January 4, 2010, - 3:31 pm
$340 Mill for Census “Rock Tour,” $80M for Arabic, Yiddish (?!) Census Ads (Most US Jews Speak English)
I had to laugh, this morning, when I read my USA Today, and on the cover, was this article about how the U.S. Census Bureau is spending and “unprecedented” $340 million to promote the census in ads, cargo vans, and a “Census Portrait of America Road Tour.” Stops at the Super Bowl, New Orleans for Mardi Gras, Chinese New Year–these Census folks are gonna be partying like members of Aerosmith. And the new Census chief (about whose fuzzy math I’ve written) gets a free tax-paid Alaskan fishing trip.
I laughed not at the absurd amount of money (which is anger-inducing, not cause for laughter), but that $80 mill of it is being spent on ads to target certain “ethnic groups” in foreign languages. Included in those foreign languages are Arabic and Yiddish. While there are many locations in America, where Arab Muslims (not Arab Christians, who speak English quite well) cannot speak English, that’s not new. In fact, we disgustingly pandered to Arab Muslims in the 2000 Census, with Arabic posters and ads in the most pro-Hezbollah neighborhoods of the Detroit area.
But Yiddish? Most Jews in America speak English, and we participate in the Census as we always have. And even the few Yiddish speakers left (it’s a dying Jewish language–a German-Hebrew hybrid), who are largely in Chassidic and other very religious Orthodox Jewish communities, speak English quite well. We are not lingua-challenged and don’t need this bi-lingual BS. We didn’t ask for this and we don’t need it.
It’s as if they are doing this and announcing it in order to give Arab Muslims a sop, when Americans get angry that they are wasting $80 to reach the Abdulmutallab, Arafat, and Nasrallah Friends Society so they can “be counted” to get more taxpayer money. “Well, they’re spending the money on the JOOOOOS’ language, too!” And, frankly, that’s exactly why they are wasting tax money on this Yiddish business. So, we won’t “look down” on the “Religion of Peace” and the other divisions of the Obama voting and amnesty brigade at whom this multi-lingual waste of money is aimed. “But they’re doing it for the JOOOS!” It’s ridiculous.
The government’s unprecedented $340 million promotional blitz of the 2010 Census launches Monday with the debut of the Census Portrait of America Road Tour in New York City’s Times Square.
A 46-foot trailer, to be unveiled on NBC’s Today show, and 12 smaller cargo vans with 14-foot trailers will crisscross more than 150,000 miles nationwide through April to promote the benefits of responding to the 10-question Census.
They will stop at more than 800 events from local parades and festivals such as New Orleans’ Mardi Gras and San Francisco’s Chinese New Year celebration to national sporting events from the Super Bowl and the Daytona 500 to the NCAA Final Four.
“This thing is all over the place,” says Angelo Falcón, president of the National Institute for Latino Policy and chairman of the Census advisory committee on Hispanics. He jokes that “it might make people sick of the Census.”
This is just the beginning:
• $140 million on TV, radio, print and outdoor advertising, including $2.5 million for two ads in the Feb. 7 Super Bowl pregame show and a 30-second spot directed by Christopher Guest (This is Spinal Tap, Best in Show) and starring Ed Begley Jr.
• Roughly $80 million spent on ads will target racial and ethnic groups and non-English speakers in 28 languages. The bulk of it will pinpoint Hispanics, blacks, Asians and American Indians, but some ads will be in Arabic, Yiddish and other languages.
• Partners from Univision and Telemundo to Google and Best Buy will promote the Census.
• Census Director Robert Groves will help count the first American in the Inupiat village of Noorvik, Alaska, Jan. 25. The Census is done early in remote areas that have no road connections and where residents leave to fish and hunt after the spring thaw.
Most American companies can’t afford a Superbowl ad. That Taxpayers, Inc. is being forced to pay for one to promote what was supposed to be a simple count–not a giant bureaucracy to enable amnesty and the welfare state–is beyond ridiculous.
Tags: Alaskan Fishing Trip, Angelo Falcon, Arabic, Best Buy, bi-lingual, Census, Census Director, Chinese New Year, Christopher Guest, Daytona 500, Ed Begley Jr, Google, language, Mardi Gras, NCAA Final Four, Noorvik, Robert Groves, Super Bowl, Super Bowl Ad, u.s. census, U.S. Census Bureau, US Census, Yiddish
Debbie:
I once heard a Jewish roommate talking to his mother on the phone in “Yiddish” (1980s). I know a little German and I’m pretty sure it was not Yiddish he was jabbering, it sounded more like pigeon German. I could tell exactly what he was saying. I wonder how many younger Jews think they know Yiddish when they really don’t.
JLin on January 4, 2010 at 3:43 pm