On Pickup Trucks
I was driving home last night, flipping through the radio stations, and landed on on Springfield's Rock 102. It had been a warm springy day and a little bit of Classic Rock was reminding me of high school. Now, don't get me wrong, when I was in high school, this was still called "Classic Rock" -- even then, my generation was under the sway of the boomers. I remember a Kiss song coming on, "I Want to Rock and Roll all Night." I was grooving along. But after that, an ad came on for the new Dodge line of heavy-duty pickup trucks. It was something along the lines of: People keep talking about responsibility, buying light bulbs that look like curly fries, but what about people who are responsible for making things? You want a big truck with a turbo diesel engine with lots of torque to get the job done, and room for five friends in your extended cab. And then there was a radio spot for the morning DJs, Bax & O'Brien, saying they were going to be on with our new U.S. Senator, Scott Brown, this morning. I was simultaneously repulsed by the reactionary message (only pointy headed liberals care about gas mileage... you're a real man: buy a big, expensive, gas guzzling truck!) and curious. So I peeked over to the radio archive at Rock 102 and looked up the Scott Brown interview. I think it's the first time I've heard our new senator on the radio. Oh, I've heard talk about him, but not an interview with the man himself. It was not so informative. Bax & O'Brien goaded him with questions about how awful the health care bill was and how tone-deaf and nefarious the Washington D.C. Democrats are. Brown obliged, but seemed thoughtful next to the shock jocks. When prodded with a question (based upon an op-ed in USA Today) about allowing illegal immigrants to purchase health insurance (purchase, not paid for by the government) and why anyone would want to allow that -- Brown demurred and said the reason was probably to relieve pressure on hospital emergency rooms. I don't think they asked him about his famous pickup truck from the campaign.