Huck Chuck facts

I have selected the campaign video of Mike Huckabee, the former Governor of Arkansas, who ran for the Republican presidential candidacy in 2008, ultimately losing out to John McCain. Huckabee is noted for being very vocal, very religious, and very visible. After failing to win the candidacy, he went on to present a television show on the Fox news channel, and continues to do so today. In the video I have selected, the often criticised, often controversial Huckabee tries to be funny. Funny by using the popular internet meme of Chuck Norris quotes. Funny by using a meme that got old about an hour after it went live.

The basic idea of the advert is to appeal to youth – Chuck Norris has become a cult figure of sorts since the quotes and their popularity, and one would imagine that by using him in this advert it would appeal to young voters. Chuck Norris is also famous for being a staunch Republican, and a very vocal supporter of guns, rugged individualism and karate. While he gives viewers an idea of Huckabee’s political values and his attitudes towards immigrants and taxes, Huckabee quotes famous Chuck Norrisisms such as ‘Chuck Norris doesn’t push up by lifting himself up, he’s pushing the earth down’ in an effort to appear less stuffy and funnier than other candidates, such as the very old and traditional John McCain. The lighting and the title card for Chuck Norris is reminiscent of old westerns, most likely a reference to the Chuck Norris show Walker, Texas Ranger in which a gun slingin’, spitin’ Norris rides horses and kicks ass. This could also be a subtle hint that Huckabee himself is a take-no-crap, modern day cowboy kinda guy.

The advert itself is incredibly short for a campaign commercial, it only clocks in about a minute and at the end it proves its credentials by claiming its approval from both Huckabee and Chuck Norris. I imagine the point of this very short, bullet point style video is to not only appeal to younger voters, but also to become viral. At the time I accessed the video it had over 3 million views, with many comments reading things like ‘one day i met chuck and i said "chuck how do you make a fire?" he rubbed his hands together for 5 seconds and put them on a tree. after the flames went out i said "what was the biggest thing you burned and when?" he said "at the time of the big bang." then i said "what was it?" and all he did was point at the sun.’ Showing perhaps that the videos real message, the message to vote for Mike Huckabee, was lost on the people it was most supposed to appeal to.