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Watch your hard-earned tax dollars sail away

U.S. politicians' campaign promises to end dependence on foreign oil finally seemed to jump the shark with the latest presidential election; for some reason, the media finally felt free to take notice that every major-party candidate for the presidency makes a big deal of this every single time, yet nothing ever gets done about it. I heard some talk about how Carter and Nixon had made major campaign planks out of such concerns—but who was truly the first to emphasize it? Perhaps it was this scrappy little bantam?

Most people, even if they were old enough to remember the '68 campaign, would not be able to tell you that the Wallace campaign gave roughly equal time to school busing, inner-city violence, and foreign oil.

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Comments (7)

Was the idea that through the end of school bussing and a reduction in the firebombing of businesses, America's need for fuel would decrease?

Tybalt:

Foreign oil? That's an attack on foreign *aid* - "giveaway of your American dollars and products to those countries that aid our enemies."

So what's in the tanker then?

Tax dollars. Nothing but tax dollars.

RGlasel:

I guess today's young people don't know American history as well as I thought they did. Governor Wallace was the blackhead of White Southerners, desperately wanting to pop and leave a pockmark in the face of American politics. Of course you couldn't be overtly racist in advertising, even in 1968, so you used shorthand.

Busing out of your neighborhood and taking authority away from local school boards referred to federally mandated racial integration in schools. The Molotov cocktail in the store window referred to urban riots, and what appeared to be the inability of white policemen to keep a lid on rioting blacks. And for the oil tankers; well believe it or not, anti-Americanism was even more virulent during the Vietnam War than during the Iraq occupation and the Six Day War took place in 1967. Technically, those were Arabs who had the oil, not blacks, but Malcolm X was a black Muslim, and it was hard to distinguish between college kids protesting the draft, Black Power activists, civil rights activists, foreigners of every color burning U.S. flags, P.L.O. terrorists, Commies,...

AtlanticTy:

I think the tanker just meant foreign trade in general...considering the rest of the ad probably cost about $20, I don't think we should overestimate their ability to specifically point out an oil tanker.

Half Canadian:

Fuel self-sufficiency today, fuel self-sufficiency tomorrow, fuel self-sufficiency forever!

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