Jive jibe: Madge on McCain

Madonna has always revelled in controversy and with the recent launch of her concert tour, Sticky & Sweet, the 50-year-old pop star has kicked up a new fuss by comparing John McCain to Adolf Hitler in a video.

As her world tour opened in Cardiff, Wales, over the weekend, Madonna showed a video montage juxtaposing images of Hitler with McCain, the Republican senator from Arizona running for president against Democratic Sen Barack Obama. The Democrats on Monday launched their nominating convention.

McCain’s campaign blasted Madonna with a campaign spokesman telling media organisations that the video was "outrageous, unacceptable and crudely divisive".

The dust-up is the latest in a career of risky moves that have paid off handsomely for Madonna, whose tours and albums have long mixed music with politics, sex and religion. While other stars rose to fame in the 1980s then faded away, Material Girl Madonna has become a global star and even courted controversy to stay relevant to younger audiences.

Courting controversies

In 1989 her song Like A Prayer, with links between religion and eroticism, caused Pepsi-Cola to cancel a sponsorship deal.

In 1992, she released a book called Sex with nude pictures of the star that caused a media sensation, and in 2003 her onstage antics with pop diva Britney Spears at MTV’s Video Music Awards proved to be yet another celebrity news firestorm.

"Madonna seems to be an extraordinarily brilliant businesswoman in the business of culture," said Robert Thompson, a senior professor of media and pop culture at Syracuse University, USA.

"She’s controlled her controversy, so every time she’s been in controversy it does her good, not bad," he told Reuters.

While Thompson noted that Madonna has successfully boosted her career in the past with controversy, he added that celebrities should speak their mind if they want.

"The whole notion of a democratic republic is that this wasn’t just about politicians, that anyone could shoot their mouth off about whatever they wanted to," Thompson said.

Sticky facts

• Besides Madonna, Democratic nominee Barack Obama’s fellow supporters also include celebs Robert De Niro, George Clooney, Matt Damon, Stevie Wonder and Oprah Winfrey.
• Madonna’s video showed a montage of genocide and the faces of Adolf Hitler and Robert Mugabe before cutting to Senator John McCain.
• As many as 36 designers including Givenchy, Stella McCartney and Roberto Cavalli were involved in creating Madonna’s outfits for the Sticky & Sweet tour.

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