Aug 30, 2008 10:00 AM
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San Francisco, 9:38 PM
Tue Feb 9
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Yes, yes, we get it already: the Republican Prez/Veep ticket looks just like Colonel Tigh and President Roslin from Battlestar Galactica. In what is either a sign that BSG has achieved cultural critical mass or that at least one of the two Republican nominees to office is actually an alcoholic robot, the similarities between the two pairs seemed to be one of the most common commentaries about McCain's choice of Sarah Palin for Vice President yesterday. We trace the limited lifespan of this meme.
The Burn Lab was the first to notice the similarities, with the image that now seems to be everywhere online, but a Boston Craigslist posting an hour later took it a little further:
The parallels continue! McCain is a military man who spent time in a Vietnam prison camp, the character of Col. Tigh is a military man who spent time in a Cylon prison camp. Sarah Palin comes from a family of school teachers, the character of Laura Roslin was school teacher before becoming Secretary of Education (and then later President).
Plus, Palin has also slept with Edward James Olmos*! OMG!
The Battlestar Bloggers knew what to do with this kind of meme and jumped right into action:
Okay, it has to be done. With the obvious notice that McCain/Palin looks a lot like Tigh/Roslin, I've gone off and registered TighRoslin.com and am provisioning a site.
May I be so bold as to solicit anyone here who is interested in doing so to create campaign banners and graphics? And if you fancy yourself a writer, any content would be terribly helpful. Position papers, an election platform, that kind of stuff. Hell, look at the existing Obama and McCain sites, copy wholesale and change it up. Political satire is squarely Fair Use, and I intend to have fun with it.
Before too long, Paste Magazine had picked up the story and, ultimately, it had its way to the political blogs; here, Reason Magazine manages to kill the joke:
The chatter is all about how Gov. Palin's inexperience will undermine the McCain campaign's ability to hammer on Sen. Obama for his inexperience. The comparison seems a little odd, though. If McCain is elected, she'll be picking up highly relevant experience very rapidly, in the low exposure role of VP. Obama won't have that luxury. [However, we must consider the] Battlestar Galactica scenario: McCain could also be killed when the Cylons return and wipe out most of humanity with a nuclear weapon. In Battlestar, the 42 officials in line ahead of Secretary of Education Laura Roslin fail to check in, and she assumes the presidency. She has no foreign policy experience, either.
Two things spring to mind immediately. Firstly, that no-one seemed to want to draw the McCain/Roslin cancer parallels - too cruel? - and secondly, that it took less than five hours for the meme to go from funny to tired. Is that a new record, and if so, can we never hear the comparison again after the holiday weekend? So say we all.
(* - This is actually not true.)
Send an email to Graeme McMillan, the author of this post, at graeme@io9.com.
Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
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