Lending Tree has a new ad with their green Muppet-style puppet, and he says that the mortgage rates at Lending Tree are so low right now, you'd have to be a dummy to miss them. And then he walks right into a box hanging from a string that's got the rates posted on it (as low as 2.53%: but not for you, you untrustworthy slob! You have to pay loan shark rates!). Then he gets mad that someone left it there for him to walk into. (What a diva, already, just because he's got a couple of cable TV ads under his belt? Just wait, he won't be able to get work after this campaign, the Muppets will sue him for ripping off their look, and then all the crew he was a jerk to won't even want to talk to him. Oh, vanity of vanities: all is vanity.) Oh, but he shouldn't be mad, because he said you'd have to be a dummy to miss it, and he's a puppet. Because until he walked into that thing there, it looked like he was dumb enough to think he was a dummy, not a puppet, and that Lending Tree thought so too, which would have rendered their judgment and honesty questionable.
Oh, but then the announcer says: "Don't be a dummy! Go save yourself boatloads of cash at Lending Tree.com." But we've got them there, standards & practices! A-Ha! This ad said you'd save yourself a boatload of cash! And so, if they don't actually give you a boat filled with cash, and then dump the boat out on you, or in your house, or at your workplace, then this is a clear a case of false advertising as you'll ever see! Ha: Got you, you liars! (Just kidding. Although you could try to sue over this little claim and see if you get the case thrown out as frivolous: you never know, it might work, especially if the judge has been screwed on his/her mortgage by some company like Lending Tree.)
Oh, but be careful what you wish for, for if you complain that they said a boatload of cash, and they gave you an electronic transfer instead, they might just go get a tall-ship's-worth of pennies and crush you to death with them (!!!). I heard they do that all the time, but usually only to people who don't pay them on time. (Just kidding! They only do that to people who make fun of their ads! But I just sell the pennies for the copper and make out like a bandit. In fact, it's a little sideline we've got going on at, um... Okay, no we don't. But it might be a way to make extra cash in this economy if you want to try it.)
Here's the dummy commercial:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juH6n3y9pR8
