Markell’s George Bailey Moment
I just threw up in my mouth several times, so you didn’t have to.
Tags: Jack Markell
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- How much for that dog in the window | Worn Off Novelty | January 13, 2017
I think the video is very cute, well made, funny, and creative. I also have no problem with it being made, but I do find one thing kind of funny. The first scene seemed to be an impression of how John Carney treats people. I feel like he nailed him right on the head. Great impression!
Also, shout out to Sarah McBride!
That picture of Putin is so triggering.
Mr. Markell is displaying a number of poor habits behind the wheel in the opening segment. He fails to follow the rule of 2N2 (Two hands on the wheel, Two eyes on the road).
He also is letting himself be distracted by the radio/audio system – and that distraction is alarming – given the fact that Delaware’s director of the Office of Highway Safety is chair of the national Governors Highway Safety Association.
For more on driving and distraction, visit – https://www.distraction.gov/stats-research-laws/facts-and-statistics.html
He sure takes a lot of credit for being in the chair when marriage equality shows up on his desk.
This is fucking lame and Jack Markell was not a great Governor at all. As the $350m budget deficit might indicate. He did some easy social issues and tackled no hard problems. He employed a revolving door of lobbyists or people married to lobbyists as his senior staff. He spent most of the last year trying desperately to position himself as a national political figure, stumping for the worst political candidate in modern American history. I honestly don’t know what he actually believes in. Yawn and goodbye, what a disappointment.
JTF,
Right on!!! You hit the nail on the head.
If the public employee unions had spine they would recut and dub in past speeches to produce Markell’s Scrooge Moment.
I wonder who flipped the bill for this …. Foreshadowing at the end was not surprising.
@fighting blue hen
here’s your answer:https://wornoffnovelty.wordpress.com/2017/01/13/how-much-for-that-dog-in-the-window/
Good research donviti.
No problem, I found another line item for 2017 that comes to $36,000!!!!
So I think that answers the question on how much the video cost
With the deficit that we are facing; If any of that money came from the state, then somebody is living in a serious bubble.
We all could only hope to someday achieve that kind of bubble status.
@nemski: Sorry the film made you throw up. I generally don’t like my stuff but I think this one came out endearing anyway.
@donviti: This film was produced with 17 other shorter videos for a total of $20k, if you’re wondering. I lost a lot of money on these, but I’m happy to because I care about doing a good job and representing Delaware well.
Most successful states (or really any organizations/concerns) invest something, anything, in marketing, in storytelling. Delaware, largely, does not. Maybe it’s because so many Delaware folks think storytelling is a waste of money. It’s not, by the way, as shown every time it has been studied.
Between this silly little thing, http://murdertown.us, and a dozen other projects, I tried to do my best in 2016 to tell stories that I hope will move the ball, even if only a little, on Delaware, and on the issues I care about. And I didn’t have to go out of business doing it (yet).
Zach, I think everyone will acknowledge the film is well done. The critical reaction is separate from the filmmaking and is about Markell himself, not about the quality of the filmmaking. I think nemski and donviti would agree, and I invite you to remain engaged with DelawareLiberal and progressive causes.
For myself, I am going to go look at the rest of your work It sounds promising, and probably should get more coverage, and we should see what we can do to support your work.
I would love to do work on minimum wage, money in politics, taxes, etc.. I hope I can get there. Unfortunately, this stuff is really expensive (mostly in terms of time, lots and lots of many people’s time). The nice part of that is, in film production, almost 100% of a spend is going to individual local workers, because the equipment is a trivial percentage of the cost at the end.
This stuff is near and dear to my heart and it’s what I want to do, but I just have never had any money with which to do it. Working on that.
@Zach Phillips:
Yes, yes, we all need more story telling. So, did the State of Delaware pay for the video ?
Yes. As stated, for this video and 17 others, the price was $20k. And if you don’t think Delaware needs to spend any money on marketing, then you may be fundamentally underestimating the importance of marketing. Maybe.
The way you worded your comment as to whether the State paid for the video could be left to interpretation, so I wanted to clarify…..Thanks for clarifying.
Donviti added that the line item was $36,000. What’s the discrepancy between the amounts?
I like Zach’s videos and i think they strike the right tone for marketing Delaware to business. I think they are worth $20K or $36K, which is probably a bargain for the quality of production.
A lot of people think it’s the little stuff that counts. Those people are wrong.
The budget deficit is $350,000,000. The videos are $36,000. You’ll notice what’s missing there: 4 zeroes. These people are really, really bad at understanding the zeroes.
People like fightingbluehen are what all conservatives are — collectors of the smallest possible potatoes, proud as all hell of ’em, too.
These are the same people, by the way, who will shit on the value of Mike Castle having made the country $3 billion by tinkering with quarters.
Yes, $36,000 is small potatoes compared to the deficit, but spending any state money at all on a pat yourself on the back video that has nothing to do with marketing, while on your way out the door, and while we face such a deficit, is incredibly tone deaf in my opinion.
BTW, I thought the video was well done. I did notice though, that the Wilmington without Markell as Governor still had hybrid electric buses with signs on them that said, “powered by hybrid electric technology”….whoops.
I agree it was tone-deaf.
Thanks @puck, I appreciate that.
@fightingbluehen, We’ve done a number of jobs for the state, including the Department of Education, arts initiatives, and other things. Honestly, I wish they paid me 36 for this piece. That’s probably around what it actually cost. 🙂 But the main thing was to get eyes on all these initiatives, which is hard to do with dry interview doc pieces.
I would contend that this does serve a marketing purpose in that if you don’t let people know what you did, and what you think is important to continue to do, you don’t really fully capitalize on it. Packaging this message in a farewell video for Markell is really just a vehicle for that message. And though I understand all of your feelings about Markell (I’m a big lib Eugene/Townsend guy too), I will tell you that he was adamant that he DID NOT want this to be about him. I felt that making it about him, in a self-effacing way, would be the best way to capitalize on his “reach” without it being an ego-piece. He really only wanted talking heads about each of the programs and initiatives and what they meant to the state.
So you can blame me for the fact it was “self-congratulatory,” and from a storytelling/character-driven/actually-have-people-watch perspective, I stand by the decision.
Hopefully together we can push all of these new administrations to work harder for our values.
“And though I understand all of your feelings about Markell”
I don’t have any feelings really about Jack Markell. I have never met him, but I have family members who know him and think he is a great guy.
I don’t think, however, that he was that good of a governor in many respects, and I still think it was somewhat inappropriate to have a “job well done” video at tax payers expense when we have a $350,000,000 deficit.
Well he created some nice bike trails but forgot about restrooms at the new Gordon Pond trail parking lot. The other other, the 1 portable toilet was full of human excrement. Embarrassing..Other than that he screw stated employees, did nothing to protect the environment, did nothing about infrastructure, hired no one but connected cronies and was irresponsible with the budget while rewarding the richest people possible. More of the same coming next…Sad
“hired no one but connected cronies”
You’re wrong on this one. This is the one area in which he broke with the Delaware Way, bringing in people who were not beholden to it, particularly at DelDOT. DelDOT is the crookedest department in the state, and as cases early in Markell’s administration showed, some high-level merit-protected jobs were filled by people who thought they, not the administration, set policy.
That’s the exception