A Sunday Ramble

I was reading Ad Age when two ads just struck me. Both featured very attractive Hispanic women. The copy for the Univision ad read: "Just talk to me in Spanish." The one for Si TV read: "You lost me at 'Hola'." It continued that 96% of young Latinos speak English. Of course, these ads reflect the respective programming of these cable networks. But, to me, it also addresses the fact that one cannot pigeonhole the Hispanic population in the language debate.

The Senate's largely meaningless gesture to designate English as the national language seemed designed more to be able to tell the folks at home about how they've "stood up for America", because the bill wouldn't alter multilingual ballots, signage, or government websites, nor should it. Next thing you know, they'll be an official muffin.

As for the President's words on the topic, he seems to be speaking from both sides of his mouth on this. As Neil Young might say, "Flip. Flop."
***
In the last three weeks, I've seen three stories, on two networks (ABC and CBS) about ethanol in Flex cars in Brazil. (This MSNBC story on the topic is nearly two years old.) Flex cars, some of which have been designed by GM, can run on ethanol, gasoline or a combination of the two. The Brazilians use sugar cane, which costs about $1 per gallon to produce. Corn, which one would likely use in the United States, costs about $1.25 per gallon to make. Gasoline now goes for about $2 per gallon to produce.
It's less polluting, it cuts gas imports (Brazil now has no imports). No drilling in ANWR would be necessary. Maybe there's a downside, besides the loss of market share for Big Oil (poor Exxon Mobil!), but I haven't discovered it yet.
Hey, I wonder if they could make a hybrid flex car?
***
The 70th most popular baby name for girls on the Social Security page for 2005 is Nevaeh. It went from not in the top 1000 in 2000 to #266 in 2001, #191 in 2002, #145 in 2003, #101 in 2004 to its current position. As I saw on the news last week, the name was devised by singer Sonny Sandoval, who, I must admit, I have never heard of. He's with a Christian band called P.O.D. Nevaeh is Heaven spelled backwards.
***
Near-twin Gordon reviews my latest mixed CD.