In the lead of his expansive story on Hawaii in the travel section of the Sunday Times, NYT editorial writer Lawrence Downes includes this little observation:
"Hawaii's blandly sunny face hides a turbulent history, an extra dimension of sadness and beauty. This is what separates Hawaii from the beach-and-beer nowheres like Fort Lauderdale and Canc�n: a complicated soul."
So the truth comes out. The New York Times thinks Fort Lauderdale -- a bursting-at-the-seams county seat of going on 2 million people -- is a "nowhere" and that we don't have much in the soul department.
Yeah, I take Downes' dis a little personally, even though I'm sure I've said as much myself (it's the sprawl, man, the sprawl). It's sort of like when somebody makes fun of your sister. You can say you want about her, but when some arrogant rag from New-frickin-York weighs in with a cheap insult ... well, watch out.
How about we show them just how much a nowhere we really are? Kill your subscription to the paper. If you don't have a subscription (like the vast majority of us), don't get one. It's the least we can do (or not do). What will we miss, really? If you're a New York transplant and yearn for some old local flavor, get the Daily News. Any big stories the Times breaks will be all over the other media, so you'll hear about them in a NY minute. And the finer points of the newspaper ... well, the NYT is just a little bit overrated. You know, like the Marlins are just a little bit young and inexperienced. It blew it on the war, bent over backwards for Little Ms. Run Amok, has Thomas L. Friedman all over it, and is best known by the public-at-large for the Jayson Blair scandal. Do you really need those vapid trend pieces by Jennifer 8. Lee? Or those columns from -- good God almighty -- David Brooks? Or the snappy and oh-so-tired little anti-Bush screeds by Maureen Dowd? I think not.
