I think I do my part to help prevent climate change. I turn off the lights in rooms I’m not in, and I stopped leaving the fridge open to cool the kitchen. But every time I think I’m doing enough to help the environment, an organization releases an advertisement about something else that’s killing the earth.

Take, for example, this recent climate change ad by the forward thinkers at Plane Stupid. The members of Plane Stupid hate planes and aviation because of the amount of pollution produced by aircraft. They decided to help us all understand their position by dropping a polar bear on a car.

Do you see what you’re doing by visiting your family in Buffalo? If you loved the gentle polar bear, you’d hitchhike to Buffalo like a good citizen of the planet. I’d tell you to bring some mace just on the off chance that some crazy serial rapist picks you up, but spraying that stuff can’t be good for the ecosystem.

If I had designed that commercial, I would have went with penguins instead of polar bears. Everyone loves penguins. A penguin would probably give you a hug and maybe bring you a fish. Polar bears tear off a person’s skin and use it as a birthing-blanket.

My version of the commercial would also be a bit more logical and on point. How did those polar bears get up in the sky? Polar bears can’t fly, so someone must have kidnapped them, loaded them on a PLANE, and then dropped them from a couple thousand feet. How much fuel does a plane full of polar bears use? I bet it uses more fuel than a plane full of people considering how huge polar bears are and how low the pilot would have to keep the air conditioner to help the bears feel at home.

~Thanks Plane Stupid

Iwanted to write about this sooner, but I had trouble finding a link to one of the commercials. I figured that was crucial for people who might not have seen the commercial because they have better things to do than watch TV and play Team Fortress 2.

Then, ironically, I found a link to a video of the commercial on Yoplait’s website. Some might suggest that I probably should have checked there first.

Anyway, I think most of you are familiar with these Yoplait commercials. The first one is set in a kitchen with the wife on the phone talking about how much weight she is losing eating junk food. Her husband, presumably fresh from playing Scrabble with a bunch of stuffed animals, gets confused and starts looking for these treats in the fridge. The wife turns around, sees him in the fridge, and then reveals to the world that she secretly beats him after dark in an upstairs closet. 

The theme of domestic abuse isn’t obvious, but Yoplait had to keep it subtle because I doubt much Yoplait yogurt is eaten in prison. In prison, the only yogurt flavor available is Buffalo Back and Sea Salt, and most of the prisoners need to be force fed.

Our first clue that something is wrong is how excited the husband gets when he hears there is possibly something to eat in the house besides his wife’s fist. His facial expression shows this excitement, but the excitement is mixed with something — terror.

That's the face a deer makes before it runs across the field toward the salt lick and gets shot.

The husband yanks open the fridge, frantically searching for something sweet he can stuff in his face. He knows this is wrong. He knows he will be punished, but his stomach doesn’t care; it’s prepared to take the high-heeled kicks. But he can’t find anything, and a fucking pile of yogurt keeps getting in his way. She could turn around any second. She will turn around any second. He needs to abandon this suicide mission. He needs to pull out, just like in his dreams where his wife’s father pulls out and prevents his wife’s terrible existence. Oh fuck, it’s too late.

babe, what are you doing?

He wants to cry out, but the last time that happened she pickled one of his testicles.

The Sequel

Afraid that the first commercial didn’t bring their point home, Yoplait decided to make a sequel. I was a little confused when I saw the husband on the phone, then I figured he had earned this privilege through countless forced oral-sex sessions.

The name of this commercial is “Guy Talk.” I think this is supposed to show us how broken this man’s spirit is; he gets on the phone and all he wants to talk about is yogurt. And look how skinny he is. He really must have gotten the “treatment” after his fuck-up in the first commercial.

He’s not chatting for long before the wife comes in and hears him lying, not just about what he’s been eating but that he’s been eating. There are two things she won’t tolerate: lying and her husband being happy. This situation looks like a combination.

She's doubly angry because if she knew she was going to have to bleed her husband out, she would have worn her "platelet hoodie."

The husband is totally oblivious to her entrance. You’d think he’d be more jumpy by this stage of their relationship. He keeps talking and talking until..

babe?

I think we're supposed to assume that he urinates. The commercial is shot from the waist up to leave an element of mystery.

Conclusion

It’s hard to say if there will be a third installment in this series. The husband has shown remarkable durability over span of  two commercials. The lack of superficial bruises makes me think that his wife works for a cosmetic company.

Yoplait does leave us with something at the end of the “Guy Talk” commercial.  The husband puts a little smile on his face before turning around. This is an obvious attempt to charm his wife into not breaking his writing hand again. The question is — will it work?  It seems like pure suicide but maybe he’s eaten enough yogurt to pull it off..

Quentin Tarantino’s most recent movie, Inglourious Basterds, is set in France during the second…  Ok, it’s a movie about killing Nazis and it’s fantastic. The movie really knows how to play off its strengths so Nazis get shot, Nazis get blown up, scalped, beaten, knifed, choked, burnt. One character in the movie, Donny Donowitz “The Bear Jew,” is particularly beloved for his penchant to beat Nazis to death with a baseball bat.

Tarantino is a director who dislikes product placement in his films. Instead, he chooses to create his own products such as Red Apple Cigarettes, Jack Rabbit Slim’s Restaurants, and Big Kahuna Burger. Quentin did the same thing in Inglourious Basterds with Donny’s baseball bat. And I bet baseball bat manufacturers everywhere are devastated that they couldn’t get a piece of that action.

The Bat

There is one promotional poster for Inglourious Basterds that clearly shows the fictional bat company.

Look at him. He's just like Indiana Jones with his whip except that Indiana's whip wasn't covered in brain matter.

The company is “Hutton and Aldrich,” which according to this blog is a homage to two of Tarantino’s favorite directors — Brian G. Hutton and Robert Aldrich.

Another interesting fact about the bat is that it is signed by all the Jews in Donny’s neighborhood. A scene was shot to explain this, but it didn’t make the final cut. Before I found the interview, I thought the names were just some of Donny’s favorite jewelry stores.

Why Advertise With The Bat

There are a lot of other missed advertising opportunities in Inglourious Basterds, but Donny’s bat is the best one for a few reasons:

• kids
• people who hate Nazis
• people who want to look cool

Another missed advertising chance. But I doubt the "Smoke Like A Nazi" campaign would have gained much traction.

I know the movie is rated R, but kids know how to use the Internet. This is why kids, and not just Jewish kids, are all going to want to be Donny Donowitz for Halloween. I think Donny is especially important for Jewish kids because how many times are they going to dress up as Magneto from X-Men? And I doubt any kids want to dress up as my favorite Jew — Dan Rydell from Sports Night. A bat manufacturer could be booming right now in preparation for trick or treating:

“No, Mommy! I need the EXACT bat Donny had in the movie!”

“DAD!  Nazi skulls are too thick for some Walmart bat.”

People who hate Nazis would also be a huge market. I hate Nazis, but I can’t buy a genuine Nazi-beatin’ bat because Hutton and Aldrich is a fake company. If Louisville Slugger had sponsored the movie, I’d have a bat in every room. I’ve had to compromise by buying other devices from the movie that were used to kill Nazis, like matches and guns.

People who want to look cool is probably the largest potential market. Right now, bleugeoning Nazis to death is the coolest. The only thing cooler is bashing Nazis in the snow with some kind of ice bat. If a bat manufacturer had forced Taratino’s hand, baseball bats could be the next Uggs. But since there’s no way to know if you have a genuine “Donowitz,” everyone would just accuse each other of having knock-offs:

Person 1: “Hey, is that a real Donowitz?

Person 2: “That’s right. I want to be prepared.”

Person 1: “I don’t know, man. It looks kind of brittle.”

Person 2: “Oh, it’s real. I paid over two-hundred dollars for it.”

Person 1: “I think someone took you. Did it come with a Nazi dog tag?”

Person 2: “..what?”

Person 1: “you know, the genuine Nazi dog tag that all Donowitz bats come with?”

Person 2: “Great. Now what am I supposed to do with it?  Play baseball?”

The Other Side

There are some who think that glamorizing an instrument of death is both wrong and irresponsible.

Look, a bat is not an instrument of death when it’s used to kills Nazis. I consider it more an instrument of karma. What do you expect me to do if a Nazi climbs into my backyard and starts scapegoating? I could call the police but do the police have bats?  No.

Other people say that this new focus on baseball bats takes away from America’s proud history of playing the actual sport of baseball.

No one is saying that you can’t keep playing baseball as long as the balls are replaced with Nazis. But seriously, you can keep your national past time of baseball as long as people are free to start a new past time of beating Nazis to death with bats.

Finally, some say that a baseball bat is not a profitable product because they last for years. It is true that before I saw Inglourious Basterds, I had one bat that only saw the occasional white-knuckled shake at a passing motorist. But, like I mentioned above, Nazi skulls are incredibly thick, so it’s not unreasonable to assume that the average person could go through two or three bats a week.

Conclusion

I only wish that I could have gotten to Quentin Tarantino sooner and explained to him the benefits of allowing a company to donate bats to Inglourious Basterds. Now the overwhelming need for bats is being satisfied by several companies, some of which sell bats with questionable quality. The only solution is to gather up some Nazis, buy a bunch of bats, and, through grueling trial and error, find a manufacturer that works for you.

Nature, in an unforeseeable blunder of evolution, has created the ultimate nerd pet — a lizard that looks like Spider-Man. The red and blue colored Mwanza Flat Headed Agama lizard hails from Africa but is now being imported in large numbers to live in tanks lined with pictures of Green Goblin.

Accidental Advertising

Unfortunately, it probably took the Agama lizard hundreds of thousands of years to develop its red and blue markings, so it could catch bugs more effectively or something; It’s a little late now to turn back the clock. Besides, if nature just starts changing the lizard’s colors without guidance, the Agama could end up looking like Magneto by the year 304567 and still remain in this predicament.

I think it’s important to understand how the lizard attracts Spider-Man fans so Nature can take steps to change the Agama. This is assuming that the lizards aren’t made extinct in five years by throngs of dough-fisted, vitamin D deprived kids wearing Punisher shirts.

Appearance

Obviously, the first thing against the Agama is the red and blue coloring. In this article, Rich Nunn talks about the Agama’s amazing resemblance to Spider-Man.

The colouring is unbelievably similar, especially in the chest arms and legs.

Quite true, Rich. But, if I may, shouldn’t the similar coloring be canceled out by the fact that the Agama is a FUCKING LIZARD?

"Hey guys! Look at this thing! It looks like Spider-Man! Someone give me the checklist. Ok ..let's see. It's got red on it. Check. It's got blue on it. Check. ....Oh wait, it's a lizard. Put it back on a rock."

However, the Agama does share Spider-Man’s blank facial-expression. So I can see how that might be confusing to someone, if the Agama was rescuing the person from a burning building.

That white stuff is webbing.

The only other similarity between the Agama and Spider-Man that I can think of is really more of a similarity between Tobey Maguire and the Agama, but I’m going to include it because Maguire plays Spider-Man in the Spider-Man movies. By looking at the Agama, it’s impossible to say whether or not it’s fucked Kirsten Dunst.

What Can Be Done

To sum up, Spider-Man fans are attracted to the Agama lizard because blue and red are primary colors that Spider-Man wears, The Agama has Spider-Man’s blank facial expression, and the Agama may or may not have had sexual intercourse with Kirsten Dunst.

I don’t know how Nature is going to fix all those problems, but I took the liberty of composing an artistic rendering of the future Agama in a state that I feel makes it the least desirable to Spider-Man fans.

Shouting out "Yay! I never slept with Kirsten Dunst!" might make it difficult for the Agama to approach prey, but it should drastically increase the Agama's chance of finding a mate.

]]> http://mediabane.com/nature-accidentally-advertises-to-nerds-with-spider-man-lizard/feed/ 5 http://mediabane.com/colgate-mongers-fear-with-ad-stunt/ http://mediabane.com/colgate-mongers-fear-with-ad-stunt/#comments Mon, 21 Sep 2009 18:10:35 +0000 http://mediabane.com/?p=765

Colgate is tried of handing out little tubes of toothpaste to people who just throw them away or keep a couple in a drawer somewhere because it seems wrong to throw them away. Someone at Colgate decided to try something new, something that would really grab people’s attention.

Colgate now hands out ice cream and candy instead of brushing miniatures. The catch is that the sticks used for the ice cream and candy resemble large toothbrushes with “Don’t Forget” written on them. Basically, when people get down to the raw stick, a big, useless toothbrush tells them they just covered their teeth with corrosive sugar.

Look at that confused smile. She must think "Don't Forget" is a 9/11 reference.

That's better. She saw that toothbrush, linked it to bedtime, and panicked.

The Fear Game

I don’t blame Colgate for getting in on the fear game. These days, everyone is doing it: terrorists, republicans, Amazon.com when they announced that Dan Brown had written another book. It’s a popular strategy that helps people choose things because they don’t want something bad to happen.

But what group of sick fucks decided to plant toothbrushes under snacks? First of all, there’s no way any respectable toothbrush would carry around an ice cream bar just to pop out after the ice cream is eaten, yell “surprise,” and remind the person to brush. Toothbrushes don’t get along with anything that’s delicious. That’s why we keep them locked in the bathroom as far away from Oreos and taffy as possible.

What’s even more of an insult is that the toothbrush-sticks Colgate used aren’t even functional. Oh, thanks for reminding me to brush my teeth, Colgate. I’ll just use this filthy sugar-slicked twig to scrape away anything in my mouth that might be hospitable for plaque. I wonder how many EMTs have had to pull bloody-mouthed kids out of public bathrooms.

“LET ME GO. I DIDN’T GET THE BACK. I DIDN’T GET THE BACK.”

“MR. CAVITY IS TESTING ME.”

Other Products

I hope we don’t start seeing other companies pulling similar stunts with their products.  I plan on sitting in front of the TV later, and now I think there’s a chance that my couch could spit out a Gold’s Gym branded free-weight. I’ll have a hell of a time dragging it to the trash.

Do you think people would be insulted if they smoked a pack of cigarettes and found a Nicoderm patch at the bottom? Or do you think smokers would just save the patches for times when they couldn’t smoke cigarettes, like while giving birth or delivering a eulogy.

I doubt we’ll see any useful implementations of this idea. We’re years away from the technology needed to make blood-testing kits fall out of the anus or vagina immediately after unprotected sex. Something would need to be in place to determine if a condom was worn — a robot or monitor that can sense if the sex was enjoyable. And then there’s the kit itself. Would it need to be teleported in? Is this something that Cris Angel could “mindfreak” on a case by case basis?

I see a lot of fuss around the web about Microsoft’s photoshoped race switch in an ad targeting Poland. The original US ad had an asian man, a black man, and a white woman. The photoshop edit removed the head of the black man and replaced it with the head of a white guy.

To be fair, this fuss is justified. But the people who should be most offended are the Polish.

Based on the quality of the ad tweak, Microsoft can’t have a very high opinion of Poland or the Polish. How’d the conversation go when someone at Microsoft made the call to edit the original ad?

Grunt: “Sir, we need to get this ad to graphic design. It’s for a mostly white region and there’s one too many black guys in it.

Guy In Suit: “One too many black guys?  Jesus Christ. Jjeeeeessssus H Christ. Jesus Mary and Fucking Joseph. Jesus Corncob Christ. Jesus Bartholomew Chri..”

Grunt: “Sir?”

GIS: “Right. Good find, my boy. I’ll put the order in right away. What market is this ad for?”

Grunt: “Poland, Sir.”

GIS: “Poland?”

Grunt: “Yes, Sir.”

GIS: “Just give me it. I’ll have my son work on it in the other room. He’s only four months old, but he’s got amazing dexterity in a couple of his fingers. Ha! Poland. Classic.”

Microsoft didn’t even bother to change the black guy’s hands.

Ok, black guy with black hands. Check.

Ok, white guy with OH MY GOD

I hope the Polish writing in the second ad reads — “Mike burnt his hands taking his fried chicken out of the oven. A white guy, eating fried chicken? What could be more racially neutral? Microsoft: Empower Your People”

But, based on Microsoft’s obvious low opinion of the Polish intellect, it probably reads — “Computers are hard. Keys go click. Mice go squeak click. Money=Computers. Computers=Money. Microsoft: Go Play With Blocks.”

Some people are defending Microsoft by saying that Microsoft left the asian guy in the ad. Of course Microsoft left the asian guy in the ad. The Polish, in Microsoft’s eyes, will see that the people in the ad are dealing with numbers and complicated electronical whirly-doodles, and they’ll expect an asian who’s biologically good with numbers to be somewhere in the room. The whole point of taking the black guy out was so the Polish didn’t see the ad and assume it was about basketball.

But my favorite part about this ad has nothing to do with the poor photoshop job. It’s how in both the US and the Poland versions, the woman’s monitor isn’t even hooked to anything. This shows that displaying women as smiley-faced idiots reads in any region. We can only assume that both the guys are smiling because the lady is having so much fun waving that little device around while making beeping noises. Or she’s showing them slides of her American Girl doll collection.

You’d think a website like Chow.com with a name that’s a synonym for both food and the act of eating would have no problem attracting Gamespot.com’s audience. Based on data gathered from myself, people who visit Gamespot are mainly interested in video games and people who are mainly interested in video games are totally interested in eating.

So I was surprised when I visited Gamespot.com and saw a Chow.com ad that didn’t include any mention of chocolate or things fried in butter.

You know, for when you stay up all night getting blasted and playing Fat Princess, but forget about the big Street Fighter 4 tournament in the morning.

Instead of a food ad, Chow.com decided to go with a hangover cure ad. This struck me as a little disingenuous. I mean, come on Chow, you know you’re targeting Gamespot so you can get all our bacon-drooling asses over to your giant food recipe site. Were you worried that a food ad would be too transparent? Were you worried that if you put up something like

To be fair, this is quite difficult

the sweaty mass of acne and AC/DC shirts that comprises the Gamespot community would riot and tear down your website? Chow.com failed to realize that any anger brought on by a food ad could quickly be extinguished by offering some type of fast-food coupon since, statistically speaking, the people mad about the ad would be the people with blood atomically closest to tapioca pudding.  Here’s a helpful graph.

I actually find Chow.com’s hangover ad a little insulting. I interpret it as Chow.com thinking that all us pudgy-thumbed gamers over at Gamespot see drinking as the peak of coolness and that any ad mentioning drinking, hangovers, or Miller Lite will automatically get click-throughs.

But I think that a jokingly insulting food ad would get a lot more clicks. I like to think that I’m a part of a group of people who don’t mind being made fun of as long as it’s honest and humorous. I would much rather have seen any of the following ads than that hangover ad.

Flags are heavy. Well, flag poles are heavy. The flags themselves are really light.

or

The heavier you get, the harder it is to play for an extended period of time without excess glucose blurring your vision

or

I'd try this if I'd been more proactive and harvested that spare hobo heart I talked about a few posts ago.

Those three ads, while pointing out that Chow is interested in Gamespot because the Gamespot population likes food, are all more honest than that hangover ad. In the end, people who click on that hangover ad will never feel like they are genuinely wanted in the Chow community. They will only feel duped by a marketing tactic.

Durex has decided to focus on a market that is mostly ignored by other condom manufacturers and advertise directly to models living in some kind of post-modern sexscape. I don’t have a problem with Durex marketing their condoms to models as I’m certain that attractive people with attractive genitals have more sex than say below-average looking humor bloggers with below-average looking genitals.

What I find amusing is that Durex creates ads that look like they belong in magazines with titles like “Chrome Runway” and “French Ottoman” and then places these ads in magazines like “Rolling Stone,” which people like me read between video game sessions.

Durex has about ten of these “that’s my pleasure” ads, but I’m going to focus on one I extracted from a recent “Rolling Stone” magazine.

Durex thinks Rolling Stone readers regularly have back-to-back sex sessions with girls at Fashion Week

If Durex wants people who don’t have a portion of their sex on movie sets to believe this ad, they need to better ground it in reality.

Landscape

First of all, is she lying on a carpet? I mean, I can understand sex on a carpet happening once if your bed is covered in comic books and you’ve whined enough to convince your girlfriend that you can be even quicker than usual so she doesn’t miss any of “More to Love,” but what kind of sadist has sex twice on a carpet? Her back would look like Johnny from The Outsiders after he fumbled his dismount from the burning house.

Or maybe that isn’t carpet but some strange new type of mattress that only models sleep on. If that’s the case, Mattress Giant will have to change their jingle.

“For that Ooohh-ahh bed is only at Mattress Giant

Ooooohhhh-Ahhhhhhhhhhh

Ooooohhhh-Ahhhh AHHHHHH AHHHHHHH MY FUCKING SKIN”

Setup

What is she wearing? Because, from here, it looks like she’s wearing clothing. And I can’t think of something that kills a condom ad quicker than showing a girl in fabric.  “Wait, the condoms only work if she’s not naked?  FUCK THAT.”

Also, she’s too attractive. It’s easy to see this ad and fantasize that maybe, someday, a girl that looks close to that will ask you for directions to 36th street or something and then touch your arm when she thanks you. It’s harder to see this ad and fantasize that maybe, someday, with copious amounts of alcohol and banned second edition Dungeons & Dragons spells, you’ll be able to have sex with an equally attractive girl. It’s almost impossible to see this ad and fantasize that the girl will then want to “go again.” That’s what Langston Hughes calls a dream deferred.

The Copy

“Getting that ‘let’s-go-again’ look” is not effective ad-copy for the general population. And it’s definitely not effective ad-copy for the average “Rolling Stone” reader.

Let’s try some different copy that’s focused on the “Rolling Stone” audience.

This one would sell a lot of condoms

or

This one would sell a lot of condoms and mace. A Durex condom dispenser that also sprays mace isn't such a bad idea.

or

Nintendo might want to get a piece of this one.

Conclusion

The more I look at these “That’s my pleasure” ads, the more I can’t tell if Durex is trying to sell models, designer undergarments, interior design ideas, or condoms. I think the point is that the product ( it’s down there at the bottom left corner, parts of it barely readable) is getting lost in the advertising. I think that condoms you can barely feel advertise themselves, but what do I know?

Wait, condoms that I can't even feel?!?! THAT'S MY PLEASURE, BABY

]]> http://mediabane.com/durex-uses-fantasy-models-to-sell-condoms-in-thats-my-pleasure-ads/feed/ 2 http://mediabane.com/digg-com-helps-me-prove-my-bill-murray-attracts-bill-murray-theory/ http://mediabane.com/digg-com-helps-me-prove-my-bill-murray-attracts-bill-murray-theory/#comments Fri, 21 Aug 2009 17:29:39 +0000 http://mediabane.com/?p=522

I‘ve been looking for evidence to support my “Bill Murray attracts Bill Murray” theory or BMABM for years. I never thought Digg.com would be the website to finally provide me with the hard-facts I need.

Basically, I have this theory that Bill Murray will attract more Bill Murray just by being Bill Murray.  Does that make sense? If there’s a Caddyshack dvd in the bargain bin at Walmart, I can almost guarantee that there’s also a copy of Groundhog Day in that bin. If you see a poster of Bill Murray on the wall of the subway, there’s an excellent chance that some homeless guy is ejaculating into a tattered Stripes t’shirt not too far away.

Now I finally have proof! Thanks Digg.com and Crackle.com

There she is! That baby belongs in a frame

Here’s the same picture, but I marked it to better illustrate what I’m talking about.

I hope I didn't make this too technical

And here’s an enlargement of that same picture

Is that a tiny Bill Murray on Bill Murray's cheek?

The only question now is which came first, the Crackle ad or the Digg post? Did an advertisment on Digg have enough influence to create content? Or did content on Digg have enough influence to attract an advertisement? The latter is probably the most likely, but since I’m in the business of the first one, I’d like to think it went down that way.

Regardless of the amazing justification of my “Bill Murray Attracts Bill Murray” theory, I’d like to know more about Digg’s advertising backend. Is it powerful enough to that accurately target ads to content, or did it just get lucky? Also, can I really watch Rushmore for free?

There is one group that “Dancing With the Stars” has yet to addict to the show’s irresistible blend of dancing and washed-up celebrity. With the addition of Tom Delay, “Dancing With The Stars” hopes to finally reach America’s largely untapped criminal population.

Tom Delay should prove popular with both convicted convicts and accused criminals awaiting trial. Now all “Dancing With the Stars” has to do is market Tom Delay correctly. Here are a couple ideas to get them started.

Outfit

Criminals aren’t going to recognize Tom Delay as one of their own unless “Dancing With the Stars” makes it clear that Delay belongs behind bars. At first, I was going to suggest that Delay join a popular American gang like The Bloods or The Crips, but doing so would probably unite both gangs in their fervor to kill him. And a deceased Tom Delay can only be marketed to the deceased people, a group that traditionally doesn’t dance, watch TV. or breathe.

I think it’s safer if Delay’s outfit lets people know that he’s a criminal but doesn’t offend any criminals convicted of violent crimes as opposed to Delay’s white collar or “pussy” crime. And it’d be nice if this outfit also had something to do with dance. Given these factors, I suggest Elvis’s outfit from Jailhouse Rock.

Tom Delay on Dancing With the Stars

The only negative thing about a a prison-uniform outfit is that Tom will have to wear it in every dance.

“Dancing With the Stars” should also outfit Tom Delay with some kind of face or neck tattoo. It will be tempting for “Dancing With the Stars” to go cheap with a temporary tat, but I can’t stress the marketing importance of making everything seem as genuine as possible. Delay’s new tattoo should be real and permanent. It should be something that has to do with criminal life, but it shouldn’t be too tough because “harder” criminals will see right through a bloody syringe or a cauldron full of infants. I suggest the McDonald’s Hamburglar holding a bag of money.

The cape should flow nicely with Delay's jawline.

Dancing

To help people in lock-up relate to Tom Delay’s dancing, each dance should be performed in an eight foot by twelve foot area to simulate the amount of space available in a typical prison cell. If imprisoned criminals can’t perform Tom Delay’s dances at home, they’ll stop watching “Dancing With the Stars” and go back to making kidney-picks out of toothbrushes.

I’m not very familiar with prison dances, but if Delay can work in some push ups or weightlifting, it will probably only help. I also suggest that Tom Delay be paired up with a male dancer to simulate the type of dance partner available in prison. Delay should also make this dance partner his “bitch” with “dance rape.” The “dance rape” will have to be fake, real rape obviously won’t go over well with most advertisers. (Note: Dancing with the Stars could try signing up some pro-rape advertisers, but they all might be busy creating ads for the Glenn Beck show.) If nothing else, this simulated rape dancing will provide Tom Delay with some practice for the future.

Attitude

This should come naturally for Tom. All he has to do is act like a total asshole to anyone who questions his dancing, his neck tattoo, the positions he chooses for “dance rape,” or his theories on evolution. It’s most important that Delay is as belligerent as possible to the judges as most criminals despise judges.

"Forget the Death Tax. All you goddamn judges want to do is hit me with a fucking Dance Tax."

Since Tom Delay doesn’t look like a traditionally tough criminal, it might be beneficial for “Dancing With the Stars” to choreograph some stunt for Delay to up his street cred. Looking at the upcoming roster, Delay might be able to best Melissa Joan Hart or Aaron Carter in a fair fight, but we don’t want to take any chances that Delay will starting to crying and ranting about health care after taking a punch. For these reasons, I suggest the Delay “shank” either Chuck Liddel or Macy Gray. Both can take a stabbing in stride, and the incident will prove to all the convicts watching that Tom Delay is the real deal.

Conclusion

If “Dancing With the Stars” markets him correctly, they can successfully use Tom Delay to reach a traditionally unreachable part of the population. If Tom Delay plays his cards right, he could have a meaningful future teaching convicts how to win at “dance rape.”