The problem with your thinking is that people ARE individuals. Hillary is a party line, NEA owned, unimaginative and uninspiring party hack. While Obama has some chance of winning, Hillary has none. The Republicans are praying for her nomination.

One part of our assignment was to familiarize ourselves with Amazon.com. Happily, for me that is easy. That is probably my most used website.

Our family probably spends more than $1,000 per year at Amazon.com. We love books. One book we recently purchased there was AFLUENZA, by DeGraff, Wann and Naylor. This book mentions Amazon.com, but not in a favorable light.

Amazon is seen as a culture killer, a giant that killed off and is killing off small business. Sure, it is very easy, when looking for a book, to go to Amizon. There have only been a few times I couldn’t find what I was looking for there. (E.g., a 1888 edition of a Greek and Latin Classical Dictionary.) How many book stores can compete with Amazon.

Homo Sapiens Consumens likes convenience. He likes TV Dinners instead of preparing everything from scratch (except, thank God, for my wife). He likes shopping from the convenience of his living room. The Ma and Pa Bookstore around the corner doesn’t stand a chance.

The authors of Affluenza had two complaints about Amazon and Internet shopping:

First, it kills off local business. I think that complaint is just plain wrong. Sure it is easier to shop at Amazon, but if Ma and Pa Booksellers have any brains, they too will have a presence on the Internet. Or maybe, their only presence will be on the Internet. It is ridiculously easy to set up shop on the Internet. Anyone who can figure out how to work Ebay and Paypal can do it. If anything, the Internet is an incentive for new businesses, not a death march for them.

The second complaint, unfortunately has more validity. The Afluenza authors complain that Internet shopping rules out one of the nice things about old time shopping, the ambiance. Yeah, sure the internet is more convenient than going out to a bookstore, but is it better? At bookstores you can get into conversations with people and exchange ideas and thought. That alone is worth the trip. I have to say, some of the best conversations I have ever had in my life took place in bookstores.

If I had to pick out one characteristic of our society that I think the Internet is promoting more than any other, I would have to say it was isolation. On the internet one shops alone; one argues alone; one lives alone. I have heard of long distance relationships, dating type relationships taking place primarily on the internet. In some cases, people who never meet have a “relationship.”

Not my cup of tea. The internet has its uses, but dating isn’t one of them. I grant you shopping on the internet, if it is not for books, is probably okay. I never had a great conversation in a refrigerator store, or shopping for shoes. But some things, it really is better to buy in person.

I didn’t watch the superbowl, or most of it anyway. I watched about 10 minutes of the game and sadly, missed the halftime show completely. But fortunately, the commercials, what I really wanted to see, are all over the internet.

Superbowl commercials are all over the internet. That’s probably the best thing about the Superbowl, at least for me, since I really don’t like to watch football. The commercials can really show you the state of this country’s morality. By this I mean, advertisors try to come as close to the line as possible in making these commercials, without actually stepping over the line. But even those who step over the line still put their commercials on the Internet.

One in particular cought my attention.

https://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/media/lounge.asp?isc=gooyg01agc&ci=11591

This commercial is interesting because it straddled the line, the commercial itself being banned from the SuperBowl, but a teaser to it, getting on the Superbowl.

The commercial that got on features Danica Patrick (Young female Nascar Driver) unzipping her racing suit, not to really reveal any cleavage, but to suggest that the banned ad went a lot further.

If you go to the banned ad, as I did, the reason it was banned becomes obvious. The ad shows some Holywood event and beautiful women are arriving in limos. Each one of them had their pet beaver with them. The reporters ooh and aah. Then Danica suddenly appears in her racing suit, and the reporters ask her where her beaver is. They walk away in disgust. Then she says, “At godaddy.com, I get enough exposure so that my beaver can remain safe and out of sight.”

Now there is no nudity or even suggested nudity in this commercial, but the “naughtiness” is the pun on the word “beaver” between its street meaning and its dictionary meaning of a furry little animal.

Personally, I found the commercial gross and juvinile, but it is right on the line. It shows where American morals are. Indeed, even Shakespeare made dirty puns, just as raunchy as this one, and probably the audience was just as vulgar.

Does this mean that things haven’t changed since the time of Shakespeare? Or does it mean that the most successful writers get their inspiration from the same source?

Does it mean that a small group of creative advertisers have tapped into the collective superego of America? Or does it mean that a small group of very bright people, such as Shakespeare, CONTROL the superego of America.

I personally find this fascinating, and will pick this topic up again from time to time.