Episode Report Card Jacob Clifton: A | 1 USERS: B- YOU GRADE IT Laika Was An Astronaut
By Jacob Clifton | Season 1 | Episode 10 | Aired on 09.26.2007
Also annoying: the Kennedy campaign ad the boys are watching later at the office, which goes like this: "Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy Kennedy!" JFK is "the man who answers straight," and also "the man who's always there." The horrible ad -- saccharine, if you will -- ends on a shot of the man himself, with Jackie and little Caroline. They have no idea what they are in for. The guys talk at length about how fun and catchy and content-free the advertisement is, and the nerdy one notes that it "gets in your head and makes you wanna blow your brains out." (Word choice!) Pete, ever the voice of reason when it comes to Nixon/Kennedy, advises them all never to forget that "the president is a product." They ignore him because he's a twerp, but he's right to like a sick degree, starting with JFK. Next up is Nixon, talking about...well, the only thing more boring than a politician is a politician in black and white, so I can't tell you for sure what he's talking about. But I'm guessing it's those tax-and-spend-and-fuck-Marilyn Democrats. They complain about the ad for awhile, but when Roger comes in he admonishes them all to start watching more television: the shows, and the ads. He points out that this is their job.
Pete wonders about the mud people are "harvesting" on Kennedy, and when Roger notes that he's known as a bit of a womanizer, Don realizes that they've handed them the election already, because soccer moms love a womanizer. And I would go off on how this is not only politically naïve but just as gross as the rest of the sinister creepy sexism on this show, but for once I'm just going to zip my big stupid mouth, because...what can you say? Everybody in the room says it shouldn't be "this close" a hundred million times. Meanwhile, though, Don sees it as essentially a battle of narrative, not an attack-ad situation at all, and launches into his usual thinly veiled Let's Talk About Don Draper Hour, Brought To You By Clabber Girl: how JFK is a nouveau riche, recent immigrant who bought his way into Harvard. (Wasn't his grandfather the Mayor of Boston or something? I don't know enough to quibble here.) Nixon came from nothing, a humble self-made Quaker with a face like a Bassett hound, "the Abe Lincoln of California," who ended up the Vice President of the U.S. six years after leaving the Navy. When Don sees Kennedy he sees a silver spoon, but when he looks at Nixon, he sees himself. I never thought about it this way, but they're both kind of Don-like, aren't they? Kennedy's just the Gatsby version of Don either way. Well, but: Catholic.