Tucker Bounds’ great quote

By Jennifer J. Foster

Published: October 31, 2008

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know the absolute disdain I have for canned campaign quotes.

But every now and then, someone comes up with a good one.

Enter Tucker Bounds, one of John McCain’s campaign spokesmen.

Bounds responded to the Obamamercial with a statement Wednesday night. Included in Bounds’s statement was this gem:

As anyone who has bought anything from an infomercial knows, the sales job is always better than the product. Buyer beware.

Come on. I don’t care if you’re Billy Mays; that’s funny.

Not surprisingly, though, some people have just plain lost their sense of humor.

I didn’t even know there was such a thing as the Electronic Retailing Association, but apparently, it is “a trade association that represents direct marketers that use electronic means including infomercials.“

Well, they’re really mad. ERA CEO Rick Petry said:

“To use a political agenda to indict an entire genre of advertising by portraying it in such a negative light is patently unfair. It would be like charging an entire industry and everyone associated with it, say politics for example, as being scurrilous. We at ERA will be the first to tell you that there are some who use this method of advertising inappropriately, which is why we have an independent self-regulation program, ERSP ( http://www.narcpartners.org/ersp/index.aspx ), administered by the National Advertising Review Council in partnership with the Council of Better Business Bureau. With this watchdog mechanism in place, claims have to be proven; a standard that politicians are not required to live up to. The fact is infomercials have been used by not only start-ups with unique products, but successful brands such as Kodak and Mercedes Benz, even the U.S. Navy.“

Oh, get over yourself! Calm down! Have a laugh!

Unless, of course, Petry thinks all this stuff is made up.