Thu 24 May 2007
Today’s Sign of the (Impending) Apocalypse
Posted by nerdmeyr under Displays, the New World Order
[6] Comments
A flap over an outsized American flag and its flagpole has city officials and an auto dealership dueling over patriotism, advertising and neighborhood peace.
The city reports receiving more than 100 e-mail messages since the City Council last week ordered Towbin Hummer to take down its 100-foot flagpole. Most disagree with the council’s decision.
Mayor Oscar Goodman blamed the dealership several miles west of the Las Vegas Strip for not keeping a promise to build a small veterans memorial with the tall pole.
Riding through the city on my bike all day
Cause the filth took away my license
It doesn’t get me down and I feel OK
Cause the sights that I’m seeing are pricelessEverything seems to look as it should
But I wonder what goes on behind doors
A fella looking dapper, but he’s sitting with a slapper
Then I see it’s a pimp and his crack whore
…
When you look with your eyes
Everything seems nice
But if you look twice
you can see it’s all lies
from Lilly Allen’s song “LDN”
Click the play button to the left to listen to a sample from “LDN” from LastFM (may take a moment to load)
Lest you’re one of those folks who thinks the world has been completely taken over by cynical, ironic people, please note that there is no mention whatsoever in the above-referenced article about the COMPLETE RIDICULOUSNESS of a freaking HUMMER DEALERSHIP making any sort of legitimate claim to love the veterans or the U.S. or anything, for that matter, other than their evident love of being the transportation equivalent of a nasty, crotch-scratching crack dealer peddling giginormous crack pipes to a nation of strung-out crack addicts, the better with which to smoke more crack! (Do I need to say again the oft-quoted stat that your average 2006 Hummer gets about 15 mpg, while the 1908 Model T got about 25 mpg??? This is progress????!?!)
If you really feel patriotic, Hummer dealerships, how about getting real and making your danged egocentric-urban-crusher-mobiles run on human blood? Instead of shipping military people all the way over the Iraq and Afghanistan to get blown to bits ensuring the flow of oil into our car-veins doesn’t slow, we could just keep them here, in camps, and hook them up to IVs. Vertical integration and cutting out the middle-man, isn’t that what smart business is all about Hummer?
Soylent green is people, people, and so is our addiction to oil.
PS. As Mike says, “I don’t have the time or energy to try to turn this into some kind of “See!? That’s what’s wrong with Vegas!†thing, because that’s not what’s wrong with Vegas.” Indeed, I would add, Vegas is the bravely pointed weeping-opening-above-the-skin of our society’s grand seething carbuncle, and its genius is that it knows its very existence is dependent on gawkers flocking to see the pus come out in real-time…. in the form of lush green lawns replacing the desert, huge Hummer dealerships, plasterboard re-creations of famously old european cities slated to be demolished in ten years….
May 24th, 2007 at 3:22 pm
“flocking to see the pus come out in real-time” – phrases like that are why I adore you.
and now back to looking at cute things…
May 26th, 2007 at 11:45 pm
Seems to me like if you can drive whatever size car you want, you should be allowed to fly whatever size flag you want. I mean, this is America, right? You should also be allowed to smoke pot and do heroin if you can drink and smoke cigarettes, etc.
I’m turning into a libertarian.
ck
June 1st, 2007 at 12:29 pm
Ok, but… what should be done?
I think that many of us are generically coded to obtain stasis – completely full stomachs in our homes while not moving off the couch. It seems that the weights and balances of our biological systems are badly tweaked; and while this drive might have worked well for us pre-industrial revolution; it’s a detriment now.
As individuals we can make our own choices; biking or taking public transit to work; not eating cows which supports an industry which takes us massive amounts of real-estate, tortures animals, and occasionally poisons us with fetid meat; vote in elections for the less reprehensible candidate – a sort of “Only You Can Prevent Forest Fires” approach – but against the tide of our overall genetic makeup, it seems to be on the loosing side of momentum. Making sure not to leave combustibles at the campsite seems underwhelming after the forest fire which eats an 1/8th of a state is started.
Pointing out things which are broken needs to happen; there are too many inconstantices around us we pass without a second look every day. But what, if anything, should be done?
June 2nd, 2007 at 4:11 pm
well, for starters, people could stop buying hummers. but more importantly, have you forgotten that nerdmeyr is one crusty handkerchief away from being the world’s crankiest old man? this blog is a little outpost of soapbox shouts. Besides, I happen to believe that yelling “the end is nigh” at passersby IS doing something. Hence the degree in rhetorical studies. For most people, a blog is an expanded version of their resume, a resume of their personal/professional/private/social life – neatly formatted in just the way they wish to present themselves to the world. This blog isn’t any different; critiquing the world is what nerdmeyr and I do for a living – literally, we do it to live, or at least to crack ourselves up lest we punch something.
June 7th, 2007 at 12:44 pm
(smile) True, enough. I sent Nerdmeyr a TED Conference video done by James Howard Kunstler who talks about the importance of living locally and the end of the “three-thousand mile ceasar salad.” He went on to something along the lines (paraphasing) “Are our men and women, over in Afaganstan and Iraq, who are fighting for their country, actually fighting for a small curb between an Applebees and a Chuckey Cheese? Is that what they are dying for?” And points out that we need to start rebuilding small, localozed communities; and indeed when the oil runs out, that’s all well be able to do.
I wasn’t knocking ‘yer blog – it’s at the top of my feed, and fun reading!
June 13th, 2007 at 8:45 am
No offense taken! I thought that perhaps you thought that nerdmeyr had gone too far, and I wanted to warn you that it’s just the tip of the iceberg….prepare for some melting ice caps.