. Though here we have more a case of an art critic quarterback…
A Russian tourist made headlines when she assaulted the Mona Lisa by throwing a mug at the 500-year-old painting. The Mona Lisa however is protected in a similar manner as the Popemobile, and the mug – not being a suitable weapon to pierce bulletproof glass – left the enigmatic smile of Italy’s most famous pinup girl unscathed.
Despite our fears that this mug may have been the “Throwing Things at Lisa” mug and what might have followed in the progression (a stein?), the mug has been reported as being terracotta. Phew.
And so, on behalf of the Mona Lisa and her many fans, we switch our Fantasy T-Wearer Award to a Fantasy Mug Award today, and award it to the nameless Russian art critic with a good arm and a fondness for drinkware. May the “Everyone loves an Italian Girl” Mona Lisa mug, at left, be used as a gentle and functional reminder of a priceless piece of art, rather than a projectile op ed piece.
American Idol fans will have to carry on without beloved judge Paula Abdul, who quit the show after 8 seasons this week.
There’s been some speculation that Abdul might end up on another talent reality show (”So You Think You Can Dance” being the most obvious), but for now the details as to why she left or what’s next for the ever-cheery Idol judge are few.
From this end we wish Paula the best in her new endeavors, whatever they may be. And so we award Paula Abdul a Fantasy T-Wearer Award today, with the “Retired Judge” T-shirt at right.
With President Obama going on and on about education, it’s easy to wonder whether or not things are really that bad in the public school system.
Well, it would seem that the Wisconsin Department of Transportation has an answer: yess.
Wisconsin’s made national news with a road sign that contains three spelling mistakes, and only one word (”exit”) spelled correctly. The misspelled words include both towns to which the sign is directing drivers, as well as the word “buisness.”
And so we award a Fantasy T-Wearer Award to David Vieth, Director of the Bureau of Highway Operations for the Wisconsin Department of Transportation – but in this case we’ll regale him with a wall clock for the office. So may he and his coworkers enjoy the “Buisness as Usual” clock, at right.
Henry Markram, director of the Blue Brain Project, told the TED conference in Oxford that a functional artificial human brain may only be 10 years away. Markram has already built components of a rat brain.
The technology hinges upon “recording the electrophysiology of neurons,” which sounds quite impressive and probably is.
The details of this technology are best left for those left-brainers who understand such matters; the crux of it, though, is the goal: to give researchers transparency as to how a brain perceives the world. Animal rights activists will be pleased as well, since Markram notes that building animal models to minimize animal experimentation is a practical application for the technology.
And so we award a Fantasy T-Wearer Award today to Henry Markram. May he enjoy the cheeky “Never Underestimate” T-shirt, at right.
The Phillies may be down 2-3 in the World Series count, but Macy’s is apparently feeling optimistic. An ad congratulating the Phillies on back-to-back World Series wins ran in today’s Tegucigalpa Daily News (per the Macy’s Marketing Director) and, closer to home and perhaps of more interest to the locals, in the Philly Inquirer.
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