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people aspire to be heroes of some sort, and in wartime the urge
picks up extra firepower. Just the other day, Arianna Huffington
announced that she is giving up her Lincoln Navigator. Her colleagues
at Salon and elsewhere, in apparent concert, argued that
SUVs should be "cast overboard" in order to lessen America's
"dependence" on foreign oil.
It is of course
a major act of heroism to declare that other people should get rid
of their vehicles, and while it is unreported if Arianna pink-slipped
her driver along with the Lincoln one can assume her conscience
has forced her into a Jaguar or a Beamer (to find out what she really
bought, you have to pay for Salon's "premium" service
— no thanks). That won't quite qualify her for a humanitarian
food drop, but among her peers she'll be widely admired, which no
doubt is the point of the exercise.
The admiration
won't be universal, however. By general consensus, it is now considered
crass in the extreme to use the war to pursue prewar agendas. The
New York Times has reported, for example, that even the fiercest
combatants in the culture wars have called a truce while we try
to bomb Afghanistan out of the stone age.
The anti-SUV
people recognize no such truce. Their crusade is of long duration,
and now it takes on an ominous tone. Clearly, the attack on SUVs
has become an attack on their owners' patriotism.
The argument
is that if you drive an SUV you increase, in your own small way,
our national "dependence" on foreign oil. Many of us,
to be sure, would rather import oil from the extremely serene Alaskan
wilderness, and vastly increase nuclear energy generation. As it
happens, SUV critics tend to oppose both those policies. So we are
left with the unstable Middle East. Being honest, we admit that
SUVs tend to get around seven fewer miles per gallon than the modified
go-carts favored by critics. We do not, however, see that as unpatriotic.
Instead, we
consider the opportunity to drive larger cars to be a blessing of
our consumer society — as is the opportunity to fly huge gas-guzzling
jets to wonk conferences, resorts, television interviews, spas,
museum openings, fashion shows, foreign vacations, and the better
shopping venues, as Arianna can no doubt attest. Would she and her
jet-setting colleagues be willing to restrict her travel to one
or two trips a year? In the same spirit, would Arianna be willing
to live in small, energy-efficient houses?
After you,
dear.
We also admit
to a taste for other foreign products, such as German beer, French
wine, Asian sneakers, and the special type of journalism practiced
in the UK. Does this make us junkies? Honest, we can give this stuff
up anytime. We don't see kowtowing to terrorists as a good enough
reason, however. It's also worth pointing out that Bin Laden's complaint
against the U.S. is about far deeper matters — and indeed has
no peaceful solution.
Arianna joins
a small but vocal herd of anti-SUV scolds. Sen. Diane Feinstein
calls drivers "energy gluttons." Journalist Geneva Overholster
has denounced SUVs as "inexplicably popular extravagances"
and "nonsensical, gaz-guzzling behemoths" — phrases
clearly typed with pinkies raised. Geneva added that "I feel
like a lunatic about SUVs and I hereby invite you to join me in
raving." Only the morally superior, of course, consider their
desire to rave as a sure sign of elevated character. For others
of us, such is a plea for heavy medication.
Meanwhile,
someone named A. J. Naomi reasons that SUVs are prized by "seemingly
testosterone unbalanced males" while Ellen Goodman calls them
"gas-guzzling, parking-space-hogging bullies of the highway."
Ellen, whose deep explorations of mundane topics has earned her
a Pulitzer Prize, also observed that "I am old enough to remember
when the shape of a car was female, Detroit's sex appeal was all
curves and cars were pitched to men with blondes draped over their
hood. Now we're sold bivouac cars with brawn. It's no accident,
one reader reminded me, that the Nissan Pathfinder was nicknamed
the 'hardbody.' If the minivan is the soccer mom, the SUV is the
muscle man, even when it's driven by a woman."
Ellen has some
issues here.
She's not alone.
The people who rail against SUVs also have issues with "sprawl"
— otherwise known as the art of not living in box full of strangers
— and are in general terrified by other manifestations of the
expansive American spirit, such as 30-ounce beers, 24-ounce candy
bars, 350-pound high school linebackers, 50-caliber target rifles,
B-52 bombers, Daisy Cutters, the Super Bowl, and tattoos the size
of bath mats. They like things puny. And while they might not like
the Taliban's dress code, they clearly find something to admire
in its full embrace of ox-cart and horseback technology.
It would be uncharitable to close without saying something nice
about Arianna's sacrifice. The Lincoln Navigator is without doubt
the absolute gaudiest of all the SUVs. It is very large yet very
smug — a precise reflection of the soul many Navigator drivers:
haughty, ostentatious, preening, perhaps hugely insecure. The fewer
of them on the road, the better — though one assumes she'd
going to sell it, not scrap it.
That Arianna
has shed her Navigator may also be taken as yet another sign of
her highly publicized (by her own hand) inner cleansing. She may
reach perfection yet. When she passes by in her Jag, be sure to
bow.
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