I'm hoping the moderators will read this and not read politics into it.

I've recently seen a commercial on Versus (a cable sports network) that absolutely smeared the reputation of Thomas Jefferson. Almost any grade school kid knows who Thomas Jefferson is and was. He was one of the finest Presidents of the US ever, and ranks right up there with George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, Sam Adams (not the beer guy) and Benjamin Franklin as a founder of this country and signer of the Declaration of Independence.

Well, right there on the 4th of July, Kraft Foods broke a TV ad starring, guess who....Thomas Jefferson at a party featuring Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. Yeah, there was Tom Jefferson complaining that someone stole his recipe for Macaroni and Cheese and he promptly threw a world class temper tantrum, kicked over a table with party goodies on it and punctured a kiddy helium balloon with a fork (pop!). The commercial slanders Jefferson's memory, and let's not even get into the idea that he concocted macaroni and cheese (he didn't) and that the commercial is grossly historically inaccurate to boot! But to think that after risking his life and the lives of his family to found this country and shape the government that he could be slandered like this for monetary gain by an American company is the worst possible thing that can be done. Does Kraft have any decency? Doubt it.

I received this reply from an email sent to Kraft:




Hi Charles,


Thank you for visiting http://www.kraft.com/ and I wanted to thank you for sharing your concerns with us about our KRAFT Macaroni & Cheese Dinner advertising.


Your comments are important to us, we do take them seriously and I want to assure you that I will share them with our advertising staff. That said, I can't promise that you won't see this ad again.

We consider our advertising the company's voice to the public. While we try to provide advertising that appeals to the majority of our audiences, it's hard to create advertising that fits everyone's taste.


Thank you again for taking the time to share your thoughts.


Kim McMiller
Associate Director, Consumer Relations

~~TLXEA_20728382~~N



As you can see, doubt Kraft Foods will do anything about this--they probably consider it normal to portray American Presidents and Patriots as temper tantrum throwing idiots. Anything for a buck...I guess.

I'd like to ask that anyone who is concerned with this write to Kraft Foods and tell them you do not approve of this advertisement.

Charles

It now appears that Kraft Foods has pulled this commercial from TV. In fact, it has been pulled from everywhere on the Internet. They even had it on Youtube--not anymore. Doing a Google search found outrage from tons of people who obvously felt the same way that I did. An odd twist to the whole thing...found out that the commercial was filmed by a Brit using her husband as Thomas Jefferson. She stated on her Face Page that it was a real hoot to film it and was done with such style.

A bit of history here, Thomas Jefferson, wrote the Declaration of Independence, which was passed by Congress on July 4, 1776. He was an Ambassador to France (our only real ally at the time), Governor of Virginia, Vice President of the US and finally President of the US. He did indeed, bring back Mac and Cheese from France--a new dish at the time--he did not invent it, but did improve upon the recipe to his own tates. Also, Mac and Cheese was originally packaged and sold by Kraft about the mid-1930's--it was the first fast food meal. Mac and Cheese passed into infamy on July 4, 2010, when Kraft first aired the commercial showing Thomas Jefferson (one of our most famous Presidents) going into melt down and throwing a temper tantrum when he accused Kraft of stealing his recipe. For any that didn't see the commercial, in it, the actor portraying Jefferson, kicked a small table scattering the stuff on top all over the place and popped a kid's helium ballon during a party.

I guess I just didn't see the humor in it.....