I think the fundamental case against John McCain may be his strident endorsement of Crocs:
You'd think that the conservative candidate -- an old man no less -- would be able to stand up for the sanctity of traditional footwear.
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McCain and Crocs
07 Jul 2008 07:11 pm
Comments (56)
Crocs are right-wing Birkenstocks
Air quotes? Jesus fuck.
If Obama weren't a black man named Hussein, he'd be looking at 400 electoral votes in November.
Serious, thoughtful political commentary, the kind only a Harvard philosophy major could pen. Bill Kristol must be jealous.
I have no problem with Crocs. And the owner is fairly philanthropic. But he has been involved in some nasty affairs.
From the Denver Post (6/2/2006)
"One of the founders of the wildly successful Crocs line of resin shoes faces criminal charges after a long-standing family feud erupted last week in a murder threat.
George B. Boedecker Jr., 44, of Boulder is charged with calling his former brother-in-law, lawyer David Moorhead, and saying, 'I'm going to slit your (expletive) throat,' according to statements to Boulder police."
From the Boulder Daily Camera (2/6/2007):
"A Crocs founding father was kicked out of a Boulder sushi bar over the weekend for causing a ruckus and later accused one of its patrons of stealing his $85,000 watch.
Police were called at 9 p.m. Saturday to Hapa Sushi Grill on the Pearl Street Mall on a report that George Brian Boedecker — who made millions off the hole-filled shoes — was drunk and harassing customers."
It's amazing how he continues to be painfully awkward in giving his speeches.
Wow - another painfully awkward performance by Sen. McCain. Anyone think he'll get better at this before the election?
He's sounding a little like Austin Powers with that laugh.. Or is it Dr. Evil? I'm not sure.. I just know I sure could picture Goldmember in a pair of those things. Don't get me started on the Love Guru!
McCain needs to stop making those jokes in his speeches. The pauses, waiting for a reaction from an unresponsive crowd followed by painfully awkward chuckles are what makes them so hard to watch.
CROX price 10/31/07: $75.21
CROX price today: $6.91
They're also lobbying FOR more trade restrictions, so the entirety of his argument is baseless.
There's a snarky comment about how Crocs are appealing to people of McCain's a...
Nope, not gonna go there.
Air quotes? Jesus fuck.
My sentiments exactly.
Wow. I bought a pair of Crocs yesterday! I've always thought they were hideous, but my friend raves all the time about how comfortable they are. Because they look so ugly, I set out to get them in the ugliest color possible. And I am happy to report that they are available in realtree and the crocs store at the 3d street promenade in santa monica. They actually are incredibly comfortable. You know when at a playground or something sometimes they have the ground surface made of mats of little rubber bits glued together? When you wear crocs, it feels like you are walking on that stuff all the time.
"He's sounding a little like Austin Powers with that laugh.. Or is it Dr. Evil? I'm not sure.."
I believe the word you are looking for is: asshole.
whoa- he needs to bring back the green screen.
What UberMitch said. Yes, it's true that they're not the hippest-looking brogans in the closet, but they are comfortable to walk in, especially for those of us who are getting up there like Ol' John. Unlike Mitch, however, I chose mine in subtle earth tones. And I limit my use to the beach, where the tan color sort of blends in.
And I limit my use to the beach, where the tan color sort of blends in.
This is acceptable, as long as they are not paired with black socks.
I heard that Crocs are really bad for your feet...well, if you wear them a lot.
More crock-pot Republican economic ideas!
Doesn't McCain know sandals are for socialists? George Orwell: "One sometimes gets the impression that the mere words 'Socialism' and 'Communism' draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, 'Nature Cure' quack, pacifist, and feminist in England." (The Road to Wigan Pier, ch. 10)
Frank Rizzo, the great former police chief and Mayor of Phila, said that homosexuals wear shoes without laces.
More crock-pot Republican economic ideas!
Doesn't McCain know sandals are for socialists? George Orwell: "One sometimes gets the impression that the mere words 'Socialism' and 'Communism' draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, 'Nature Cure' quack, pacifist, and feminist in England." (The Road to Wigan Pier, ch. 10)
He's worse than Tim Calhoun!!
As with most things, the Onion's cartoonist was all over this one in advance (really, this is worth your time).
As with most things, the Onion's cartoonist was all over this in advance.
(The cartoon, like the candidate, is a parody of an out-of-touch, confused political dinosaur).
I'm starting to think that the Sandmen had the right idea in Logan's Run. And I'm over 30.
Crocs are also ridiculouly expensive ($25+) for what they are: a dollop of foam in the shape of a clog. How much do you think it cost to make a pair, 8 cents? You can by knock-offs for $5 at wallgreens.
Weren't Crocs the footwear of choice in Idiocracy? Maybe it was just the prisoners that wore them, but they were definitely featured in that gem.
Wow, that was awful. There are more effective candidates running for 7th grade class president.
He is...buffoonish is the closest I can come up with...when he tries to deliver zingers. They're pretty lame zingers to begin with - "Her certainly says no we can't a lot." - but the way he delivers them, he makes them even worse.
He certainly says no we can't a lot.
Heh. Heh.
*grimmace* *look around*
The audience acts like they're helping an invalid up the stairs every time they applaud. Good for YOU, John!
It doesn't just fail; it makes McCain look like a tool. He's completely lost, adrift, wholly dependent on his campaign advisors, and they're making an idiot of him. Far worse than Kerry under Shrum, and that was pretty awful, too.
I use them as garden shoes. Very good for that purpose, and also good for wearing to the convenient store in the middle of hte night. And my eight year old daughter loves hers.
Like wearing slippers outdoors.
But absolutely hideous.
"(The cartoon, like the candidate, is a parody of an out-of-touch, confused political dinosaur)."
One could say the same thing about the Onion's cartoonist, as long as you add angry, misanthropic, unfunny, and paranoid. There must be a very interesting story behind the fact that the Onion has a single unhinged far-right political cartoonist.
There must be a very interesting story behind the fact that the Onion has a single unhinged far-right political cartoonist.
FYI, Colatina: those Onion cartoons are intended to be satire a la "The Colbert Report." (I'm not sure if you actually missed the joke, or if your comment was intended to add one more ironic pancake to the stack.)
"FYI, Colatina: those Onion cartoons are intended to be satire a la "The Colbert Report." (I'm not sure if you actually missed the joke, or if your comment was intended to add one more ironic pancake to the stack.)"
If that's true then the joke's on me. Now that I look back at some of them it's obvious. I guess it's that cartoon's usually beat you over the head with the point. There's also the fact that half of the cartoons barely make sense as jokes, let alone satires of right-wing ideology.
This is sort of like watching Ming the Merciless or someone like that trying to get elected to public office, and basically messing up all the magnanimous-sounding lines someone has written for him because what he's really chafing to say is something that's totally the opposite, like "Evil will reign supreme!"
Friends don't let friends wear Crocs. This might make me elitist for making fun of people wearing overpriced foam that gets caught in escalators, getting your toes cut off, but Crocs are the sweat pants of shoes. The fact that George Costanza was a grown man and would wear sweat pants everywhere was an easy way to show he was a loser who had given up on life. Your appearance says things to people and wearing Crocs just says "I don't have the self-worth to care or look decent anymore. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to eat a whole pint of Haagen-Daaz while crying and hating myself. Has anyone seen my Real Doll?" You know that one American tourist who when he goes abroad is such a stereotypically ugly American that all of the other American tourists start hating that guy? You know, the guy in an old white T-shirt or an ugly Hawaiin shirt, shorts that don't fit him and black socks with sandals who carries his camera everywhere while complaining about the food and only eating at the Hard Rock Cafe and Planet Hollywood? Well, he has now ditched the black socks with sandals for Crocs. The fact that they now sell them down the street from my Beijing apartment is even worse.
This speech - taxes + golf = the sad sad late performances of Bob Hope's career.
"And I limit my use to the beach, where the tan color sort of blends in.
Posted by Henderstock | July 7, 2008 9:28 PM"
Ditto what Tyro said. This is the only place wearing Crocs is acceptable. Nobody would sit down to eat at any restaurant not next to a beach wearing a wet swimsuit and no shirt, so why some people show up and say "Your restaurant is so crappy, I'm not even going to respect it or the people around me enough to wear actual footwear" by wearing Crocs, I have no idea. At least the old man at the buffet wearing socks and sandals is wearing actual sandals and not the shoe version of a five year old's Nerf football.
So how did McCain come to pick Crocs as his example? Turns out Rick Sharp is the CEO of Crocs and also Carmax. He held a fundraiser at his estate in Richmond, VA with Bush as the guest of honor that raised $630,000 for the Republican Party. The logrolling never ends with these guys. Crocs needs a bit of a boost since it has lost 90% of its value in the last year.
Bold prediction: 10 years from now, Crocs will be no more.
It's this decades version of Vision Street Wear. Trendy for a while, but subject to a backlash.
He's actually too pathetic to be a buffoon. More like a pantaloon. Except he's too fat.
I am very conflicted about this race, and have not decided who to vote for. But I admit, every time recently that I have watched a McCain speech, I cannot believe how awful he is. What happened to the McCain from 2000? Is it just that he's older? It's as if he's never given a public speech before. I don't think a president should be chosen on charisma and rhetorical ability alone, but if something doesn't change drastically, Obama will be president simply because he's eloquent and inspiring. So far, McCain is an embarrassment.
So McCain endorses businesses whose success is heavily dependent on having perpetrated fraud on the USPTO and then subsequently making misleading statements about the nature of their IP rights in their SEC statements? Good to know!
I dunno, it makes sense to me. They mostly seem to be McCain's favorite shade of green.
So how did McCain come to pick Crocs as his example? Turns out Rick Sharp is the CEO of Crocs and also Carmax. He held a fundraiser at his estate in Richmond, VA
To quote A. Whitney Brown: "Say what you want about Stalin, at least he didn't do commercials."
I wonder what the rates for product placement are in McCain's speeches.
They're everywhere in Japan. Maybe there's some exception for Japanese fashion, but I never knew Americans felt so strongly about Crocs. I personally prefer to wear my wooden geta around.
Uh guys, the people wearing black or white socks with their sandals aren't Americans, they're German tourists.
Well, fashion be damned, then. I tell you that crocs are the penultimate in foot comfort. And the only thing more comfortable with crocs: crocs with socks! I feel like I'm floating on clouds and angels are gently wafting me down the street while a choir sings softly in the background. You can point and laugh all you like.
Dont you people ever wonder why those who wear Crocs are so smug despite wearing something stupid-looking in public? They just are that comfortable/amazing...Anyway, in the hospital where I work almost everyone wears them due to their superiority over regular shoes (though I suppose given that scrubs which are basically glorified pajamas are acceptable this isnt too surprising)...Before becoming a giant fashion douchebag, one should give them a try...
Dont you people ever wonder why those who wear Crocs are so smug despite wearing something stupid-looking in public? They just are that comfortable/amazing...Anyway, in the hospital where I work almost everyone wears them due to their superiority over regular shoes (though I suppose given that scrubs which are basically glorified pajamas are acceptable this isnt too surprising)...Before becoming a giant fashion douchebag, one should give them a try...
Dont you people ever wonder why those who wear Crocs are so smug despite wearing something stupid-looking in public? They just are that comfortable/amazing...Anyway, in the hospital where I work almost everyone wears them due to their superiority over regular shoes (though I suppose given that scrubs which are basically glorified pajamas are acceptable this isnt too surprising)...Before becoming a giant fashion douchebag, one should give them a try...
"Well, fashion be damned, then. I tell you that crocs are the penultimate in foot comfort. And the only thing more comfortable with crocs: crocs with socks! I feel like I'm floating on clouds and angels are gently wafting me down the street while a choir sings softly in the background. You can point and laugh all you like.
Posted by Craig | July 8, 2008 9:39 AM"
Enjoy fucking up your feet. You know what else is comfortable? Being naked. That doesn't mean you should go everywhere naked. Babies also seem comfortable in diapers, but you wouldn't wear those in public (whatever people do in private, I don't care).
The best part of this is that Crocs were invented by a Canadian company. A *french*-canadian company. They were acquired later on. A story of American enterpreneurship if I ever saw one!
I wear Crocs, simply because its awfully hard to tie shoes with a broken hand. They're better than sandals, but running shoes are tops for comfort and not having nasty feet at the end of the day.
Penultimate means next to the last.
I call crocs UPS standing for ugly plastic shoes. Nevertheless, I wear, the orthopedic kind that accomedate my orthodic. It shows how low my standards have gotten as I've aged, but they're very comfortable Now that they are associated with John McCain though, I'm put in a real bind. I guess if I was my crocs and my Obama button at the same time it will balance everything out.
Crocs copied Waldies.
Waldies were two-years old by the time Crocs were supposedly invented. Crocs were first made with the exact molds and production capabilities previously used by Waldies. But Waldies could not make a financial go of the business. So, the business changed hands and eventually Crocs took over and became big by having a marketing engine to enter homogeneous mall culture and by trolling its likely invalid patents. Waldies were a big deal in the Appalachian Trail hiking community by early 2003 (as camp/town shoes), but hikers were then frustrated by summertime when local outfitters pulled the Waldies off the shelves to wait for the dust to settle from the emerging intellectual property threats lobbed by Crocs.
So, Crocs is indeed a model pick for the new American business--it used an unoriginal idea cloaked in ambiguous IP and succeeded largely by marketing efforts, rather than by true innovation.
Crocs copied Waldies.
Waldies were two-years old by the time Crocs were supposedly invented. Crocs were first made with the exact molds and production capabilities previously used by Waldies. But Waldies could not make a financial go of the business. So, the business changed hands and eventually Crocs took over and became big by having a marketing engine to enter homogeneous mall culture and by trolling its likely invalid patents. Waldies were a big deal in the Appalachian Trail hiking community by early 2003 (as camp/town shoes), but hikers were then frustrated by summertime when local outfitters pulled the Waldies off the shelves to wait for the dust to settle from the emerging intellectual property threats lobbed by Crocs.
So, Crocs is indeed a model pick for the new American business--it used an unoriginal idea cloaked in ambiguous IP and succeeded largely by marketing efforts, rather than by true innovation.
As someone who masquerades as a podiatrist, I gotta say that they are damn comfortable, and the flip-flops are less ugly, but comfort does not equal good foot care.
Comments closed July 21, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
Especially odd choice since they lost a few million last quarter, and they're getting sued all over the place.
Posted by matt | July 7, 2008 7:19 PM