Remember when you could be proud to be an American? Not that you can't be proud now, but I just remember when it used to mean something. Used to be when you swelled out your chest in pride, you had some reasons to do so. We wereNumber One. Standard of Living. Gross National Product. Food Production and Processing. Education. Automobile Production.
Today? America is number one, alright. Number one in fat kids who couldn't find Germany on a map unless you smeared chocolate on it. The only thing we've successfully created in the last 25 years is a generation dependent on prescription drugs. We should just hand out diabetes and heart disease at every bris and baptism.
And what happened to our grip on the world's transportation jones? We were the main supplier of that chrome-covered drug for decades. Remember the Motor City? Remember when we were at the forefront, on the cutting edge, leading the pack, and thinking outside the box? It was back when we created cars with personality and vision that were the envy of the rest of the world. As far as we were concerned, the rest of the world created ox-carts and rig-shaws. We Made Cars. Today we make cars that all look like the same sliver of shower soap.
Let's get busy and start kicking some transportation ass again!!! That's all I'm saying. We need to completely rethink this whole four-wheeled technology and build something that's gonna make everybody's eyes roll back in their collective heads, do a skull and go, "Oh, yeah, God. That's IT! Why didn't WE think of THAT? Yes, of course! Man, I gotta have one of those." And while we're at it: Where the Hell are the Flying Cars!?! This is 2009. Two THOUSAND Nine. That's the future. We are in the future, and I want my flying cars and my three-course meal pill and my robot butler. Ok. Maybe not the butler. But I expect at least reasonably affordable mass-produced Hover Craft by the year 2010.
One thing I want us to do because we can and we should is to Learn From Our Mistakes. Detroit and Flint are not Dead Cities. They're not overgrown and forgotten like those old Mayan Temples or Ahngor Wat or whatever. They are viable production centers with tons of space and people hungry to work. Let's build some stuff there again and prove to the world that we can wipe the chocolate from our lips long enough to get our chests swelling out farther than our bellies again.
We should have learned from the design flaws of the Edsel. We should have learned from the gross pollution and shoddy workmanship of the Model T (look it up before you try and reprimand me). We should have learned from the supposed Energy Crisis of the 1970s. But we didn't. And we kept on creating cars that no one wanted to drive. No one. Not even those guys with the ox-carts. Look, I'm simply saying: No more Aztecs. No more 8,000 pound land yachts that get nine gallons to the mile. No more over priced toys that can't carry your groceries home without a re-charge.
Click on the Title Above to see what Time magazine -- yes, TIME MAGAZINE, people -- have deemed the worst cars of the last 17 years. See what you think. Agree, disagree, complain, sing halleluhia...complain about my spelling...Whatever. Just get back to me with your comments. I'll be here.
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