New habitable planet

Good news and bad news: Astronomers have discovered the first possible
habitable planet other than earth. It's only 20 light years away, a
serious road trip, but doable in a multigenerational flight.

The good news is that some of us might escape the foolishness of the
contemporary politics, social policies and religious practices that keep
us at each other's throats. Just load the family in a space ship, and our
grand kids could have the good life.

There are downsides. For one, we'd become the illegal aliens and would
probably be unwelcome. Whoever or whatever lives there would not
appreciate us using up their resources and perhaps taking their jobs.
Another problem is that if you and I decide to go there, what's to stop
all the people we're trying to escape from? I'm guessing that in a couple
of generations every whacky ideology that plagues us on earth will be
firmly established on this new planet.

So, on second thought, moving isn't going to work. Perhaps the solution is
an advertising campaign, touting this new planet as the promised land, and
when all the "seekers" and opportunists leave, Earth will once again be
the legendary Garden of Eden .

Sociology of beer ads

Let's take beer ads to investigate Americans' capacity for analytical thought. An ad tells you why you should buy something, so beer ads should have something to do with flavor.

The most striking example is a very popular beer that bases its ads on it being cold. Now, anyone who got through 4th grade physical science knows that the temperature of beer is the temperature of the refrigerator. One beer in that refrigerator is a cold as any other. Still these ads draw customers.

Another ad just shows people relaxing on a beach, doing nothing particularly other than sipping beer. Hello. You can relax with any beverage, alcoholic or otherwise. You can relax with a bag of peanuts or with nothing at all.

During sports seasons, beer companies advertise that they sponsor the event. Does that mean the players drink it? The coaches? It only says they paid to put their ad on TV.

By the way, what does "Where there's life, there's Bud" actually mean?
How about a beer that claims its name is the Aussie word for beer?

There is one beer ad that comes to mind that actually talks about the flavor, and that just happens to be the better beer. Funny thing.

Now, if people can be manipulated into buying something as mundane as beer by ads that say virtually nothing about the product, how are they going to react to ads that deal with political, economic, social and religious issues?