If the Internet has taught us anything, it’s that even the most boring, tedious back-and-forth political minutia about dollar signs can be transformed into something funny — or, at the very least, something slightly more entertaining.
So it goes with the debt ceiling debate, which seems to progress like trench warfare in World War I.
You can get all that detailed coverage you need from The Daily Caller’s own top-notch reporters. But thank goodness for PACs, independent groups, bored stay-at-home dads and Taiwan. They’ve given the talks over debt and imaginary ceilings a bit of spice and humor.
Check out some of the more enjoyable media hits about the debt debate below. They certainly don’t compare to nudie sites and kitten videos, but they sure beat another Hill press conference.
Remy’s “Raise The Debt Ceiling” rap
Rap hasn’t been this political since Kanye West announced that he doesn’t care about white presidents. Remy’s rhyme, by the libertarian weirdos at Reason magazine, manages to drop both lyrical bombs and statistical scuds.
Where else are you going to hear lines like this:
Still making it rain // And yeah it be so pleasing // Wait, not making it rain // We be “Quantitative Easing!”
Eat your heart out Lil Wayne:
Debt ceiling explained in commentary and through abstract art
If, for some inexplicable reason, you’ve decided that after those great bong hits you want to really understand the debt ceiling crisis on a cosmic level, this might be the video for you.
Artiste Steve Props’ illustrated debt ceiling is more of a “multi-dimensional” debt box because “this is a mult-dimensional problem.” There are also multi-colored “loves & kisses,” “slings & arrows” and long, slender objects leading up to the ceiling that look very … well, it’s certainly interesting.
Be sure to bring an extra spliff or two, because the video is 10 minutes long. And don’t just skip ahead to the kaleidoscopic final product. A Jackson Pollack commentary on postwar poverty among the transgender dwarf community might make more immediate visual sense. Best to listen to Props’ continuous dialogue:
The debt debate, animated
It’s not really an important news item until the Taiwan-based Next Media Animation (NMA) gives your story a once-over. Big winners to date: Al Gore’s alleged sex scandal, Tiger Woods’ actual sex scandal and that angry JetBlue flight attendant who quit his job with style.
This NMA debt-limit video features President Obama’s credit card getting declined by a giant bear at the grocery store and a very haggard and gin blossoms-looking Uncle Sam — not to mention literally shrinking dollars.
The other debt debate video from NMA features those rascally members of Congress who refused to get their “asses in line” behind House Speaker John Boehner’s plan. In NMA’s depiction, the Tea Party members are 50-foot-tall infants who throw their poo at Boehner. There’s also a pack of violent bears wreaking bloody havoc on the floor of the stock exchange and a Rock Master Scott & The Dynamic Three soundtrack.
How long will the debt debt last?
If anything, it seems the more time it takes to reach a deal, the more offbeat and in-depth the videos will get. Unfortunately for debt ceiling video connoisseurs, it does seem like a deal is in the offing.
But in the past week, videos about the debate included mock commercials, mock horror movies and metaphors about hot potatoes. If the compromise deal falls apart and the crisis goes on longer, maybe we’ll even see an Avatar-like full-length movie.
The debt debate is now truly a horror movie
It’s like George Romero had a zombie child with Ayn Rand.
A video from the Power Line blog re-imagines the current financial debate boiling in Washington, D.C. in a post-apocalyptic future where the dead debt walks the earth and only a few fiscally responsible, freedom-loving individuals still roam.
Debts, lies and tweet pics
How do you make the debt crisis interesting? The same way you make anything else more watchable: sex it up! At least that’s sort of what the group Ending Spending did when the debt debate really began to pick up steam a few weeks ago.
Although the video lambasts both sides for their inability to tamp down on skyrocketing spending, the 45-second spot was part of the fallout from New York Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner’s show-and-tell debacle and ends with a heck of a zinger: “Next time, congressmen, please just show us your plan for ending spending.”
Yeah, keep it in your pants … the money that is:
National debt is a woman’s problem, too
The parody ad from the group Concerned Women for America advertises “Spenditol,” the new miracle drug “made in Washington” and the “answer to all the painful problems Americans face.” In a pitch-perfect spoof of the standard drug ads seen on TV, “Spenditol” features an attractive, suburban soccer mom suffering from the “chronic pain” of gas prices, potential unemployment and paying the bills. Then she cheerfully announces:
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