http://www.msnbc.com/news/923214.asp?0dm=C15JB
One of my favorite quotes, (unattributed) was "the information age has given
new credeance to uninformed opinion".
This story contains some little bits of significant information, (in my
opinion) it is typical in a very common practice in today's news... bias. It
used to be, that when you watched the nightly news, you got 25 minutes of
news, and at the end, the disclaimer of "editorial content" or something
similar came up, and you got one man's opinion.
I've spent many many years selling into the broadcast markets, giving
networks, major news groups, and individual independant organizations
various tools for editing and delivering the news. I've been in nearly all
of the major market television stations, or dealt with the large entities
that also control newspaer, magazines, etc. You name it, I've probably been
there, and sold them (or tried to) sell them something. I've seen the behind
the closed doors agendas. I've seen it from the top on down, all the way to
some college student, intern editor, choosing a flattering picture of
someone he favors, while picking someone else's most awkward moment in an
effort to subtley influence public opinion.
The slant that's prevalent in vast quantity of what passes for "news" these
days is amazing. In this case, it's relatively harmless. I'd say, it would
go unnoticed by most.
As car people, we look at this story, and marvel at the 70 year production
run. We look at the political considerations of the car's inception. We
recognize the impact of its contribution to the German economy in a post WW
world. We understand how a "compact car" changed the accepted norms for what
we drive. We value the beginning of an awareness of fuel economy. We
remember the brilliant ad campaigns that brought the car wide acceptance in
the market place. We remember the limitations of the platform brought on my
impact and emissions standards.
Sure, the "Peace" sign, and make love not war, and many of those similar
images are part of that car's heritage... but the term "Hippie Icon" in the
headline of the story just seems narrow minded and stupid, (in my opinion).
What about the long production runs in the post US markets, primarily 3rd
world countries? What about the aftermarket performance craze it spawned,
or, the dune buggy derivatives? What about their ubiquitous function as taxi
cabs in places like Mexico City? What about their successes in areas of
competition?
Maybe its just me, but the author (unknown... how does that work?) of this
Rueters story seemed to just barely scrape the surface, while choosing (in
my opinion) a minor flavor in its long history, as a description of a
historical car with so many wide reaching effects in transportation,
economies, pop culture, engineering, etc. etc. etc.
Fluff is what we get, and we seem content with it.
As a many, many, many (think Imelda Marcos numbers) owner of air-cooled VW
stuff...
I am...
The Flounder
(and this has been my editorial content for the day)
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