Redstate

It is simply impossible for me to take the UN, any part of the organization, seriously.

We should evict them from their posh real-estate and give it to Trump for $1 - the difference between the value of the land and the price paid being the amount of work Trump would have to do to clean the stench of the area before he could start development.

Perhaps this project could be the grand prize for the next Apprentice...

The UN is nothing but plain idiots. That picture doesn't even make sense other than as a pointy stick. There is no obligation on the part of the  puzzle to have to completely transform itself for the lego to fit in. The lego needs to transform itself to fit in. That is the problem with this diversity nonsense. You want to be a success in a society, you need to fit in. If you are a muslim in Manchester, learn to sing "God Save the Queen". If you are a black in Detroit, get an education, lose the snizzle drizzle, don't have babies out of wedlock and go to work every morning.

This is suppose to be a rebuke to Denmark?

I guess we should be thankful for Modern Art and it's utter incomprehensibility to most people.  The sybolism is so elevated (sarcasm) that only those already initiated can understand.  At least it limits the infection

I'm torn between outrage that they (the UN) would target a company like this--i.e. to try to hit the Danish economy by giving international bad publicity to LEGO and amusement that in the any-publicity-is-good-publicity tradition, they will be inspiring people to go out and buy the product in protest.

Dear tenant,

Thank you for your occupancy at our property.  Due to ongoing terrorist concerns and your complete bungling of every job we've ever given you, it is our decision to terminate your lease effective September 11, 2001.

If you would like a brochure listing some of our other facilities that may soon become available in Tehran and Pyongyang, we will be happy to forward that information to you after the sites have fully cooled.

Signed

The United States of America

P.S. We have frozen all U.S. assests in order to begin the recoup of all U.S. governement funds dispensed to your institution post September 11, 2001.  We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, and encourage you to contact Caracas for alternative sources of filthy lucre.

that this was entirely innocent :-)

The only thing on can say is if it was innocent, it demonstrates a remarkable lack of awareness on the part of the graphics designer and the customer (the UN). It is so remarkable as to make it difficult to believe that it was not somehow subtly intentional.

On the other hand we can't have it both ways. We've been accusing the UN of having a tin ear for decades so this may be just another example of their complete and utter obliviousness to the world around them.

Mr. Annan, someone is towing your Mercedes away!

I agree that it is a symptom of a large and obvious problem, but the interesting thing here is that the venom that is usually reserved for the US and Israel is being directed against a country like Denmark.  It's no longer just anti-Americanism anymore...

At first I was trying to figure out if the puzzle was supposed to be in the shape of Denmark but I just realized Lego is a Danish company.

Darn fine products too, particularly the Star Wars line of Legos - my personal favorite until I can get my hands on the new Star War Transformers that are coming out ;)

the UN is equal opportunity stupid. Look at the membership and look at the votes. Actual democracies need not apply --- doesn't fit the design of ideal UN member state.

It is long past time for us to pull together a new international organization with actual freedom being the key criteria for membership. We start with the English speaking nations and add Europe, and Japan. Then we start setting some barriers.

Then reduce our UN representative to a Chargé d'Affairs and cut our contribution to $1000.00/year. Starve the buggers out.

What Mercedes?

Hear hear.

This is cool too:

http://shop.lego.com/product.asp?p=7779&cn=244&d=7&t=3

That was merely a Volvo.  And it was stolen from the street.  But I did not own it, my son owned that.  It is a false charge that I stole the car from my son.  I don't know anything about this.  He never reported it missing because he was out of the country at the time, studying the problem of governmental corruption in Israel.

If they have Star Wars and Batman, how about a set of Muslim figures, including an action figure of Mohammed holding a scimitar and riding on a horse?

My teenage son took his old Legos and a video camera and re-created two scenes from The Matrix using stop-action animation.  Really cool!  With a set of Muslim figures, maybe there could be a whole cadre of teenagers and geeks out there making stop-action animation versions of all of Mohammed's exploits and military victories accessible to the masses on the internet.

If Lego is going to be boycotted by Muslims anyway, why not take advantage of the situation?

my son purchased said vehicle with his own bribery and kickback income,<ahem>, I mean honest hard-working wages.

http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i189/djchillyt/Legohammed.jpg "> Lego Mohammed

...time and time again

Whatever happened to the liberals who support freedom of the press?  Or does that only apply when it's used to criticize conservatives?

The UN was a good idea in it's day, but it's become abundantly clear that you can't have a "representative body" in which the representatives aren't answerable to the people they claim to represent.  Heck, it's hard enough having one in which they ARE answerable.

I'd go along with what you propose on the proviso that we then take the money we DONT send to Turtule Bay and spend it instead on direct aid, along with the requirement that for every $.75 we spend in actual aid, we spend $.25 in local advertising to make sure that (a) the aid actually goes to the intended recipients, and not to the port manager (who happens to be the brother-in-law of the Hereditary-President-For-Life), and (b) that the people we're helping actually understand that it's AMERICA that's helping them, not the UN and not the idiot with the funny hat who lives in the People's Palace.  Any country that doesn't want to go along with this (North Korea) can simply choose not to receive aid (and we find a way to make that decision abundantly clear to the citizens of that country).

Advertising is one of the things Americans do best, might as well take advantage of the situation.  I figure that 25% is a pretty hefty advertising budget, but 75% of the aid money, filtered through the usual US beurocratic overhead of 50% still works out to something more beneficial to the intended recipients than the current setup (which would be a lot more efficient if we just cabled the money into the HPFL's Swiss bank account).

Is this for real?

That's my current, and for the last 20 years, has been my profession. It's been rewarding in many ways and am in my prime delivering product promotion to companies worldwide.

This ad I believe, would be percieved without the cognative relation to Lego as a Danish company and the political cartoon fiasco that accompanied the artist and satirist.

In fact, if that was the objective, I would estimate that less than 1-2% of the American population would "get it", and perhaps twice that in Europe. The Asians "DON"T CARE", and the South American's want to know if LEGO would like to open up shop in one of thier countries, "Tax-Free" of course, furthure demonstrating thier concerns.

As an ad conveying a specific message, I would rank it as one of the most ineffective pieces of work I've seen in recent history and I would guess will leave most confused if they are searching for such a message from the ad.

Ironically, traditional puzzle pieces can only fit into one slot, making them very ridged and unable to adjust to fitting into anyplace else or into some other configuration. All the while, the lego block has the capacity to place itself into countless puzzle variations and adjust very easily.

It seems that either way, the ad misses on all points. This could be good for me, they obviously need a new ad man. Hmmmmmm, to be continued...

I couldn't find any official Lego products relating to Mohammad or any Muslim for that matter but I remember hearing something about Knights and Crusader figures once. I may be wrong but it seems like a good time to start (if I were running Lego these would be avail. this Christmas)

btw any representation would have to be generic as no one knows what Mohammad, like Jesus, looked like!

legitimacy to murderers and thugs and has not desire or will power to do anything.

It is a giant money suck and the money being sucked is from the US citizen.

The reality is that the UN could only work if it was a "by invitation only" club, and the requirements for the invitation were actual full fledged democracatic governments.  And even then I don't think it would be all that great.

My first thought was that it was some sort of slam on Red states vrs blue states. Maybe I'm paranoid.

anyway its stupid.

What is most striking about that ad is it's total stupidity:  It looks like an ad that David Duke might have run.  If you don't already know what the ad is about, all you see is that the red piece doesn't fit and all the others do.

In fact, even after knowing the point of the ad, that red piece still screams at you.

A child of two who would try to fit the red piece in with the grey would be considered mentally handicapped.

If anything, that ad would reinforce racism, not diminish it.  It's cute, tho. Or maybe precious is a better word.

are the jigsaw puzzles.  They are not accomodating the Lego piece.  They are saying that to conform and fit, the Lego piece has to alter its shape and depth, and possibly even the color (or the jigsaw pieces will issue death fatwas and burn down the Lego containers).

Maybe it is a good representation of the cartoon jihad.  Perhaps the UN Unintentionally stumbled upon the correct concept.

It's been, I think, a good ten years at least since I picked up a LEGO set for myself.

I feel the urge for some building this weekend...

When, exactly, was the UN a good idea?  When it was being created as an explicit forerunner of global government by the soviet spy Alger Hiss and other communist operatives?

I never understood the logic: Hey, the League of Nations worked so well, let's try it again!  Plus, since Charles deGalle is such a swell guy and Vichy France was such a wonderful ally, let's give them a permanent seat on the security council!

Not to mention the oft-noted idiocy of a General Assembly in which military dictatorships, brutal theocracies, and murderous Stalinist client states are granted equal status to free representative republics.

The UN was a dumb idea then, a dumb idea today, and a dumb idea tomorrow.

Here's a page from a competition that my kids participate in. It has a cargo container made from lego blocks.