I've long thought that the 2002/2003 ad campaign for Hummers summed up the Iraq war better than anything else I ever saw. Their unapologetic embrace of a vehicle that said "Fuck You" to the world perfectly summed up the Bush administration's approach to...everything.
Of course, the effect of the ads were a little different before the war started - when gas was still $1.50 a gallon. Looking at them now, one almost feels a wave of nostalgia for a time when America felt confident enough to kid around about being an asshole. Can you even imagine a print ad like "IT ONLY LOOKS LIKE THIS BECAUSE IT'S BADASS" running in 2008?
Here's my personal favorite. The caption reads "EXCESSIVE. IN A ROME AT THE HEIGHT OF ITS POWERS SORT OF WAY." (Sorry about the black & white, but the only copy of this ad I could find is one I saved on my computer for an article I wrote at the time - all the color ones seem to have disappeared from the internet. Gee, I wonder why?)
What I love about this ad is that it just came right out and said it. Not only are we going to sell you a $50,000 FUV - we're going to do what's never done in advertising and explicitly link it to politics! Just...'cause we feel like it! Cuz...we've got balls!
This ad campaign perfectly captured the mood of a country so besotted with its own exhaust fumes that it could - first of all - elect a president it "wanted to have a beer with." The USA consciously embraced a man who was obviously unqualified to be president just because we couldn't be bothered to give a fuck. We wanted somebody who wouldn't bother us too much. A guy who'd do what needed to be done with less thought than a driver of an SUV gives to a squirrel he's just squashed on the highway. Hey, it worked in the first Gulf War! And anyway, who was gonna give us shit about it? We were the world's only superpower. If other countries didn't like it - what the hell could they do? Nothin'. America was a Hummer, gliding over the world, serenely protected by its' technological prowess from the consequences of its actions. The more our technology turned the planet into a wasteland - why, the more fun it'd be to drive our luxury tanks over the "dangerous" (terrorist-infested) landscape.
Another nice bit of propaganda from the Hummer campaign was its' ironic feminism. They were supremely aware that they were selling a Male Enhancement product - and women's money was as good as mens'. If a big dick is something you can buy, why not market yourself to the little ladies? This war truly was about spreading American values - like, anybody (with enough cash) can have a big dick!
The caption says "PERFECT FOR RUGBY MOMS."
It almost seems as if General Motors knew the war was coming and had started designing the Hummer specifically to be rolled out as part of the same ad campaign that sold the war. Do you suppose that someone at the Project for a New American Century was on the board of GM and tipped them off about the plan for taking over the world after the Republicans took over in 2000? Or are we supposed to assume that the Hummer simply arrived full-blown in all its armored glory, ad campaign and all, just at the moment America was about to embrace its excessiveness in that "Rome-at-the-height-of-its-powers sort of way"? Far be it from me to join the 9-11 conspiracy theorists...but, you know, it does take a few years to design a new car. And obviously, the Hummer was more than just another new model - it was designed (from the concept up) to be a tank for the masses.
And you know what? If the war had gone well (and why wouldn't it?) (we were gonna be greeted with candy and flowers, remember?) they would have made a gazillion dollars. The Hummer ad campaign would have been seen as absolute genius, and the advertising gurus who designed it ("Modernista!" is the name of the ad agency) (Modernista! With the self-conscious exclamation mark and everything!)) would have been on the cover of Cigar Afficianado and the subjects of fawning, 5,000-word thumbsuckers in the New York Times Sunday Magazine.
But no. The bubble burst. The reality-based community reared its boring head and intervened on the utopian dream. The Pax Americana lasted about as long as the ad campaign. Sure, they're still selling Hummers. But have you seen the new ads? They brag about how practical the Hummer is, how it packs the same fun into a smaller frame, how cute it is. In fact, in its latest iteration, the Hummer's barely even an American car anymore:
Yep. Just about sums up the whole Bush era.
And I didn't even have to mention that "hummer" is slang for blowjob.