viz.

By now, you've probably seen the moving and (I assume) influential video by the Black-Eyed Peas' Will.i.am "Yes We Can" video in support of Barack Obama, which sets Obama's New Hampshire primary speech to a stripped-down tune, the words voiced by a coterie of A- and B-list celebrities:

While some might argue that seeing/hearing Scarlett Johannson sing Obama's words might dilute their power, the video certainly helped determine where my vote, once belonging to John Edwards, would go. I had not previously heard Obama's speech, and hearing his indirect (yet rhetorically powerful) reference to Martin Luther King, Jr., sung by John Legend certainly caught my attention.

Equally interesting is the "spoof" video (one among many, I am sure), which adopts many of the same techniques, casting "real" people in the celebrities' roles and portraying their dismay at John McCain's pro-war rhetoric. The producers, "Election 08," claim that "earnest people reacting to a candidate is the future of music video":