Good Times at the Superbowl

You probably saw the Superbowl ad with Bill Frist and James Carville - but just in case you missed it you can check it out on the AOL sports page under “third quarter”. Coca Cola also hopes to launch a bestselling song that is used as the soundtrack, “Good Times” by Gavin Heaney (Latch Key Kid).

Coca-Cola speaks to the general public unease with infighting between political parties and candidates. The weekend’s political talk shows emphasized that theme as they all explored the question, would Obama and Clinton consider teaming up? The pundits also speculated about just how much blacks and Hispanics resent each other.

Coca Cola’s political ad is a throwback to its wildly successful ad of 1971, which popularized the lyrics “I’d like to buy the world a Coke and keep it company”. The idea then - and now - is that the Coca Cola brand brings people together, transcending race and politics and creating the friendly and gentle world we seek.

Despite all the blacks v Hispanics politicking, a recent Pew survey showed that “overwhelming majorities of both blacks and Hispanics have favorable views of each other”. The differences become more clear when measuring whether or not the two groups think they are getting along. A large majority of blacks (70%) answered favorably, but a substantially smaller number of Hispanics agreed (57%).