Ladd Ehlinger Jr. (born August 21, 1968 in New Orleans, Louisiana) is an American filmmaker. He is the director and animator of the 2007 film Flatland as well as a creator of numerous political videos promoting a libertarian conservative viewpoint, some of which have become highly controversial and reached viral levels of publicity. On his website, he compares himself to Sam Peckinpah and Orson Welles. [1] He also hosts a radio talk show in Huntsville, Alabama. [2]
In 2007, Ehlinger directed, animated and edited the film Flatland, which is based on Edwin Abbott Abbott's novella of the same name. The film takes place on a two-dimensional world inhabited by intelligent polygons, most of whom refuse to acknowledge the existence of a third dimension. "The story follows its hero A Square, who inhabits a world that is completely flat and two-dimensional. A mysterious visitor from the third dimension arrives, bent on spreading the gossip about another dimension called height. A Square is taken out of Flatland and transported to the 3D universe. In so doing, the very fabric of space-time itself is placed at risks, potentially destroying all of creation." [3]
"Flatland" was widely reviewed and received critical acclaim as an independent, innovative film. [4] [5]
In 2010, Ehlinger released another full-length film, more overtly political than the last. This film, Hive Mind, centers on a conservative talk radio host who is the last "normal" human in a world otherwise inhabited entirely by zombies who are part of the "Hive Mind" of the title. [6]
Ehlinger has created numerous viral videos, including a video of a dancing Barney Frank between disco balls, [7] [8] an ad portraying Nancy Pelosi as the Wicked Witch of the West [9] an ad promoting Dale Peterson's candidacy for agriculture commissioner in Alabama, and an anti-Janice Hahn ad portraying the congressional candidate with red eyes and as a stripper who gyrates while two black rappers grab dollar bills out of her panties and chant "Give us your cash, bitch". The ad focused on Janice Hahn's promotion of a taxpayer-funded program in Los Angeles that hires convicted felons as "gang intervention specialists", many of whom have been subsequently indicted. [10] This latter ad was described in the media as "the most racist and sexist political ad ever", and Democrats at the state and national level urged Republican candidate Craig Huey to disown the ad, which he eventually did. Ehlinger himself said in response to the criticism, “I didn't kill anyone. I didn't even enable anyone to kill anyone....The ad's funny. It makes me laugh. So if, for some reason, it's pulled by YouTube, a thousand will be launched in its place.” [1] The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee made mention of the controversy surrounding the ad in one of its fundraising e-mails. [11]
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions is a satirical novella by the English schoolmaster Edwin Abbott Abbott, first published in 1884 by Seeley & Co. of London. Written pseudonymously by "A Square", the book used the fictional two-dimensional world of Flatland to comment on the hierarchy of Victorian culture, but the novella's more enduring contribution is its examination of dimensions.
Josiah Robins Bonner Jr. is an American academic administrator and former politician who currently serves as the fourth president of the University of South Alabama. He was previously the U.S. representative for Alabama's 1st congressional district from 2003 to 2013. He is a member of the Republican Party. He resigned from Congress on August 2, 2013, to take a job with the University of Alabama. He served as Chief of Staff to Alabama governor Kay Ivey from 2019 to 2021, before becoming the president of the University of South Alabama. He was officially inaugurated in December 2021.
Robert Brown Aderholt is an American politician and attorney serving as the U.S. representative for Alabama's 4th congressional district since 1997. He is a member of the Republican Party. The district includes most of Tuscaloosa County north of the Black Warrior River, as well as Birmingham's far northern suburbs in Walker County and the southern suburbs of Huntsville and Decatur.
Spencer Thomas Bachus III is an American politician. He is a former U.S. Representative for the state of Alabama, serving from 1993 to 2015. A member of the Republican Party, he served as ranking member (2007–2011) and chairman (2011–2013) of the House Financial Services Committee. On September 30, 2013, Bachus announced his retirement from Congress. His term ended in 2015.
Dylan Jason Ratigan is an American businessman, author, film producer, former host of MSNBC's The Dylan Ratigan Show and political commentator for The Young Turks. He was a candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in New York's 21st Congressional District. He is a former contributor to The Huffington Post.
The 2006 United States Senate election in Ohio was held November 7, 2006. Incumbent Republican Mike DeWine ran for re-election, but was defeated by Democratic congressman Sherrod Brown. As of 2024, this is the most recent time a Democratic Senate candidate in Ohio won a race by double digits.
Janice Kay Hahn is an American politician serving as a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors from the 4th district since 2016. A member of the Democratic Party, she was a U.S. Representative from California from 2011 to 2016, elected in the 36th congressional district until 2013 and later in the 44th congressional district. She was previously a member of the Los Angeles City Council, representing the 15th district from 2001 to 2011. From 1997 to 1999, she served as an elected representative on the Los Angeles Charter Reform Commission.
Luke Montgomery is an American viral commercial director, entrepreneur, media strategist and political activist.
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Flatland is a 2007 American animated science fiction film based on the 1884 novella Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott Abbott. The film was directed and animated by Ladd Ehlinger Jr. in Lightwave 3D. The screenplay was written by author Tom Whalen. The music was composed by Mark Slater.
Lucas R. Baiano is an Emmy Award Judging, Cannes Lions featured, American political and commercial filmmaker, referenced as “one of the most impressive millennial-generation ad-makers”. Baiano has directed for Hillary Clinton, John McCain, The Republican Governors Association Tim Pawlenty, Rick Perry, Chris Christie Mitch McConnell. Commercially including Google and BMW. Baiano has been featured in Time (magazine), Forbes, GQ, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Vanity Fair (magazine) and cited in First Cameraman: Documenting the Obama Presidency in Real Time, written by Arun Chaudhary, Barack Obama's White House Cameraman and Collision 2012: Obama vs. Romney and the Future of Elections in America written by bestselling author Dan Balz.
Flatland: The Movie is a short animated film which was released to video in 2007. The cast includes the voices of actors Martin Sheen, Kristen Bell and Tony Hale. The story is based on the 1884 science fiction novella Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions written by Edwin A. Abbott.
The 1988 Jesse Jackson presidential campaign was Jesse Jackson's second campaign for President of the United States. This time, his successes in the past made him a more credible candidate and he was both better financed and better organized. Although most people did not seem to believe he had a serious chance at winning, Jackson once again exceeded expectations as he more than doubled his previous results, prompting R. W. Apple, Jr. of The New York Times to call 1988 "the Year of Jackson".
Martha Kehres Roby is an American lawyer and politician who served as the U.S. representative for Alabama's 2nd congressional district from 2011 to 2021. A member of the Republican Party, she defeated the incumbent Democratic U.S. Representative Bobby Bright in 2010. That year, Roby and Terri Sewell became the first women elected to Congress from Alabama in regular elections. On July 26, 2019, Roby announced she would retire from Congress at the end of her fifth term, which ended in 2021.
Harold Eugene Ford Jr. is an American financial managing director, pundit, author, and former U.S. Congressman who served from 1997 to 2007 in the United States House of Representatives as a member of the Democratic Party from Tennessee's 9th congressional district, centered in Memphis. He is a member of the Ford political family from Memphis, and is the son of former Congressman Harold Ford Sr., who held the same seat for 22 years. In 2006, Ford made an unsuccessful bid for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by the retiring Bill Frist. He was also the last chairman of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC).
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Howard Goodloe Sutton was an American newspaper editor, publisher, and owner. From 1964 to 2019, he published The Democrat-Reporter, a small weekly newspaper in Linden, Alabama. Sutton was widely celebrated in 1998 for publishing over four years a series of articles that exposed corruption in the Marengo County Sheriff's Office; he received awards and commendations and was suggested as a candidate for the Pulitzer Prize. In 2019, Sutton once again became the focus of national attention when he wrote and published an editorial suggesting the Ku Klux Klan be revived to carry out lynchings to "clean out" Washington, D.C. He already had a local reputation for other, similarly inflammatory racist, sexist, anti-Semitic, anti-Muslim, and homophobic editorials.
Kimberly Nicole Klacik is an American businesswoman and political commentator. She is the Republican nominee for Maryland's 2nd congressional district in the 2024 general election. She was the Republican nominee for Maryland's 7th congressional district in both the April 2020 special election, held following the death of incumbent Elijah Cummings, and the subsequent November 2020 election. In both 2020 elections, she lost to Democrat Kweisi Mfume by over 40 points.
Mark Andrew Slater is a British film composer, conductor, cellist and pianist. He is the composer for the film Flatland, 400 Years of the Telescope., and numerous planetarium fulldome films. He lives in Tokyo, Japan and is a professor of film music at Andvision International Music School, Tokyo.Slater is a sponsored artist of the Make Art Not War Foundation.