When I logged into Facebook today, one of the ads on the right hand side (the ones that don’t get blocked by adblock), grabbed my attention. Normally all of the ads are pictures of girls with the caption “Am I Your Wife” or “Meet Hot Girls” or MLM pyramid schemes.
This ad said
“Get your Obama Check” with an obviously photoshopped picture of Obama holding a government check over the bottom half of his face. The caption said “The government is giving away billions of dollars to stimulate the economy. Find out how I got $12,000.”
I clicked on the link because I was curious to see if this was in any way, shape or form associated with Obama. I thought it wasn’t, but since the Obama campaign was the most tech savvy and used social networks the most in the history of politics, I thought there could be a possibility it was a new Obama program to reach Facebook users.
The first link led me to a “
blog” by a guy who claimed to be from Chicago, named Tom. It is one of the fakest looking blogs of all time. He claims that he got 12k from the government, allowing him to pay off his 10k credit card debt, take a 1k vacation and save 1k. All this occurred within 30 days of him asking to government for money. He says:
My name is Tom and I am from Chicago, IL. After hearing all the news on the Government Bailout of the banks and the possibility of an Auto industry bailout, I decided there had to be a way for me to get some money like that from the government. Because if anyone needs a bailout, it is hard working Americans like myself, who have a hard time keeping their head above water. After Doing some research I found that the US government has all kinds of free grants available to the public, for all sorts of reasons, that often go unclaimed. And these grants are not loans, they are checks you never have to pay back, funded by different government agencies. And if they don’t give what they were budgeted, they actually get less money the following year. So these government employee processors are just approving application after application, especially if no one is applying for these financial aid programs. So after researching on Yahoo Answers, I found a program that helps guide you through the process and I signed up for Goverment Funded Grants.
But most importantly I want to help other people get the money they are entitled to and not stand by while all these fat cats from large companies get rich off government bailouts. We all deserve to live debt free, so I am glad I signed up.
At the end of the “blog” you can click on a link that takes you to a page that prominently features Obama. It asks you to sign up to receive info on how to get your free cash.
Beyond the obvious idiocy of these claims, its amazing that the Obama administration allows these people to use his image so prominently. First it was
drug dealers, now its people trying to capitalize on the recession and America’s laziness and desire for get rich quick solutions. It will be interesting to see if Facebook continues to run these ads or if anyone protests their inclusion of Obama’s face. You would think that at least one of President Obama’s zealous college student supporters would have reported this by now.
EDIT: Forrest commented below saying that the site uses IP locations to change where “Tom” is from based on where you are browsing from. Shady. I still see these ads on Facebook and the “get your obama check” websites are still up. Secret Service, what’s up?
