I still want a t-shirt though!

Trisha — Sat, 10 May 2008 12:49:57 -0500

I did learn a lot about him by reading the books. I still want a t-shirt though!

Well, I think reading his

Super Jive — Sat, 10 May 2008 12:37:04 -0500

Well, I think reading his actual ideas is probably a better idea than dressing him like a circus clown. Consider these extra credit.

I thought I had it!

Trisha — Sat, 10 May 2008 00:18:51 -0500

I thought I had Obama Fever - but now I don't know - I've never played an Obama game or even heard of Barackula until now - I don't even have a t-shirt (yet).

I have read both his books though and have buttons and links to his site on my blog. Is that enough to count?

My mom has got her copy of his first book autographed!

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Obamarama! Obama Fever Sweeps the Interweebs

Super Jive — Fri, 09 May 2008 19:47:33 -0500

Obama Fever? Do you have it? Or should I say, in proper lolcat, Obama fever, do you has? The answer to that is, Yes, We Can Has.

It's official. Gawker has even declared Obama "a living meme." Obama stuff is all over the internet. And in my very informal survey of what's out there, a whole lot of it seems positive. This is notable itself in an election year.

In 2004, it seemed that all the internet memes and viruses had a real political focus. Now some of the websites that feature Obama seem more about celebrating his celebrity. His...Obamaness. Issues are not mentioned. The uninformed observer may not even be able to discern what political party he belongs to.

Of course you have your Obama swag. There's all the prerequisite tee-shirts and hats, but how about you surprise your Republican date with the Obama thong? Surprise, Democrat! Let's watch how fast the evening goes downhill after that. I don't remember there being Kerry thongs. I guess Obama just has that "sexee factor" that can get him slapped onto the butt floss. And don't get me started on the wrongness of the Hillary thong.

And here's what I mean about the adulation of Obama as a celebrity: many of us have seen Barack Obama is Your New Bicycle, because it's been Twittered and blogged like mad. There is not even real political subtext here, and the giant text on the page screams at you like pop art. You may have clicked on it for a minute, gone "hur hur" and then clicked away. But can you live without the book, Barack Obama is Your New Bicycle? Yes? Well, I'm sure someone will want it. Kind of dicey, releasing it in August, though. But who knows, maybe the primary will still be going on then!

Killing time at work? Then you can play with Obama. Try the Race for the Whitehouse game, a copycat of Snood, the latter of which has better sound effects and cuter graphics. Your call on that one. (As an aside, I will say that I am dismayed to see that the Snood people have piggybacked on a trend and created "Snoodoku" based on my nemesis "Suckdoku." Math is evil and will kill you in your sleep.) Ooooor, Dress up Barack! Is there something really wrong with this, or what? Well, if dressing Obama in Crocs, a polo shirt, and a Strong Bad mask is wrong, I don't want to be right.

Obama Fever! reaches its apex with Barackula, the Musical. Obviously, the title is a shout out to the old "blaxploitation" movie "Blacula", and other cultural references are embedded as well. Set in 1990 during his tenure at Harvard, in the short movie Obama fights off the vampire society that wishes to induct him into their ranks, singing to them about his dream for improving society as the President of Harvard Law as a non-vamp.

A selection of the lyrical stylings of Barackula:

Honolulu, Indonesia, never Transylvania/
Chicago, L.A., Africa, I could never be Barackula

There doesn't seem to be any deeper subtext than that. Obama will unite the mortals and the immortals, so they can work together. Maybe the message is that you should vote for someone who can talk vampires out of biting him?

That said, I find Barackula mostly rad, because like most of the web, it's about Barack the Entity, rather than anything of political substance, which makes it massively entertaining. Plus, it has pretty good singing and West Side Story-style vampire jamming.

Enjoy the Obamageist!

SJ also applies Obama to her mama at I, Asshole.

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I still want a t-shirt though!

Well, I think reading his

I thought I had it!

Obamarama! Obama Fever Sweeps the Interweebs