No One Wants An Electric Car

Even though yesterday I said that this subject made my ass tired, I think that I'm going to have to talk about it now because I just paid $3.85 a gallon for gasoline and I'm not happy about it. Maybe, if I thought that prices would go down anytime soon, I wouldn't be so concerned about it. Maybe, if I thought that there was a reason for it (gasoline goes up all the time for no reason at all, so I'm not so sure that unrest in Libya is not so much of a reason as much as it is a semi-reasonable sounding explanation), I wouldn't be so annoyed by it. Or maybe, even if I thought that there were people working on a solution that wouldn't involve such a dependence on oil, it wouldn't cause me great despondence. But none of that is happening. The price isn't going to go anywhere but up. I have no idea if the craziness in Libya has anything at all to do with it. And the people who are "working" on getting us all something besides a gasoline powered automobile have their heads so far up their collective asses, I don't know how they'd come to be able to drive the thing in the first place if they ever did manage to create a viable alternative method of individual transportation.

See, I've been hearing about the Chevy Volt and the Nissan Leaf for at least three or four years now. Both are supposed to be wonderful electric cars that will be the beginning of a beautiful friendship with things that don't run on gasoline. And believe me, I would take great pleasure in being able to flip both barrels at every single gas station that I drove by, were I given the opportunity or the alternative to drive something that doesn't require gas. And before you start harping about public transportation to me, just stop it. I'm not about the environment. I mean, I am. But I'm not so much about it that I'm going to be inconvenienced by the bus. Good Lord, no. I'm about not having to feign any sort of a relationship with abhorrent dictatorships in the Middle East simply because they're sitting on top of a bunch of oil that we want. That's what I want. I want to not give a flying crap what happens over there in the sand lands. Give me an alternative to gasoline and I'll be able to not give that flying crap.

And briefly, before I move onto ranting about the Volt and the Leaf, I need to mention that while I don't want to have to worry about what happens in the sand lands, there is an alternative at our fingertips that doesn't require any innovation what so ever. If people would stop being so damned concerned about whether or not a pigeon gets a drop of oil on its wing and let people start drilling out the 100 to 200 year supply of oil that is underground in the United States, we would have a great deal less to concern ourselves with. Y'all in Afghanistan want to blow the crap out of each other because you're fighting over a group of rocks? Have at it! Think I give a crap? I don't! You know why? Because we have oil, you backwards living weird beards! Fight amongst yourselves. I'm outta here!

Whew! That felt good. Now, on to the electric cars. I'd like to start with the name of the Nissan Leaf. Um, that's not exactly the coolest name that you ever could have come up with. It's a little sissy-like. The Leaf. Does it run on leaves? No? Does it have anything to do with leaves? No? OK, then. So how about naming it something that doesn't make you feel like a freaking pansy when you mention it? "I drive a Leaf." Yeah, I'd never tell anyone that. At least the Volt sounds kind of cool. Unfortunately, that's about all that they got right.

A car that runs entirely on electricity must get that electricity from somewhere. The Leaf and the Volt are able to be plugged in directly to an outlet in your home (provided you buy some sort of an adapter that runs, from what I can figure out, somewhere between one and two thousand bucks). Thus, they're using the energy that is generated to electrify your house. Where does that energy come from? Why, it comes from coal! Wait. I thought that the idea of the electric car was to get away from coal usage so that it would be 'green' and good for the environment? It was! But is it really doing any good for the environment when the electricity that it uses is produced by coal? Hard to say, but my guess is no. My guess is that it makes it so that you don't pump all of the harmful emissions into the air. So that's good. But is it really a 'green' product? I take umbrage with that statement (mainly because it's extremely rare that I can take umbrage with anything).

With both the Volt and the pansy-ish Leaf in production, let's take a look at how sales have gone so far. We'll even do a little comparing to other vehicle models that are not electric. First the Volt. According to their monthly sales report, there were 281 Chevy Volts sold in February. 281. That's it. What was GM's best selling vehicle? Why, that would be the behemoth Chevy Silverado C/K Pickup. They sold 31,728 of those bad boys in February. That's almost 113 times as many Volts as they sold. Oh, and their mileage? Right around 15-17 mpg in the city. Yeah, if that doesn't tell you that people don't care about electric cars, I don't know what does.

But maybe the Leafs numbers will tell you that very same thing in a different way. According to Autobloggreen, while Chevy was only able to unload a mere 281 Volts, Nissan could only get rid of a paltry 67 Leafs in February. 67. And it's ten thousand dollars cheaper than the Volt! 67! Why do I have the feeling that they could give these things away and people still wouldn't want them?

And that brings me to my final point. The price of these things. The base price of a Chevy Volt is $40,280. Yes, you can qualify for a federal tax credit of up to $7,500 and that will take it down to $32,780, but that is still a lot. (Personally, I don't see why my tax dollars should help someone else buy a car that may or may not do any good to the environment. Then again, I don't see a lot of the need for a bunch of crap that my tax dollars are spent on, so maybe that's my problem.) In comparison, the Leaf starts at $32,780 and with the maximum tax credit, that could go as low as $25,280. Then again, without the maximum tax credits, you're looking at two very small cars that are over $30 thousand and $40 thousand dollars. There aren't a lot of people who are going to pay that for a car. Wait. I take that back. The Chevy Silverado is more than the Volt and people seem to have no problem paying for that.

What have we learned here? Plenty. But the main point is that people don't want electric cars. People want big, big cars. And they want to drive them fast and they want to pull a boat behind them all the time and without using a trailer! That's what we want! Drill on US soil or in US waters for our own damn oil! Make big-ass cars and stop trying to make us drive shoe boxes with solar panels! This is a failed experiment! Please stop! Please! I can't take any more inane-ness in this department! No one wants an electric car! Got it?! Good!

Cars And Freedom - Together At Last

Look, I'm all good with all of the patriotism that is being displayed these days. I really am. But is this what we can look forward to in terms of automobile commercials? Because if it is, I don't know that I'm totally on board with it. George Washington driving a Dodge Challenger as he scares off hoardes of redcoats? Um, OK. I guess. It a slight "Dukes of Hazzard" feel to it. Maybe that's my issue. I'm not sure. What's next? The signing of the Declaration of Independence on the tailgate of a Dodge Ram? Why do I have the feeling that it will be?

White Trash Tweet

If you're a business that is going to sponsor an individual (probably an athlete), you're going to want to be sure that the person that you're sponsoring will be a good reflection of your business. If you have a classy business, you're going want to make sure that you're not sponsoring someone like Tonya Harding, for example. That won't look good at all. (Even if you're a lead pipe manufacturer. It's still probably not a good move.) So if you're a company like, say, Jaguar, you're going to want to sponsor someone who would seem to have a great deal of class. Maybe that's asking too much. How about a classy person? Some class? Let me put it another way. If you're Jaguar, don't sponsor someone who is going to Tweet "Suck on that faggots!" Wait. What?

Correct. It would seem that there is an Australian swimmer named Stephanie Rice. She's apparently a fairly big deal. At least in Australia she is. Then again, she was also a pretty big deal at the Beijing Olympics where she swam her way to three gold medals. And since three gold medals is nothing to sneeze at (unless you're allergic), Jaguar decided to sponsor this young dolphin-esque swimmer. And just like a Jaguar, she sure isn't difficult to look at. Behold!

Ah, yes. In the typical pose that one would expect from a swimmer. Laying atop rumpled bed sheets with hair all a-flowing. Sure. That's how all women look when they're just hanging out. Uh-huh. All the time. But I digress. The point here is that this woman is apparently a big fan of the Australian rugby team, the Australian Wallabies. Huh. For such a brutal sport, that's kind of a wussy name, isn't it? The Wallabies? (Granted, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers of the NFL went for years with their mascot as a guy with a feather in his cap who was winking. Not the most manly mascot anyone has ever dreamed up.)

But the Wallabies apparently beat the South African team. (I cannot locate the name of those blokes in any report of this because the media is now sucking worldwide. Thanks for that, sucky worldwide media.) They won 41-39 in a game that was described by The Telegraph as "a nail-biting victory". I'll take their word for it. I have no idea if that is a high scoring game or just an average score that was tight in the end or what. Not a clue. None. I guess that I just need to learn more about rugby, as I can't really assume that every publication reporting on this sort of thing is going to spell it out, but I really wish they'd maybe just give us a little clue.

Now, Ms. Rice was so excited about the victory that she did what anyone would do in that situation. That's right. She tweeted. Good Lord. I'm so over people and their tweets, I cannot even tell you. But what I can tell you is what she tweeted. And it wasn't very Jaguar-esque to tweet out to the entire world "Suck on that faggots!"

I wasn't the only one who thought that it wasn't exactly the kind of person that Jaguar might not want to sponsor. Yeah, Jaguar thought the same thing as well. They dumped her. They were more elegant about the announcement than I was just then, of course. A one Mark Eedle, who is the marketing and public affairs manager for Jaguar Australia, said, "We made a decision yesterday, and we've terminated the agreement with her."

They terminated their agreement with her?! But...but...she made a really weak apology after she was told how stupid she was! You mean that it didn't matter to Jaguar that she said, "I made a comment on Twitter on Saturday night in the excitement of the moment. I did not mean to cause offence and I apologise." That's what she says in the "excitement of the moment"? She gets so excited that she tweets "Suck on that faggots!"? You know, some people simply shout, "Yipee!" What if they had been playing a German team? Would she be tweeting what she thought the Jews should do? I certainly hope not.

Enter The Invisible Monkey

Who would have ever thought that those car commercials that we are bombarded with when they're having a "special event" would turn out to be rather amusing? Enter Dodge and enter PETA and you've got yourself a recipe for a wee bit o'hilarity ensuing. The hilarity ensues immediately after the annoyance over the emergence of PETA subsides, by the way.

See, Dodge made an ad that promoted their Dodge tent event. I don't know when the practice of erecting a tent became equated with a good deal on a shiny new vehicle, but it has been that way for quite some time now. They mention what a great deal you can get yourself on a brand new Dodge Charger, Dodge Journey or Dodge Grand Caravan. (What's a Journey? Is it named after the band? Shouldn't they have had Steve Perry in this commercial? I'm pretty sure he's not doing anything these days.) Not only that, they'll give you sixty days to see if you want to keep the vehicle. (There is, of course, no mention of the eight gazillion strings that are inevitably tied to such an offer. Things that I would imagine might include not having driven the car over 30 miles in those 2 months and never having turned on the air conditioning.)

That's when voice-over guy (the lovely and cancer-free Michael C. Hall) says that this whole thing could not get more amazing. He soon realizes that he is wrong when a little monkey wearing an Evil Knievel jumpsuit comes out and presses down on one of those ACME detonator things that Wile E. Coyote was always using to try and do in that sneaky roadrunner. The monkey pushes it down and a bunch of confetti blows out of somewhere. Voice-over guy deadpans, "I stand corrected." Not bad. Funny. I liked it. Maybe you will, too. Behold!

But who did not like it was PETA. PETA doesn't like anything having to do with cute animals being mistreated. I know. I know. All the monkey did was push the lever. But that is bad, according to PETA, because that little monkey had to be taught how to do that. (It's also bad because the little monkey is really a chimpanzee and there is, apparently, a difference. I don't know if it offended the chimp, but it really seemed to rile up PETA.) According to the website "Where's the Monkey?" in which Dodge tries to explain why they altered their commercial, they informed them "...about the poor conditions of working animal "actors." They told us how these animals are usually separated from their mothers at a young age and are usually discarded at seedy roadside attractions after they get too old to act." What sort of "seedy roadside attractions"? The only seedy roadside attractions around here are taco trucks and fruit vendors. None of them have monkeys. I'm not saying that what PETA is saying is false, I'm just saying I want more information of these primate abusing attractions that allegedly congregate roadside.

Dodge said that this made them sad and they took the spot off of the air. They also said that "Dodge is firmly committed to never using great apes in our advertisements again." While I suppose that is good, they don't mention anything about never using mediocre apes in their advertisements, so...fingers crossed!

But, wait! There's more! They took the ad off of the air and tweaked it just a little bit. They removed the chimp from the footage. Oh, don't get me wrong. They left the jumpsuit and the walking over to the blowy-uppy thing and the confetti that booms out from somewhere. That's still there. There just is no monkey. The monkey is invisible. Wait. Invisi....? Behold!

Most awesome! Very amusing! I'm glad that Dodge didn't completely ditch the ad. I'd like to see Dodge keep the invisible monkey in upcoming future ads. I'd also like to see PETA burn off of the face of the earth. I'm all for animals not being mistreated. And with everything that you can do digitally these days, there's probably no reason why Dodge can't just make a cyber-monkey instead of using a real one. But I'm never for PETA making an appearance. From what I can tell, they do one thing really well, and it's not caring for animals. It's their own attention whoring that they're so successful at.

Tata Nano Coming + Boulez Becalmed + CC & Kundiman in Bkyn

A few years back I posted about MDI compressed-air automobile technology, developed by Guy Negre in France, which seemed to me to be an option that US automakers in Detroit or elsewhere might consider investing in. The ongoing problems with US automaking, symbolized at the time by the faltering Chrysler-Daimler Benz deal, were central in my mind. One of the articles I'd linked to said that Indian auto powerhouse, Tata Motors, had leapt on the technology and was going to start producing compressed-air models later that year. Three years later, it doesn't appear as though Tata has gotten that far with the compressed-air technology, but it has produced the least expensive car on earth ($2,500 US), the Nano, which it'll begin selling over here very soon. The Christian Science Monitor writes that Tata is finalizing a European model, which will require changes to the system's engine to meet the EU's much higher auto-emission standards, and is said to be "tinkering" with its US version. The images remind me of some of the tiny cars C and I saw in Sicily and have seen in other parts of Europe. The price, which is expected to come in at about $8,000 US for the EU and US models, would beat the best current offerings on the market, and I'd love to test one out. I also wonder how well they'd sell in the US, where size, safety, and comfort are paramount. Hitting one of the Evanston or Chicago Sheridan Road potholes might twist the tiny car's axles like a pretzel, and the snow and heavy rains in many parts of the country would also pose a challenge. But I'm excited about seeing one of these in the metal, and even taking one for a spin. Just not on Sheridan Road.



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L'enfant terrible est actuellement un vieillard sage.  Or so you could say about a true bad boy of the 1950s era, Pierre Boulez (at right, Guardian.co.uk), who infamously proclaimed in an obituary he wrote, with both glee and spite, that Arnold Schoenberg was "dead," by which he meant, among other things, that Daddy was in the ground and the kids now had control of the joint.  But Schoenberg's ghost shouldn't have worried, because Boulez shed even fewer tears over the demise of Igor Stravinsky, Leos Janacek, and some of the other major early 20th century avant-garde figures. Boulez, and the great experimenters of his generation, had surpassed them and the music establishment in general. Only a few of these forebears, including Schoenberg's pupil, Anton Webern, and Boulez's former teacher, Olivier Messaien, offered a way forward. Eventually even some of Boulez's peers, like John Cage, had to be cast aside. Or at least that's one reading of the narrative of le jeune polemeciste Boulez, who is now known across the globe for his sensitive conducting of Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Debussy, Ravel, Janacek, and other modernist composers. Heis also a highly respected composer, essayist and memoirist, and institutional founder. As in establishmentarian.

Michael Kimmelman explores the contemporary Boulez in a recent New York Times piece, "Boulez's Gentler Roar," which discusses the now 84-year-old composer's visit to New York's Carnegie Hall to conduct works by Schoenberg, Mahler, Webern, and himself, with the Vienna Philharmonic.  What Kimmelman gets at, as Andrew Clements and Tom Service did a few years ago in the Guardian Online, is Boulez's somewhat mellower approach to everything, including the music he had imagined himself and his generation superseding. He also touches upon how aspects of Boulez's vision, in such matters as his approach to the New York Philharmonic's programming and self-presentation, was ahead of its time. Instead of a figure to be feared, a "Don Corleone" as one critic put it, these days he's beloved by his students at the Lucerne Festival Academy. Yet he doesn't apologize for his combative approach or his embrace of the new. Quoting Boulez in Kimmelman's piece:

“I like virtuosity, although not for the sake of virtuosity but because it’s dangerous,” was Mr. Boulez’s description of “Répons” when we sat down to talk for a few hours after the rehearsal. By danger he meant that music, to be worth anything — which is to say to be new — can’t stick to safe ground but must entail some risk and effort.

“If you want to have a more interesting life, you will make some effort,” is how he put it. “It’s about the organization of one’s life. I am still shocked that so many people are not more creative, by which I mean more demanding of themselves.

“The main question we need to ask ourselves is: Do I try to be necessary to the evolution of language? Do I try to be original? And being original means using the tools necessary to be original, not just having the desire to be original.”

That was part of his criticism of Cage, who was, admitted, creating or finding the tools, which many others then adopted and ran with. In fact it might be apt to say that in many cases, in many works, the process was as important for Cage as the outcome. (Think, for example, of 4'33".) This wasn't enough for the mathematically trained, severely doctrinaire Boulez, but from Kimmelman's article, it appears that perhaps he might not be so rigid about such things these days. I wonder if that will include finally coming out too?

If you haven't checked out iLike, which features musical artists of every type, including Pierre Boulez, in a simple to view and understand audio snippet-and-purchase format, I recommend it. iTunes, watch out!

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Coming up very soon, a real treat for New Yorkers: Cave Canem and Kundiman-affiliated poets will be reading together, at Cave Canem's new home in Brooklyn. From CC:

Cave Canem and Kundiman invite you to an evening of outstanding poetry in Cave Canem's new loft, featuring Regie Cabico, Jacqueline Jones LaMon, Tan Lin and Mendi Obadike.

www.cavecanempoets.org
Cave Canem & Kundiman Poets Read
January 20, 7 pm
20 Jay Street, Suite 310-A
Brooklyn, NY

Recommended admission $5 - $10

Dems' Race Flap + Obama & Latinos + MDI Car + Living Longer w/ AIDS

I've received and read a lot of emails and posts about the racial (and to a lesser extent gender) imbroglios that the Clinton and Obama camps have been engaging in, all of which end up harming Obama, in my opinion, to Clinton's and ultimately the Republicans' benefit, in that any talk of "race" (as well as "racism") magnifies his blackness (which "race" chiefly signifies in this society) among non-Black voters and allows him to be cast as the too self-consciously "Black" candidate, or "angry Black" man, or or racial "whiner," while also deflecting attention from his opponents issues and problems and from substantive critiques of his positions, policies and record. (The most cynical reading would be that even if the Clintons piss off Black voters, they would assume Blacks have no place to go, beyond voting by not voting, in the general election, and perhaps that's a risk they want to take.) You can argue that Obama's set himself up for this by his careful straddling of the politics of race, offering differing faces to differing crowds, while gliding over racism as an abiding societal issue via a nearly post-identitarian (and post-"issue") discourse, but I think he and his advisors assume that this may be the best or most effective route, and it appears to have worked so far, so we'll see soon how it turns out as things play out. Either way, the emergence of intra-party rifts over identity politics creates dangers that the Republican Party will not hesitate to exploit, so Obama's call for ramping down the rhetoric is a good sign, though he, the Clintons, their surrogates, and the party in general will nevertheless need to address the tensions.

Alongside this mess, there's the broader gantlet that Obama faces, which I've written about before. Today I read that "liberal" columnist Richard Cohen offers the newest volley in the anti-Obama game of religious, racial and ethnic smears by trying to link him to Rev. Louis Farrakhan, via Obama's South Side Chicago church and minister, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. I think the aim here is to scare White people, but particularly Jewish voters. Personally I think Obama could tamp this down immediately by framing the response in crude terms, such as, "What do these people attacking my church and faith have against Christianity, or the Judeo-Christian tradition?" which is the sort of thing I'd expect out of Mike Huckabee's mouth. At the same time, it would probably be very effective. If Obama won't do it, find an ordained surrogate to go that route; isn't that what's been going on so far, with the various comments from Jesse Jackson Jr., Andrew Cuomo, Charlie Rangel, and, of all people, Robert Johnson?

There's the ongoing issue of the Manchurian Muslim email, originally generated by a right-wing nutcase, then furthered by right-wing commentators and eventually people affiliated with the Clinton campaign; it continues to circulate and will probably transmogrify in ways we cannot even imagine if he wins the nomination. (Chris Matthews managed to take things to a new realm of bizarrie when he stated on TV that Obama's mother and maternal grandmother were Muslims.) No matter how often this thing gets debunked, it'll keep surfacing. In light of the last week, I'll just repeat what I've written to anyone discussing Obama's electoral prospects, which is that I hope he and his advisors--like the Clintons, if Hillary gets the nomination, or Edwards--are ready for much, much worse.

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And then there's this: today the New York Times, following some weeks after other news organs (Raw Story, for example), is telling us that Obama's going to have problems with Latino voters, because he's Black. While this wasn't the case in his US Senate race in Illinois (either in the Democratic primary or the general election), and while the Latino populations differ by region, reporters Adam Nagourney and Jennifer Steinhauer report that Obama's being Black may cause problems among Latino voters. To quote them:

Mr. Obama confronts a history of often uneasy and competitive relations between blacks and Hispanics, particularly as they have jockeyed for influence in cities like Chicago, Los Angeles and New York.

“Many Latinos are not ready for a person of color,” Natasha Carrillo, 20, of East Los Angeles, said. “I don’t think many Latinos will vote for Obama. There’s always been tension in the black and Latino communities. There’s still that strong ethnic division. I helped organize citizenship drives, and those who I’ve talked to support Clinton.”

Javier Perez, 30, a former marine, said older Hispanics like his grandmother tended to resist more the notion of supporting an African-American, a trend that he said was changing with younger Hispanics.

“She just became a citizen five years ago,” Mr. Perez said. “Unfortunately, that will play a role in her vote. I do think race will play a part in her decision.”

Interestingly, Carrillo doesn't say, "a Black person," but "a person of color," which could easily include a Latino, like Bill Richardson, which points to broader issues beyond Black-Latino relations (cf. above). For activists like Rev. Al Sharpton, Obama's problem is that he's run a "'race-neutral campaign'," and yet this appears to matter little to those who would foreground his Blackness, no matter how he plays it. Yet the article isn't all doom: on the other hand,

In California, Mr. Obama has won backing from Latino lawmakers, some of whom had supported Mr. Richardson, but winning rank-and-file voters will be hard, said the State Senate majority leader, Gloria Romero, Democrat of East Los Angeles.

“Do we have a long way to go?” she asked. “Absolutely. I think there are some tensions on questions of immigration and jobs. But I believe that we have moved forward in a way that the community will embrace an African-American president.”

She said the solution to overcoming the tensions was discussing economic problems of middle- and lower-class blacks and Hispanics like the mortgage crisis, an issue that first Mrs. Clinton and now Mr. Obama have been raising more frequency.

“I don’t think eating tacos,” is effective, she said with a flick at Mrs. Clinton. “We need to address what unites us. The key is not to raise the wedge issue.”

I wonder how true this will be. Nevada will provide the first test, but I think it's too soon to write off Latino support for Obama everywhere, even if some places (California and Texas, say) prove tougher than others (like New Jersey and Connecticut).

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Commentator Biodun's excellent "The Third Rail of Identity Politics in the US" is here.

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Given how recalcitrant the Detroit automakers are proving to be in terms of raising fuel standards and producing vehicles that compete with the best that Japan, Korea and other countries now offer, and given the overall bleak economic situation in Michigan and other parts of the upper Midwest region, I was thinking that perhaps the autoworkers' unions, or even a group of ambitious workers and concerned citizens and government officials might undertake a fact-finding mission to ensure that this revolutionary product, Frenchman Guy Negre's MDI compressed-air car (photo at left, Maycha.blogspot.com) which Tata, the Indian carmaker, is set to produce in sizable numbers later this year, is also being produced in the backyard (or front yard) of the Big Three.

If the "air car," as it's also being called, takes off globally, promises to upend the current discussion about automobile fuel emissions andefficiency, energy conservation and global warming. Its lightness helps conserve energy, and Negre says that it produces near-zero pollution on city streets and very low emission levels on the highway. The car does require a period electrical charge, and can be fitted with fuel tanks if needed, but for city driving it need not have the latter. Even its assembly would mark a shift from current practices (and back to an earlier mode of production); Negre envisions local factories using local materials, thereby helping to cut down on energy use in manufacturing process. The suggested price is $7000. According to Buzzfeed, it's already in 12 countries, so why not the US too? Talk about a great gift to the people of Detroit--and the US as a whole....

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About a week or so ago I posted on the New York City Health Department's report on the rise of HIV seroconversions among young men of color. Keguro and Kai chimed in, and shortly after they did so, I noted the following report, which I've been meaning to post about for days now. It's intimately linked, I think, to the Health department's findings: reporter Jane Gross's "AIDS Patients Face Downside of Living Longer."

It opens

John Holloway received a diagnosis of AIDS nearly two decades ago, when the disease was a speedy death sentence and treatment a distant dream.

Yet at 59 he is alive, thanks to a cocktail of drugs that changed the course of an epidemic. But with longevity has come a host of unexpected medical conditions, which challenge the prevailing view of AIDS as a manageable, chronic disease.

Mr. Holloway, who lives in a housing complex designed for the frail elderly, suffers from complex health problems usually associated with advanced age: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, kidney failure, a bleeding ulcer, severe depression, rectal cancer and the lingering effects of a broken hip.

Those illnesses, more severe than his 84-year-old father's, are not what Mr. Holloway expected when lifesaving antiretroviral drugs became the standard of care in the mid-1990s.

The drugs gave Mr. Holloway back his future.

But at what cost?

That is the question, heretical to some, that is now being voiced by scientists, doctors and patients encountering a constellation of ailments showing up prematurely or in disproportionate numbers among the first wave of AIDS survivors to reach late middle age.

The article goes on to discuss the challenges the various people profiled experience, and given the number of people living with HIV and AIDS today, and living longer, this got me thinking about the notion of AIDS as a "chronic" disease, and, from my perspective, the lack of discussions and narratives, especially in terms of the conventional media's public discourse or popular culture, about the long-term effects of HIV seroposivity and the lives and experiences of long-term PWAs. I understand why; these topics are ones that few people other those involved in HIV education, prevention and treatment, and people living with HIV/AIDS, probably are interested in. But given that the notions that drug cocktails approximate a cure and AIDS is just another chronic, indefinitely manageable illness have taken hold, perhaps that there should be more discussion on what the various challenges of living with HIV and AIDS over a long time-span are now and will be in the future.