Looks like I'll soon have to make a category just for political ads, as Sweden has begin airing election ads on the national TV channels that accept advertising (SVT is like BBC paid for by license fees and thus has no advertising). This election is ad-historical in that all of the political parties are bringing TV ads to the table, and you non-Swedes will be getting an eyeful of Swedish political advertising in the coming weeks. ;)

This is the ad for the controversial political party "SverigeDemokraterna" (SD), and shows two people pouring money out into their respective budgets while the count down at the top is the national budget, and depleting. The pile of money on the left is labelled "pensions" and the other, significantly larger pile on the right is labelled "immigration". Meanwhile the VO says: "Politics is about priorities." When the state budget count down hits 100,000 two handbreaks drop from the ceiling and the VO says: "Now you have a choice." Enter the little old lady with her zimmer frame hustling to get to the breaks. Right behind her, a group of burqa-clad women appear pushing prams, racing toward the other break. The VO continues: "The 19th of September you can choose between pension-break, or immigration-break. Vote for SD."

Not very subtle, is it?

Update! Dagens Media reports just now that TV4 has refused this commercial to air on their network. They have no comment from TV4 in their article, but the press secretary for SD, Erik Almqvist, has this comment;

They haven't told us. We will have to discuss this internally. Of course we don't accept this, we have a contract.