September 22, 2015 07:06 AM UTC

Super-Scary Anti-Bennet Iran Ad Parodied In Record Time

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• by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: AP via the Colorado Springs Gazette—it looks like Advancing Colorado was fudging their buy number for dramatic effect, as if the ad wasn’t enough melodrama:

“With Washington Republicans lacking an opponent in the Colorado Senate race, it comes as no surprise that a secretly funded group with ties to the billionaire Koch brothers is out with a deeply offensive, fear-mongering attack against Sen. Bennet,” said Andrew Zucker, senior communications adviser at the Colorado Democratic Party.

Lockwood, who formerly ran the conservative billionaire Koch brothers’ Colorado young voter outreach organization, said Advancing Colorado is not funded by the Koch brothers, though he declined to disclose donors. He said the ad buy was six figures, including broadcast stations in Denver starting Tuesday, and online and digital. Democrats said the broadcast portion is only $46,000, which Lockwood didn’t dispute, making it a fairly small buy. [Pols emphasis]

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A press release from well-funded conservative advocacy group Advancing Colorado this morning announces a “shocking” new ad, criticizing Sen. Michael Bennet for his support for the agreement with Iran to prevent that nation from developing nuclear weapons:

Today, Advancing Colorado launched a six-figure television advertising campaign to alert Coloradans to Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet’s support for the president’s Iran Deal. The launch follows Bennet repeatedly voting to block an up-or-down vote on the disapproval resolution.

The video sequence begins with children counting down from ten in their native languages. The children countdown in English, Hebrew, German, Spanish, Arabic, Italian, Russian, Chinese and Swedish. Then video of a mushroom cloud explosion cuts off the last child as she says, “one,” with intense sound effects and a lasting piercing noise, depicting a nuclear attack from the leading state sponsor of terror.

“A nuclear Iran is a threat to the entire world. Sen. Michael Bennet support’s Obama’s Iran Deal. Sen. Michael Bennet is jeopardizing our safety. Call Sen. Michael Bennet,” the ad declares, featuring Bennet’s DC office’s phone number. “Ask him, ‘Why?’”

It’s a shocking TV spot, for sure, but it’s hardy original: the sequence of cute kids counting followed by a loud, scary nuclear explosion is a direct homage to the infamous 1964 “Daisy” ad produced by Lyndon Johnson against Barry Goldwater. That these historically gripping visuals are being used to campaign against a peace agreement, as opposed to calling out Goldwater’s foreign policy belligerence, is rather Orwellian. For members of the public who know the underlying story of the Iran agreement, this ad could be an offensive backfire.

But that may not be the best part of the story: overnight, before this ad was announced to the public, we were sent a parody version with a request not to post it until Advancing Colorado’s ad was released–but as soon afterward as we could. Don’t ask us what happened here with Advancing Colorado’s internal production process, but the parody is truly hilarious if you’ve seen the original:

It helps if you’ve seen Terminator 2. As long as you have, this turns the six-digit scare into a bit of a punchline.

But don’t worry, folks, Advancing Colorado will “be back!” After all, they’re very well funded.