Wamu’s ad metaphor came true

I always liked Washington Mutual, which is why I also banked with them. They sort of blamed Suze Orman for their stock price when I spoke to them on Saturday, but in the end it was the quicksand of bad loans, not bad media that dragged them down.

In their mind they conducted branch banking and relationship banking along a ‘think different’ approach. Tough when you’re dealing with a generic product – money.

This commercial was funny at the time, but since they were ‘seized‘ by the government and sold off to J.P. Morgan Chase, it’s not so funny after all. They portrayed themselves as driving the old suits to jump off into the abyss.

Ultimately it was the old suits who drove them off the ledge.

Video scrutiny keeps ‘em honest

There are lots of web sites, political groups, media folk and organizations (even the candidates’ sites) fact-checking statements politicians make, so it must be increasingly hard to face the cameras.

Some wing it, others –like Joe Biden- completely make it up as they go, only to be found out. Everyone is up for this kind of scrutiny.

Watch Jon Stewart’s approach, running side-by-side video clips that reveal the danger of double talk.

Video scrutiny like this is playing an interesting role this election season. It must force campaign managers to think hard before deploying surrogate snipers on the campaign trail