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,duck logic,
schmuck logic
For just $30,000, you can
buy a car that Donald Duck wouldn't
be caught dead in!
On the other hand, August is the time to put summer by and prepare for the fall, fashion-wise anyway. I only spend money on neckties, mind you, but it always puzzles me why the display of models bored with their own looks would entice us to feel anxious enough about our own appearance to spend large sums of money on clothing. I'm old enough to remember when Vanity Fair, and other things New Yorkish, were artifacts of an alien culture, unless you lived somewhere New Yorkish. When I grew up in the Midwest we bought our clothes at J.C. Penney's and wore them until they were shiny. We only read Vanity Fair for the articles, which it didn't even have back then, poor us. But today we can all afford style, and we all want it, at least as it is dictated by those who dictate such things. Look at the public reaction to the murder of Gianni Versace! I don't intend any offense to his memory, but good grief, you'd have thought the pope had bought the farm. There used to be some logic to the media process. It was based on simple envy: If you bought this outfit, people would perceive you as someone vaguely New Yorkish. Their hatred and envy would be your mark of style. Now that New York is turning into Disneyland, the point of buying high-end products is vanishing. What's the advantage in being envious of the New York lifestyle when it's just an E-ticket away for anybody? Not even an E-ticket. All you need is a DKNY sweatshirt and a mocha, really, and you're styling. In the face of this, advertisers are becoming desperate. Take Cadillac, for instance. Vanity Fair had a print ad for Catera, the so-called "Caddy that zigs." (Yeah, but does it zag?) It was headlined "Duck Logic," and proceeded to detail for some 400-plus words what Duck Logic is. "Philosopher fowl ... avoid talk shows like the plague. They dance in the rain and take great pains to not walk around puddles. They observe human folly with detached amusement. They waddle in the face of convention." This blithering twaddle did lead to copy points eventually, as I knew it must. Apparently we are to believe that the Cadillac engineers who made the Catera used Duck Logic to create it. Regarding aerodynamics, the ad even claims: "Duck Logic tells us that wind noise isn't the result of wind. It's a result of those that resist the wind ... So engineers tested and retested Catera at up to 125 mph over and over again." This is the equivalent of saying that noise only happens if an ear is around, but, OK, whatever. Engineers might have bonded with a mallard to come up with this approach. A tree might fall in the forest and be heard only by an ad agency. You never know. But what do we make of this: "Duck Logic knows the virtue of clear sound on long trips. It led to the design of an optional sound system with computer programs to create a three-dimensional picture of how sound would behave in a Catera." I'm no ornithologist, but I know this truth: Ducks do not crave digital audio. They just don't. This revelation led me to conclude that neither the creators of this ad nor the creators of the Catera, despite the presence of a cute little cartoon duck as a mascot, have any special relationship with ducks at all. Do ducks drive cars, much less Caddies? I think not. This ad is mere whimsy. Don't get me wrong. I like whimsy. But when it's being employed to sell a product that sets you back 30 grand, it seems a little forced. Think about it: 30,000 bucks for a sedan. That's more than what my father paid for a house. To entice me into buying, what do the marketing geniuses dream up? A fucking duck. What am I supposed to think? Will the little duck appear on my payment coupons? That'd make me smile every month for the next five years or so, I'm sure, as I write out my $300 check. If I'm going to shell out that kind of dough for a car (and I'm not about to, even if I could, believe you me), it'll be in exchange for a Mercedes or BMW logo, something classy, not a little cartoon waterfowl. The whole thing reminds me of the DKNY sweatshirt. It doesn't reflect the Donna Karan style, does it? No, rather it indicates to others that its wearer is the sort of person who knows who Donna Karan is. It's fashionless fashion. It's Miami Beach, New York without the annoying New York part. It's Vanity Fair. It's "Duck Logic." It sucks.
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