Being a yokel from southern California who now lives in Manhattan, isn't 
everything that New Yorkers believe about the sticks true?  (Just kidding!)

Henry is quite right about New York remaining the media center for the US, 
despite "Hollywood," etc.  Roughing it for a New Yorker is a subway trip to 
Queens.  The advertising execs who approved the commercial only have a vague 
idea where Virginia is.

Yet, how many Virginians know the difference between Manhattan and Queens? 
We are and always have been a people united by a common ignorance of our 
national geography.

Harold S. Forsythe
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Henry Wiencek" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, October 17, 2007 10:46 AM
Subject: Re: New Quaker Oats ad:


As a former New Yorker, very happily residing in Virginia since 1992, I have
another explanation for the ad. It was probably produced in NYC, a haughty
and insular place. Everywhere else is "the sticks" or "the tall grass,"
places of perpetual darkness and impenetrable ignorance inhabited by yokels
and trolls. Any sane person, in the NY view, would leap at the chance for a
ticket out. Putting the "ticket out" words in the mouth of an
African-American adds an entirely new, different meaning; but the idiots who
made this ad were deaf to that. I see nothing sinister in it; just
stupidity. But I am surprised the ad made it through all the layers of
review. I wonder if it was shown to focus groups.

Henry Wiencek