The Foundation for a Bitter Life, Pt. I

Several years ago, Philip Anschutz's Foundation for a Better Life opened the Pandora's Box of non-sectarian positivity by launching a billboard campaign in the best (i.e., the worst) tradition of Norman Vincent Peale. Somehow, and no doubt inadvertently, most of the billboards were only mildly nauseating. (A few--no doubt even more inadvertently--were even educational [See http://www.values.com/inspirational-sayings-billboards].)

But some of them cried out to have their sentimental cheeriness spanked right out of them with a good, old-fashioned parody paddle, thus making necessary the establishment of the Foundation for a Bitter Life--and its own line of billboards.

The For a Better Life original that got it all started . . .

And its tongue-out-of-cheek For a Bitter Life parody . . .

(The in-high-school-Einstein-was-no-Einstein story, by the way, is an urban legend; other than being a bit slow to start speaking, Einstein was precociously brilliant.)

Admittedly, the parody of this For a Better Life billboard . . .

. . . might disturb the lactose intolerant, but still . . .

Now, for a hard swerve into tastelessness, here's another For a Better Life original . . .

. . . and its For a Bitter Life doppelganger:

And second-to-last but not second-to-least, a little fun at the expense of our sixteenth white president: For a Better Life . . .

For a Bitter Life . . .

This last pairing requires some explaining. Apparently, the comedienne Whoopi Goldberg suffers from dyslexia, hence the misspelling of overcame in the following For a Better Life poster . . .

We here at the For a Bitter Life foundation, however, noticed that the point of Goldberg's billboard could be driven home more unambiguously by rearranging the letters of dyslexia instead . . .

For Part II: http://teacherinamerica2.blogspot.com/2010/05/foundation-for-bitter-life-saw-best-in.html