GBlog

It was Bob Dylan, urging all who watched the Super Bowl to buy American cars. Specifically the Chrysler 200, judging from the title card at the end. (Never mind that Chrysler is owned by Fiat, a multinational company headquartered in Italy the Netherlands.) But Dylan didn't mention Chrysler, just "American pride," and "the zoom, and the roar, and the thrust," and "the heart and soul of every man and woman working on the line."
The ad calls to mind the Clint Eastwood spot directed by David Gordon Green that got a lot of attention two years ago (siehe unten), though this commercial is not as well written or directed as that one was. ("Is there anything more American than America?") But this is not the first time Dylan has raised eyebrows with a high-profile commercial—and, for better or for worse, American automobiles are a more obvious product for him to hawk than upscale lingerie. (David Haglund - Slate's Culture Blog, Feb. 2 2014)



Interessant: Der Versuch der Heroisierung der Reste einer nationalen Arbeiterklasse in Zeiten der Globalisierung zum Zweck der nationalen Identitätserweckung; - albern und hilflos angesichts der tatsächlichen Eigentums- und Produktionsverhältnisse. - Aber wenn schon, dann kann Clint das besser als Bob: Clints "The world's gonna hear the roar of our engines" klingt einfach klarer, auch bedrohlicher für den Rest der Welt als Bobs sozialromatisches "the heart and soul of every man and woman working on the line."

Interessant auch, dass deutsche Werbung in dieser Produktklasse ohne solch nationalistische Aufladung auskommt, offenbar weil das deutsche Exportprodukt als solches bereits genug Identifikationspotenzial mit der erfolgreichen Exportnation bietet, so dass es einer expliziten Aufladung gar nicht bedarf. Wie das wäre, wenn Wolfsburg aussähe wie Detroit, möchte ich mir lieber nicht ausmalen ....


Detroit's abandoned Packard plant, remnant of industrial glory days.
Eine fein ironische Wendung bekommt der hilflose Versuch der Detroit-Re-Heroisierung durch eine Meldung der NYT: Developer From Peru Has Eye on Detroit!

Die Gebrauchtwagenhändler-Frage, die nach der credibility der old heroes, habe ich im Titel zwar gestellt, möchte sie aber nicht beantworten. Es sei denn ganz kurz so: It's the economy, stupid!
Wir waren da schonmal weiter, was die Einsichten in die economy im politischen Lied angeht:

Oh I laid down your railroads, every mile of track.
With the muscles on my arm and the sweat upon my back.
And now the trains are rolling, they roll to every shore
You tell me that my job is through, there ain't no work no more.

Though I laid down your highways all across the land.
With the ringing of the steel and the power of my hands.
And now the roads are there like ribbons in the sky,
You tell me that my job is through but still I wonder why.

For the wages were low and the hours were long
And the labour was all I could bear.
Now you've got new machines for to take my place
And you tell me it's not mine to share.

Though I laid down your factories and laid down your fields,
With my feet on the ground and my back to your wheels.
And now the smoke is rising, the steel is all a-glow,
I'm walking down a jobless road and where am I to go.

Tell me, where am I to go.

Phil Ochs – Automation Song (1964)

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Zur Dylan-Eastwood-colour Inszenierung der amerikanischen Arbeiterklasse passt sehr schön:

The real State of the Union. By Pepe Escobar
US President Barack Obama's State of the Union (SOTU) address was a somewhat surrealist spectacle. Way beyond avalanches of PR spin, the US government for a long time has not exactly done wonders for the public good. So as it advertises itself in front of a dysfunctional US Congress dismissed as repellent by an overwhelming majority of Americans - including, and expanding, on those 76% who are living paycheck to paycheck - what's left is a grand, old Hollywood production...

Economic Forum in Davos - that snowy Vegas for the 0.00001% - in which the Masters of the Universe finally "discovered" inequality. So much inequality, in fact, that 2014 was instantly tagged by the Masters - and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe - as the new 1914, all that furiously tweeted to all corporate boardrooms of the liquid modernity elite.

As Obama got into his groove, he proclaimed that Obamacare had won; that he would resort to ruling by executive order to get things done; and that a mixed salad of platitudes and vague proposals/generalities attested to the imminent success of his agenda of improving "opportunity" as the only answer to fighting inequality. Oh yes; and that the American Dream was not in a coma.

No word, of course, about the "gentle", progressive dismantling of what's left of US democracy, via the Orwellian/Panopticon complex, through which 0.00001% elite rule is painfully achieved in a sanitized Total Information Awareness (TIA) environment. With the US government in total control of the Internet, that once-upon-a-time dream - the revolution will be televised - won't happen even on the web....

With the US working class paralyzed and fearful of losing their jobs (labor unions have been virtually destroyed), and with students mired in horrendous debt (even as the average starting salary for graduates has been dropping steadily), two key vectors of protest are neutralized...

The key point would be to examine how American turbo-financial capitalism has been drifting since the mid-1970s. The point is not that a cabal of medievalist Republicans, evil corporate CEOs (and their handpicked pols), plus Wall Street is in charge. The point is to examine how demented financial asset speculation plus a demented inflation of dodgy financial securities have been the defining features of the US and global system.

This would imply a hardcore critique of advanced capitalism - which in fact is neither "advanced" nor really capitalism - that is absolute taboo in US corporate media. And the whole thing started even before the prophet Ronnie Reagan, then through Bubba Clinton and all the way to the Dubya/Obama continuum...

Lesen!!

Pepe Escobar im GBlog