Did you actually think you'd
get away with such an obvious
lift (the lede, a twist on
the famous Zappa quote about
music writing, wherein he
indicts all critics and
illustrates the futility of
words when it comes to
describing art)? Or was the
lack of attribution
deliberate, designed to
foment just this sort of
reaction? I always knew that
writing about "borrowing" was
like writing about something
that was written about
something that remotely
touched on talking about
television. By the way, I do
enjoy the site and agree with
its sensibilities.

Peter Hyman, Manhattan
<PHyman@vf.com>

And if we had any
sensibilities, we'd probably
agree with you.

As it is, we simply devote
ourselves to lacing
noncontent with cleverly
unattributed quotes
(sometimes other people call
them "references"), in the
hopes that readers just like
you will get the joke.
Congratulations, Peter, you
are smarter than just about
anyone else, including us.

Ann

A Few Good Unmentionables

I wanted to get irate but I
couldn't stop smirking.
Where's the leak? When first
retired from the military I
spun in the revolving door in
order to stay involved but
never had access like this.
War may be hell but no war is
harder to cope with as you
obviously understand. As far
as military loathing for the
Commander-in-Chief is
concerned, can you imagine
how much worse it would be if
WJC actually had a vision for
America and some
understanding of the
relevance of military
preparedness? They're just
doing what they always do in
the absence of orders
(leadership); having a big
GI party.

David George
<brencat@inland.net>

Hmm. Sounds a lot like high
school, except that trashing
the house might lead to
consequences a little more
dire than being grounded.

Some Jingle Jangle Morning

I hate to be the one to break
it to you, but art
masquerading as advertising
and vice versa have been
around for some time. In
fact, the intellectual
shenanigans involved in
confusing the two was the
whole point behind the art of
Andy Warhol and others in the
pop art movement of the '60s.
The fact that ad people have
just now caught on to the
joke just goes to show you
how dumb some of these people
are. I personally believe
that, besides raising product
awareness to a national
level, advertising does very
little to really convince
people to buy a specific
product, and TV advertising
is really more about
communicating pop Zeitgeist
than anything else. But so
long as they want to keep
paying for programming - I
say fuckin' go at it!

Charles McClelland
<chasmail@mindspring.com>

Who is this Andy Warhol guy
you refer to?