Forward, Comrades!

Further evidence that the Internet is a place where people go when they have too much time on their hands . . . .

The Obama campaign rolled out its new slogan, “Forward,” on Monday, and the great hyperspace peanut gallery took it upon itself to weigh in on the sourcing. Personally, I just hope Davids Axelrod and Plouffe didn’t spend too much of my latest (meager) donation on this one, because it’s about as revolutionary as promising A Brighter Tomorrow. Everyone, from the local dentist to General Electric to — and I’m just guessing here — Mussolini probably guaranteed a brighter tomorrow. And “Forward” works as well for Toyota or a high school marching band as it does for Obama. It’s so general, in fact, that you’d think it would be hard to criticize on specific, nitpicky grounds. But God bless the Internet, because it excels at nothing better than dredging up nitpicky criticism. To wit:

•   The “Morning Joe” crew at MSNBC cried copyright infringement, claiming the campaign had stolen the slogan from the network’s “Lean Forward” ad campaign.

•   Dan Amira at New York Magazine joked that “Lean Forward” is hardly the best corporate jingle out there, and suggested a handful of others, including “It’s not TV, it’s BHO” and “Got health insurance?”

•   The American Spectator thinks that the best-known use of the word was in Mao’s “Great Leap Forward,” and snarks that “We know President Obama has lamented that he’s not president of China, because it’s so much easier to run things there. Is there a little sublimated wishful thinking in his choice of his new campaign slogan?” It suggests “Cultural Revolution” as the slogan for a second term.

•   National Review, which occasionally lets a below-the-belt, Birther-esque remark slip through its facade of party-elder respectability, directed readers to a Wikipedia entry that notes “Vorwärts (“Forward”) was the central organ of the Social Democratic Party of Germany published daily in Berlin from 1891 to 1933.” The journal dabbled in Marxist economics and published pieces by Friedrich Engels and Leon Trotsky. The National Review writer remarks that “And if you don’t think David Axelrod doesn’t know this, you really ought to think again,” then links to a sketchy site describing itself as “A Guide to the Political Left” that attempts to link Axelrod, via his mother and an early journalistic mentor, to organizations “alleged to have ties to the Communist party.”

•   The Washington Times, which counts Ted Nugent among its columnists, ran with the headline “Obama slogan has long ties to socialism, Marxism” and attempted to spin this “analysis” as a straight news story:

Conservative critics of the Obama administration have noted numerous ties to radicalism and socialists throughout Mr. Obama’s history, from his first political campaign being launched from the living room of two former Weather Underground members, to appointing as green jobs czar Van Jones, a self-described communist.

Yeah, conservative critics . . . . like the Washington Times. Way to stand behind your politics, guys.

•   The always-amusing Ed Kilgore at Washington Monthly rolls his eyes at the Times and responds with the observation that the chant of “forward!” has “a long-standing association with the sports of basketball, soccer, and ice hockey.” He continues, tongue in cheek:

Indeed, people playing the Forward position often score goals, making it attractive to impressionable young people. Is it possible that Obama—long known for his ties to the game of basketball in particular—has chosen a slogan that will encourage youth to transfer their affections from sports to politics—from all-American competition to European-style class struggle?

Legitimate concerns about this question may haunt the Obama campaign until its crushing defeat next November.

Well, at least until tomorrow, when the latest canine-ingestion scandal breaks, or perhaps Thursday, when a hot mic catches Obama promising China he’ll sign away our free economy if he wins a second term. So it goes.