The great SarkObama Mystery... and a puppet! ... and some soda.

[Clio the Leo]

(How superawesome is it that the world is as madly in love with our Guy as we are!)

Greenpeace behind Paris 'SarkObama' poster mystery
5 hours ago



PARIS (AFP) — Greenpeace admitted Wednesday it was behind a mystery poster campaign that saw walls across Paris plastered with pictures of President Nicolas Sarkozy modelled on an iconic Barack Obama election image.

The campaign sought to raise awareness of UN climate talks under way in Poland and the imminent adoption by the EU of plans to fight global warming which, "unfortunately, does not interest many people," the environmental group said.

Modelled closely on a pop-art design by the US street artist Shepard Fairey in support of the Democrat's presidential bid, the dozens of posters pasted up in Paris last week show Sarkozy against a red, white and blue backdrop.

Each spells out a policy goal -- "Making polluters pay?", "Producing clean and sustainable energy for Europe?" or "Saving each household 1,000 euros a year?" -- above Obama's slogan "Yes, We can".

Suspecting a pro-Sarkozy publicity stunt, French news website L'Express launched a reader appeal to try to identify the poster gang, who responded with a trail of online clues.

They posted photo galleries of themselves -- faces masked behind the "SarkObama" images -- plastering the posters at emblematic sites across Paris, on the file sharing websites FlickR and Dailymotion.

Greenpeace France head Pascal Husting said Sarkozy, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, was failing to push through an adequate European climate change package.

"He is letting (EU) member states get bogged down in the defence of their short-term national interests instead of emphasising the collective interests and the imperatives in the struggle against climate change," he said in a statement.

Among rich regions, the European Union has set down the most ambitious plan to fight climate change, saying developed economies should cut their emissions by 25-40 percent by 2020 over 1990 levels.

It has already promised to unilaterally reduce its own contribution of greenhouse gases by 20 percent by 2020, but this plan has been weakened by objections within its own ranks, with Poland and Italy fearing it will inflict too high an economic price.



(and THEN there was this from World Aid's Day....)



Several hundred African anti-AIDS campaigners paraded giant puppets of U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Tuesday to demand that they deliver promised funds for plans to fight the disease.
Waving some banners reading "African children are watching you" and others supporting AIDS victims, the demonstrators, most of them dressed in white, marched through a central avenue of the Senegalese capital Dakar. They included many children.

Giant puppets, each nearly four metres (yards) high, represented Obama, clad in a blue jacket, red bow tie and red-and-white striped trousers, and Sarkozy, dressed in a black coat with a handerchief in the French colours spilling from a top pocket.

A big red-and-yellow spiky ball representing the AIDS virus was carried between them by marchers wearing white gloves.

The campaigners, gathering on the eve of an international conference on AIDS in Dakar, said the demonstration aimed to remind the U.S. and French leaders not to forget their multi-million dollar commitments to anti-AIDS programmes.

"They have to walk the talk ... the pledges they have made must be fulfilled," said Velephi Riba, a spokesperson for the Save the Children charity which helped organise the march.

Save the Children said that as governments in the rich developed world grappled with the global financial crisis and provided tens of billions of dollars for financial rescue packages, their leaders should not renege on public pledges to help the planet's poorest, including those suffering from AIDS.

"HIV and AIDS-impacted children in Africa -- who have never heard of Wall Street -- should not pay the price for the global economic decline," said Ame David, another spokesperson.

According to Save the Children, U.S. President-elect Obama had recently pledged to provide at least $50 billion by 2013 for the global fight against HIV and AIDS.

France, which holds the rotating European Union presidency, was a leading contributor to HIV-responding initiatives in Africa with funding of 360 million euros ($458 million) yearly.

"Obama and Sarkozy must not drop from these pledges by a single dollar or euro," Riba said.

An estimated 33 million people worldwide were living with the HIV virus, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, at the end of 2007. AIDS has killed 25 million since being identified in 1981.

An estimated 2.7 million people become infected each year.

Among the Dakar marchers, 11-year-old Abdoulaye Maria carried a banner calling for help for AIDS sufferers.

Asked what AIDS was, he answered shyly: "It's a sickness".

And how should it be avoided? "I don't know".



(Note, we've seen our President hung in effigy so many times it's easy to mistake these photos, while the protestors were serious, it's clear from the puppet that they hold Obama in pretty high regard. They just dont want to be dissapointed. They're trying to get attention and that's exactly what they did. I think the puppets are a hoot.)








And, here's a random can of soda....


French businessman Jean Jacques Attisso shows cans of his new drink "Obama Soda" in La Courneuve, outside Paris, Wednesday, Dec. 3, 2008. Attisso plans to auction 100 cans for a charity association supporting education in a deprived Paris suburb.


And if you REALLY want to see how much SPAIN loves Barack Obama, do a Google search on the caganers .... yet another tribute, but not exactly something I can post here. lol

[Alter Ego]

1. Countdown till every major world leader changes their name to "Barack Obama".

[Clio the Leo]

2. My name change becomes official tomorrow .....

... he's like the new Dr. Pepper. :)

"I'm an Obama, he's an Obama, she's an Obama, wouldn't you like to be an Obama too."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hkGJ2OjsSg

(my GOODNESS commericals were long back then)

[bunnies]

3. That Sarkozy thing is L-A-M-E !!!

One person has a good idea, and everyone else rips them off. What a wonderful world... :eyes:

[Mass]

4. So, you think that Greenpeace was wrong to do that? I think it was a good idea.

What good idea are you talking about: the picture?