Tag: Michelle Obama

In what can only be called a recurring theme, another Republican/teabagger/conservative idiot has failed to recognize that racism against black people is not a universally accepted tenet, and that not everyone welcomes emails depicting the Obamas as pimped-out, watermelon-eating, simian-looking members of a race too lazy to flee from hurricanes. It’s happened in California, Florida, Texas, and now, Tennessee.

This go-round featured the following email from Walt Baker, CEO of the Tennessee Hotel & Lodging Association and Principal of a group called MERCATUS Communications, going out to “[Nashville Convention & Visitors Bureau Pres. Butch] Spyridon, Nashville Mayor Karl Dean’s legislative liaison, public relations executives and members of the Nashville media.”

From: Walt Baker < wbaker@mercatuscom.com > To: Albie DelFavero, Bruce Dobie, Butch Spyridon, Joe Hall, Peter Heidenreich, Terry Clements, Toby Compton, Chuck Creasy, Rob Moorefield, Ken Whitehouse, Paul Brown, Bob Davis Date: March 4, 2010 9:18:29 PM CST

Quoting Larry the Cable Guy…I don’t care who you are, this is funny…

I was at the store yesterday, and I ran into Tarzan! I asked him how it was going and if he was into anymore movies.??

He told me that he could no longer make any more movies as he had severe arthritis in both shoulders and could no longer swing from vine to tree.

??I asked how Jane was doing, he told me she was in bad shape, in a nursing home, has Alzheimer’s and no longer recognizes anyone, how sad. I asked about Boy, and he told me that Boy had gone to the big city, got hooked up with bad women, drugs, alcohol, and the only time he heard from him was if he was in trouble or needed something.?

I asked about Cheeta, he beamed and said she was doing good, had married a Lawyer and now lived in the White House!!!

And here are the accompanying graphics.

Turns out he should have cared who you were. Despite his defense of the email as “political humor,” Baker’s company has been dumped by the Convention Center.

The Nashville Convention & Visitors Bureau on Saturday dropped its contract with Baker’s marketing firm Mercatus Communications. The firm had received almost $50,000 to market the new convention center and money that came indirectly from Metro to market the annual Music City Bowl.

In his “apology,” Baker, who showed true obliviousness for a man with a porcine countenance in comparing the First Lady’s face to a chimp’s, demonstrated how profoundly he doesn’t get it.

In an e-mail sent to Metro Council members Saturday, Baker suggested the message was intended as a joke but was misinterpreted:

“I did not think or consider its implications, other than that it was political humor. I am saddened that anyone misinterpreted the sentiments behind the e-mail.

“I deeply apologize to anyone who is offended by this action. I hope that those who know me realize that the message was not intended to be malicious or hurtful in any way and can find it in their hearts to forgive me.”

If there was a shred of political humor in this gag, I missed it. The punchline says Michelle Obama is a chimpanzee. The attached photos compare her to a chimpanzee. And the political aspect in that is…? Didn’t think so.

Baker wrote the five-year marketing plan for the State of Tennessee in 1986, under Republican Gov. (now Senator) Lamar Alexander.