New InternetMana billboards

A series of billboards saying things about which politicians have never resiled would be an excellent resource for this election.

ALCP’s Richard Goode has started the ball rolling with this one above, from trendsetter and DotCon icon Laila Harre, uttered in the Evening Post in 1987 apropos of not much at all.

For young trendsetters who might not get the reference, the Evening Post was a late, unlamented newspaper. 

And Stalin was a late, unlamented genocidal murderer.

Coming up next, Annette Sykes laughing and applauding at the September 11 atrocity – “I was laughing, I was so happy.”

Other suggestions welcome…

This post is offensive

In the Middle East and Eastern Europe, people are being killed because they’re the wrong race, or the wrong religion.

Kind of puts an antiquated joke and a few vandalised billboards in perspective, doesn’t it?

Are we all just getting a little bit over-offended on behalf of everyone else?  If John Key isn’t offended by jew-baiting billboards and being called Shylock, why should you? If Wongs are offended by a politician in search of a headline, and some are, couldn’t they just lighten up?

Sure, parts of the world are perishing from religious-and race-hatred, but here in this place, we’re not. We’re in the  fortunate position of being unencumbered, so far, thank goodness, by violent racism. Can’t we enjoy that fact?

Can’t we just make fun of our differences, safe in the knowledge these differences are  just part of our character, and mostly unimportant?

Can’t we, please, stop taking offence over nothing more potent than being called names?

Can’t we stop giving pricks like Peters headlines he can easily predict in advance, about jokes that have been around since 1947?

Oh, no, we can’t.

Instead we have earnestness – what PJ O’Rourke used to call stupidity sent to college. Earnestness ensuring that whenever anything remotely colourful appears committees and Commissions full of these right-minded folk  emerge to ensure that none of us say anything inadvertently offensive, and to invite those they think should be offended to be so.

And thank goodness they can help out we less enlightened folk by drawing up rules and charters ensuring no-one anywhere ever is  inadvertently assailed -- nay, assaulted -- with bad thoughts, bad jokes, or actions likely to bring New Zealand into disrepute.

Can't be too careful. Can’t be too safe. Might offend some right-thinking person at any moment. Thank goodness for their lists.

You know, some people are sent emails about which they’re invited to take offence. Me, I get sent those emails to laugh at.

By the way, why am I getting so many emails about Robbie Williams’ dad?

And what do you call a Welshman with a stick up his arse? Answer: A taffy apple.

Please tell me if those quips should that be banned because they’re offensive? Would I be a wrong-thinking person for laughing? Or enjoying a wry smile? Perhaps the people drawing up lists could tell me.  They could tell me after they’ve taken the stick out of their own arse.

Is that sort of mild jest  too offensive, and just plain wrong? Then draw up a list. And don’t read on…

Billboard improvement

Two best things about elections: slagging off politicians to their face, and vandalising billboards. (Slagging off not shown.)

More billboard improvement at someone’s NZ Billboards Tumblr site.

More brainy billboards

Here’s another set of brainy billboards to match a previous trove posted here.

In order to capture the natural aspects of their products, they used a billboard using nature itselft to represent their product.  A perfectly placed billboard that uses the sunset and moonlight to illustrate their superior hair color products and change the hair color of the billboard.”

See what they mean!

Who says billboards have to be boring.

Head here for an image of the entire ad at different times of the the day.

British billboards

It seems a long time since there was a British election in which voters were offered a fundamental choice—perhaps the most stark was the ‘Winter of Discontent’ election of 1979 when Britain was offered the same full-on socialism that had led Britain to bankruptcy in just three decades, or Margaret Thatcher.

Sadly now, when its government’s deficits are once again at South American levels (and climbing), all that Britons are offered as an alternative to Gordon Brown’s print-and-hope policy is David Cameron--Britain's smile-and-wave leaderette in the wings.

Sad.

But despite the often paper-thin differences between the main parties, their political advertising has always been brilliant. Being much easier to attack than to present the non-existent positive qualities of their own party, they’ve always gone for the jugular in attacking their opposition.

 The Telegraph has a gallery of some of the more memorable, including a few from elections where there really was a stark difference.  These are some of my own favourites, in roughly chronological order:

 

Budget Week billboarding

Julian Pistorius’s billboards got some titivation ready for Budget Week – a simple reminder that this government is about to break its foremost campaign pledge . . .

And a few other slogans were added around the Waterview area . . .

Clever and creative billboard advertising

Billboards don't have to be as boring as National's blancmange offerings last year, as some of these examples demonstrate.

Miele vacuum cleaners, on a billboard near a flight school:

Kill Bill.  Crap film, inventive billboard:

Tide Detergent.  After a few weeks the background becomes progressively dirtier . . .

A "bright idea" for The Economist magazine:

Bic razors, in Spain:

Extra strong sellotape, in Malaysia:

Paint ad on a building in Columbus, Ohio:

Many more of these here. [Hat tip Stephen Hicks]

Greens: Vote for [.........]?

The Greens invite you to make up your own Green billboards, and it's as easy as falling off a manifesto.  Just head here, and start clicking. [Hat tip MikeE]

And since a vote for the Greens is undeniably a vote to impoverish future generations (and this one) why not make up some more honest Green billboards than their present soft soap.

Here's one if you think they're just dumb instead of dangerous:

Here's one for Vlad worshipper Russel Norman :

Here's a couple for the rank and file:

For all the Green supporters of the Urewera 16:

And here's one for "former" Maoist Sue Bradford:

And for "population control" enthusiast Metiria Turei, here's one straight from her political mentors at China's One-Child propaganda ministry:

And another from her spiritual mentors at the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement:
 

And finally, here's one for old Keith Locke, that hero of socialist foreign policy, who once wrote a lead article for Socialist Action under the banner heading: "Cambodia Liberated: Victory For Humanity" The "liberators" were of course the murderous Khmer Rouge led by the infamous Pol Pot...

Head on over and make up a few signs of your own...

More billboards

Been out billboarding over the weekend -- repairing signs, and putting up a few new ones.

Yeah, don't vote for some kid you've never met (and voting Greens would only impoverish the kid anyway).  Vote for yourself . Or for this chap...      
             

And there's been more rational billboards going up around Wellington ... pics at Pacific Empire.

And some irrational billboards going up around Auckland for some bloke apparently in charge of a holiday camp.

  Hi De Hi Campers ...

Aro Valley bondage

With bondage jokes, two-hundred jeering hippies and a water pistol trained at the back of candidates' heads, the Aro Valley election meeting is always the most entertaining, if not the most enlightening.

The Dim Post has a roundup of the meeting as raucous as the meeting itself; The Dom Post has the stuffier report, but it does have an added video.

And what exactly did happen to Bernard Darnton's billboard?

UPDATE:  Billboard's location still uncertain, but Wellington photog Matthew Plummer posted some pics of the political event here [hat tip Stephen Franks].

One thousand reasons to despise the Electoral Finance Act

Here are one-thousand reasons not to have home addresses on political literature: one-thousand knives stuck into Family First's Bob McCroskie's lawn:

As a couple of bloggers have noticed, this is precisely why Libertarianz have placed the following statement on their billboards:

We figured that since Helen Elizabeth Clark, of 4 Cromwell St, Mt Eden, had introduced a law regulating political speech one-year-in-three, including a rule that all such speech must include the name and address of the person who "authorises" it -- in McCroskie's case his Value Your Vote website -- she needs to personally understand the chilling effect of such a law.

After all, if she's going to write laws placing at risk the homes of people who criticise her, people whose homes don't come complete with police protection...

NB: The photo comes from the Herald, who for their own reasons chose to digitally remove the number of Helen Clark's house, while leaving the address above. Go figure.  [Hat tip

Don't Vote Green

Allow me to direct you to a  new election website:

 

The message is this: Don't vote to make future generations poorer, as the Greens' billboards exhort you to: vote instead for freedom, vote for prosperity, vote (in short) for yourself.

Which means Don't Vote Greens.

Don't Vote Labour.

And whatever you do, Don't Vote National.

National are NOT the answer.

We can see your house from here, Helen

 

Helen Elizabeth Clark, of 4 Cromwell St, Mt Eden, introduced a law last year requiring all political speech to be regulated one year in three, including the rule that all such speech must include the name and address of the person who "authorises" it.  So the Libertarianz party has followed the law with our billboards, and as the Herald has just noticed we've included on with it not just the name and address of the fine chap who authorised them, and also the name and address of the woman who mandated that we must.

After all, if she's going to write laws placing at risk the homes of people who criticise her, people whose homes don't come complete with  police protection...

NB: Interesting, don't you think, that the Herald in the picture above chose to blank out Helen's home address, but not the one above it.
Herald picture by Brett Phibbs.