Hostess Issues & Analysis

Hostess Bakery: Behind The Pillaging And Sacking Of Another Famous Brand

(By “BlueBeaumont Boyz, DailyKos.com, 18 November 2012)

 

The purpose of this diary is to explore the economic and financial background of those pillaging and burning a (formerly) great American brand.  Hostess Bakery created several American comfort foods including Ding Dongs, Ho Hos, Wonderbread, Suzy Qs, Dolly Madison Zingers, and Drake's Ring Dings.  The fact that Hostess Bakery was the 2012 version of 2008's General Motors and Ford Motor Company is beside the point of this diary.  However, let me note that Ding Dongs, Ho Hos, etc. do not mesh well with diet-conscious cuisine.  Since moving to California ten years ago, I am not sure I have had more than two or three doughnuts during this period.  Carbs and sugar and calories, oh, my!  Nevertheless, Hostess is now a great American tragedy, in no small part related to venture capitalists and corporate raider.  This diary is the story of what has become normal in American business history and unfettered capitalism since 1865 and the end of the American Civil War.  The robber barons came to the fore and such American luminaries as Cornelius Vanderbilt, John D. Rockefeller, and others earned their fortunes at the misfortune of others.  Sometimes, this misfortune was facilitated by the very people who later benefited from the 'distressed events.'  More recently, Michael Milken, Carl Icahn, Monarch Alternative Capital LP, and Silver Point Capital LP have taken up the mantle of the robber baron.  The venture capitalists see opportunity in the recession and swoop in to take advantage.

For an interesting filmaic history of the robber barons, the History Channel now has some fantastic historical background on the rise of the robber barons in 'The Men Who Shaped America.'  Modern day robber barons and their admirers provide commentary (think Donald Trump, GE's former-CEO Jack Welch, Time-Warner's former-CEO Richard Dean Parsons, CNBC Mad Money's Jim Kramer, etc.).  According to the History Channel, Vanderbilt reportedly attempted to sell railroad rights of way into New York City to various railroads only to be rebuffed.  'Sell' in this case might be synonymous with 'extort.'  When the railroads refused to open their purses to Vanderbilt, he blocked them from crossing the Albany Bridge towards New York City, causing a financial panic.  Seeing opportunity in the misfortune of others that directly resulted from his own actions, Vanderbilt purchased as many shares of the New York Central on the New York Stock Exchange as he could at firesale pricing.  Vanderbilt parlayed his investment into the control of the New York Centeral and into purchase of other railroads in similar fashion.

To further his transportation empire, Vanderbilt financed the early kerosine industry based in Eastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania.  The direct beneficiary of Vanderbilt's efforts to fill his freight trains was an upstart oilman by the name of John D. Rockefeller.  Eventually, Rockefeller bankrupted hundreds of refinery owners as he solidified his hold on the kerosene and oil industry.   When Tom Scott, head of the Pennsylvania Railroad attempted to build his own oil pipeline to compete with Rockefeller, Rockefeller closed his Pittsburgh refineries, costing Scott fifty percent of his freight revenue.  Rockefeller's actions lead Scott's laying off thousands of workers and decreasing the wages of the remaining workers.  The rioting that ensued nearly destroyed the Pennsylvania Railroad (full disclosure, at least three generations in my family worked for the PRR).  Needless to say, today's vulture capitalists, including Monarch Alternative Capital and Silver Point Capital, are merely a stone's throw morally away from Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, Carnegie et al.  Today, when you discuss the new robber barons, famous American company names like Blockbuster, the Texas Rangers, the Dallas Stars, Muzak, and Hostess Bakery enter the conversation.

When you think about Hostess Bakery, you need to explore the financial underpinnings of the company.  Apparently, the Monarch Alternative Capital LP and Silver Point Hedge Funds are the primary culprits. The machinizations of Monach and Silver would make Vanderbilt and Rockefeller proud.  These two hedge funds are known as distressed debt investors, purchasing the debt of troubled companies at steep discounts.  When Hostess Brands announced that it would close up its operations, the forces most responsible for that decision were two hedge funds that control hundreds of millions of Hostess debt and which have finally decided they won't squeeze any more filling into the Twinkie.  The funds, Silver Point and Monarch, are what are known as distressed debt investors. They buy the debt of troubled companies—usually at steep discounts. Some consider them white knights who are willing to take make risky investments in companies on the verge of failure. Others say they are “vulture funds.”  Only Silver Point and Monarch could have kept Hostess out of liquidation and kept the Twinkie bakery ovens firing. But they were, ultimately, unable to reach a deal with the unions that represents the workers who make and deliver products like Twinkies, Wonderbread and Ding Dongs. Without large union concessions- what some would say, total union capitulation- the hedge funds decided Hostess would have to die.

Of course, like diarist bluebarnstormer points out, Monarch and Silver Point could not be trusted to work in the best interests of the union members, their families and their pension funds.  The hedge fund managers' only interest lies in pulling as much capital out of Hostess Bakery and putting in as little as possible.  Profitability is not the issue.  They pillaged as much of the pension funds as possible and now walk away, leaving thousands of employees and their families shattered.  Interesting of course that this all came to fruition the week following the election rather than during the week prior.  Just wondering what would have happened had Monarch and Silver Point done the deed in October 2012.

Now to the Monarch and Silver Point Hedge Funds and their principles.  Bloomberg's BusinessWeek has profiles on each of these Vanderbilt and Rockefeller personifications.  Monarch Alternative Capital LP is a privately owned hedge fund sponsor. The firm invests in the public equity and fixed income markets across the globe. It primarily invests in debt of bankrupt and distressed companies. The firm also invests in equities received in connection with the conversion of such debt into equity. It employs a fundamental analysis to make its investments. The firm conducts in-house research to make its investments and it was formerly known as Quadrangle Debt Recovery Advisors.  Monarch has approximately $5.0 billion in assests under portolio management and is based in New York with an office in Israel.  Monarch's corporate website self-describes its approach as research-oriented and 'event-driven.'  Research-oriented suggests a proactive approach and vision.  Event-driven suggests a more reactive approach.  Kind of like sharks in the water.  In 2010, Monarch became involved in the messy bankruptcy of the Texas Rangers baseball team and the Dallas Stars hockey team when it purchased the debt of Hicks Sports Group LLC.  Monarch then threatened the 'involuntary bankruptcy' of its Texas Rangers holdings if Commissioner Bud Selig did not play by Monarch's rules and attempted to seize the team for sale to an acceptable bidder.    

Still no word from Major League Baseball concerning its imminent seizure of Your Texas Rangers in order to expedite the sale to Chuck Greenberg and Nolan Ryan's Rangers Baseball Express. But, finally, there's been direct contact with Monarch Alternative Capital, the main lender holding up the deal with Hicks Sports Group: The New York Times has gotten hold of an e-mail Monarch's managing principal, Andrew Herenstein, sent to MLB owners gathered in New York City this week for owners' meetings.  He more or less reiterates what Sports Business Journal reported this week and what Bloomberg News noted in mid-April: Should Bud Selig make a move, so too will Monarch -- straight to the federal courthouse, involuntary bankruptcy papers in hand.

It all comes down to the numbers. Tom Hicks last year defaulted on $525 million in loans. Greenberg's offer has long been believed to be between $570 and $575 million. The creditors claim that "additional costs, including unpaid interest," as The Times notes, have pushed Hicks's debt closer to $600 million. The creditors, right now set to get about half of the sale proceeds (unless MLB steps in and nullifies their claims completely), want their money. So too does Hicks, which is why, sources say, he's been hoping to bring Houston's Jim Crane and his higher offer back to the playing field. Greenberg's stuck in the middle and staying quiet, though Monarch says now that "the Greenberg-Ryan group had rejected 'various modifications' in the sale agreement that would increase the proceeds to the lenders," according to Times writer Richard Sandomir. 

Long story short: If MLB steps in, Monarch's suing. And it'll get "costly, distracting and messy," writes Herenstein. "It would be a bad result for the Texas Rangers, M.L.B. and the banks." And, don't forget, the fans.  In February 2011, Monarch was connected to Carl Icahn in an attempt to purchase Blockbuster for $300 million following the latter's bankruptcy filing.  Did I mention that Monarch and Icahn were Blockbuster creditors who helped finance the actual bankruptcy filing, thus having access to the internals?  Creditors including billionaire Carl Icahn and Monarch Alternative Capital LP are targeting Blockbuster Inc., the bankrupt movie-rental company, in a possible buyout for less than $300 million, a person familiar with the matter said. Icahn and Monarch are Blockbuster creditors who helped to finance the bankruptcy, making them potential candidates to buy the company, said the person, who declined to be identified because the discussions are private.

Silver Point Capital LP is a privately-owned hedge fund sponsor based in Greenwich, CT.  Interestingly, the corporate website has less than limited information available to the public.  Silver Point Capital L.P is a privately owned hedge fund sponsor. The firm manages hedge funds for its clients. It invests in the public equity, fixed income, and hedging markets of the United States. The firm primarily invests in securities of distressed, large-cap, and Mid-cap companies; bank debts; bonds; and trade claims. It specializes in credit analysis and diversified credit-related investments. Silver Point Capital is based in Greenwich, Connecticut.  Silver Point's corporate officers include Edward A Mule, Co-founder and Partner, age 50, Robert J. O'Shea, Co-founder and Partner, age 48, David Steinmetz, Chief Financial Officer, Michael A. Gatto, Principal, age 45, John M. Gannon, Principal, and Richard Parisi, Board Director.  Mule and O'Shea are alums of our friends at Goldman, Sachs.

Some of Silver Point's 'distressed events' include Kripsy Kreme, Moneygram, Herbst Gaming, Dana Holdings, Torch Energy Royalty Trust, Cooper-Standard Holdings, and FiberMark.  Silver Point also has investments in Sage Telecom, Granite Broadcasting and Communications Corporate of America.  In April 2011, Silver Point was involved in the attempts of Mood Media Holdings to merge with Muzak, a provider of music, messaging and video for businesses.  Cleary Gottlieb is representing Silver Point Capital, a private equity firm, and Muzak Holdings, a premier provider of music, messaging and video for business, in connection with the proposed acquisition of Muzak by Mood Media Corporation, a leading in-store media specialist. Under the terms of the merger agreement, a subsidiary of Mood will merge with and into Muzak, with Muzak unitholders receiving cash and contingent consideration in exchange for their units in Muzak. The transaction values Mood at approximately $345 million on an enterprise basis.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/11/18/1162822/-Hostess-Bakery-Behind-the-pillaging-and-sacking-of-another-famous-American-brand

 

Who Killed Hostess Brands and Twinkies?

(By Helaine Olen, Forbes, 16 November 2012)

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I’m sure you have, by now, heard the news. Hostess Brands, the company that gave us such remembered childhood treats as Twinkies, Ding Dongs, Devil Dogs and other baked foodstuffs that have fallen into disfavor in our more gourmand age, announced today that it would be closing for business, effective immediately.  More than a few observers say they know who to blame for the demise of the iconic company: the Bakery, Confectionary, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International union, which represents thousands of striking Hostess Brand workers who have refused to accept a new contract that would do everything from slash their salaries to their retirement benefits.  

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Time for a reality check.  Hostess has been sold at least three times since the 1980s, racking up debt and shedding profitable assets along the way with each successive merger. The company filed for bankruptcy in 2004, and again in 2011. Little thought was given to the line of products, which, frankly, began to seem a bit dated in the age of the gourmet cupcake. (100 calorie Twinkie Bites? When was the last time you entered Magnolia Bakery and asked about the calorie count?)

As if all this were not enough, Hostess Brands’ management gave themselves several raises, all the while complaining that the workers who actually produced the products that made the firm what money it did earn were grossly overpaid relative to the company’s increasingly dismal financial position.  So now an estimated 18,500 workers will join the nation’s unemployment rolls. But while Hostess Brands might soon become a forgotten name from the past, it’s unlikely such a fate awaits such signature products as Twinkies. Company executives have already asked for bankruptcy court permission to begin the process of selling off their famed product lines to other companies.

Finally, a personal note: A few years ago, my husband picked our children up from a playdate at a home where, he said, it seemed like more food was banned than allowed, there was no television, and it was all too politically correct in the way all too many middle class childhoods are today. My husband’s response? Before bringing the boys home, he stopped in at a local grocery and introduced our ecstatic children to fine products of Hostess Brands. “Yodels,” he told me, “never tasted so good.”

Addendum: Since this has come up in the comments, I need to remind everyone that Hostess Brands acquired Drake’s Cakes in one the many of the misbegotten mergers it was involved in.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/helaineolen/2012/11/16/who-killed-hostess-brands-and-twinkies/

 

Alternatives to Twinkies & Other Hostess Brands

Little Debbie is a strong competitor of Hostess. For most of the Hostess products, Little Debbie makes an alternative. Little Debbie makes Cloud Cakes, their answer to Hostess Twinkies.

Alternatives to Ho-Hos and Yodels

Drake's, the company that makes Yodels (among other snack cakes) is owned by Hostess and will also be going out of business. Little Debbie has Swiss Rolls as an alternative to Ho-Hos and Yodels.

Alternatives to Hostess Cupcakes, Yankee Doodles, Ring Dings, and Ding Dongs

Of course there are Little Debbie Alternatives to Hostess cupcakes (the Little Debbie cupcakes may be more famous), but they also makes alternatives to Ring Dings and Ding Dongs. Tastykake has their own cream-filled cupcakes.

Alternative to Funny Bones

Drake's makes a chocolate cake filled with peanut butter cream and covered with chocolate frosting. It's not exactly the same, but Tastykake makes a cake covered in chocolate and peanut butter.

Alternatives to Zingers

Zingers are made by Dolly Madison, owned by Hostess, so Dolly Madison will likely be shutting down, too. Tastykake makes good alternatives to Zingers called Krimpets. I could only find Butterscotch Krimpets, but their Kandy Kakes look like a good alternative to the chocolate Zingers.

Alternatives to Devil Dogs and Suzy Q's

Once again, Little Debbie has an alternative to these Hostess and Drake's products. Little Debbie has Devil Cremes that are the Devil Dog knock-offs.

Alternatives to Drake's Coffee Cake

Drake's has coffee cake snack cakes. I love coffee cake, and Tastykake has some coffee cake snack cakes that can replace the Drake's coffee cake.

Donettes

These mini doughnuts are a staple at convenience stores. While Donettes may be the most well-known mini doughnut, other brands make mini doughnuts that are just as good. Little Debbie, Tastykake, and Duchess have versions of the powdered sugar variety, and Duchess has mini chocolate doughnuts.

Fruit Pies

Hostess makes convenient little fruit pies that you can pick up at a convenience store. Fortuantely Tastykake makes a wide variety of small fruit pies, including pumpkin pie.

http://www.squidoo.com/alternatives-to-hostess-snack-cakes

My Name Is Jehovah, and I’ll Be Taking Care of You Tonight

(By Brian Palmer, Slate.com, 05 February 2013)

A 2012 Zagat survey found that the average restaurant tip has risen to 19.7 percent, while another recent survey found that donations by mainstream Christians to their churches have fallen to 2.38 percent of their annual income.  When Applebee’s tried to impose an automatic 18 percent tip last week on the bill of Atlanta pastor Alois Bell, she crossed it out, reduced the tip to zero, and added the note, “I give God 10%, why do you get 18?” A waitress posted the receipt online, earning Bell nationwide derision and the server a pink slip for violating Bell’s “right to privacy,” according to Applebee’s. Over the weekend, the restaurant chain suffered an avalanche of criticism. More than 20,000 angry Facebook commenters responded to the company’s attempts to explain its decision to fire the offending waitress.

Equating tipping with tithing is absurd, of course. Traditional tithing is a fraction of one’s annual earnings, while tipping is a percentage of a restaurant bill. If you tip a waiter 18 percent and your preferred deity 10 percent, waiters can only out-gross God if Americans spend more than one-half their income at restaurants. (In fact, the average American spends around $2,500 annually eating out, which is less than 10 percent of average per capita income.) The more apt comparison is between tithing and taxes, but presumably Alois Bell lacks the courage to scribble, “I give God 10 percent, why does the government get 17.4?” on her Form 1040EZ.  Bell’s spurious comparison, nevertheless, does require some attention. Tipping and tithing are both largely unenforced social norms. If you fail to tip a server between 15 and 20 percent, restaurants don’t force you to wash dishes. Likewise, few Christian churches banish tithing delinquents from the congregation. And yet, they’re trending in opposite directions. 

Tipping had an inauspicious start in America. When the practice migrated from Europe, many consumers considered it bribery. The Anti-Tipping Society of America, a lobby group of traveling salesmen, pushed many states to ban the practice. When the laws were struck down or repealed under pressure from restaurant and hotel owners who profited in saved wages, members of the media suggested that a tip should total no more than 10 percent. Since then, the national tipping rate seems to have risen inexorably. Guides from the 1960s suggest that an appropriate tip ranged from 10 to 20 percent, with 15 percent representing the average. Tipping a server 10 percent is now widely considered a serious offense, and a Zagat survey from 2012 found the average restaurant tip has risen to 19.7 percent.

America’s churches should be so lucky. When the Christian research group Empty Tomb began tracking tithing in 1968, mainstream Christians gave 3.3 percent of their income to a church. Those donations have steadily dropped, falling to a mere 2.38 percent in the most recent survey. Evangelicals like Bell typically give more, but their donations have also fallen by around 30 percent since the late 1960s. Churches could really use the cash, too. Only 10 percent of U.S. congregations have an endowment that exceeds their annual operating budget. Even the Mormon church, the international tithe-collecting champion, fails to pressure the faithful into a full 10 percent tithe. There’s little data on U.S. contributions, but Canadian Mormons pay about 8 percent of annual income to the church. (Fortunately for Mormons, the church hardly needs the money.)

Why do Americans increasingly prefer to donate money to waiters than to God? One potential explanation is simple awareness. Most studies on tipping show that a fair proportion of bad tippers or nontippers don’t know—or at least claim not to know—that they’re expected to leave 15 to 20 percent. Between 1987 and 2000, the likelihood that an average American would eat at a restaurant in any given week increased 40 percent. The more people dine out, and the more they hear servers moaning about their pitiful baseline wages, the more the tipping norm sinks in. God is experiencing no such awareness surge. Different methodologies yield different church attendance numbers, but most studies find that the proportion of Americans who attend church regularly has stayed nearly constant for decades.

There may be a better explanation than simple awareness, though: the rise of the megachurch. Lakewood Church in Houston packs 43,500 people into its seats per week, and several other churches count congregations in the tens of thousands. The average churchgoer now attends service with 400 others. Getting big makes sense for any individual church. Entrepreneurial pastors get their own television shows and crank out book after dreary, repetitive book, amassing huge fortunes in the process.  The growth in congregation size, however, may be bad for churches’ collective income. God looks increasingly like an institution, and 21^st-century Americans don’t like institutions. Trust in banks, schools, and Congress has slid steadily for 40 years. Churches have suffered from the same cynicism. The proportion of Americans who express a “great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in organized religion dropped by one-third between 1973 and 2012—the same as the drop in the average Christian tithe. Modern megachurches look a lot more organized than the little community chapels of yesteryear.

A 2012 Pew survey on trust in government should be of particular note to America’s churches. One-third of Americans have a favorable view of the federal government, while 52 percent view state government favorably, and 61 percent express satisfaction with local government. The message couldn’t be clearer: Big is bad.  Rather than sending minions like Alois Bell to nudge us, God should watch and learn from America’s eminently relatable waitstaff. Your waiter’s first move is to tell you his name, although you have absolutely no use for it. They get close, sometimes disturbingly so. They take individual responsibility for “taking care of you.” That promise doesn’t just have the same effect when sent down from on high or from a stage in a football stadium

There’s one other problem for the Christian God: He has a flock full of cheapskates. Long before Alois Bell stiffed her server on religious grounds, American waiters complained about the Sunday afternoon crowd leaving Bible quotes in lieu of cash tips. A 2012 study by Cornell University tipping expert Michael Lynn showed that Jews and people with no religion tip better than self-identified Christians. (To be fair, the overwhelming majority of Christians tip between 15 and 20 percent, just lower in the range than nonbelievers and Jews.) This phenomenon is difficult to explain, but it’s possible that Christians think their devotion to the next life exempts them from such social niceties as tipping in this one. That confidence in their ultimate salvation may also diminish their sense of financial obligation to God. Perhaps churches need to modify their appeal to something like “faith alone, plus 10 percent.”

Washington Rated The Worst For Traffic Congestion- Again

                                (By Ashley Halsey III, Washington Post, 05 February 2013)

When it comes to traffic congestion around Washington, even the good news is bad, and it goes downhill from there.  The city that so hungers to be No. 1 at something — usually on a gridiron or diamond-shaped field — has again risen to the top as the most congested metropolitan area in the United States, a place where the average driver burns 67 hours and 32 gallons of gas each year sitting in traffic.  The No. 1 ranking is the good news. The bad news is that it’s going to get worse.  The annual crunching of numbers by the Texas A&M Transportation Institute projects that unless something is done about traffic, the economic recovery will put more wheels on the road and create more congestion. By 2020, analysts say, the average U.S. driver will spend an additional seven hours in traffic each year and waste six more gallons of gas.  The Institute’s calculations are based on data from transponders on millions of moving vehicles. It comes from Inrix, the commercial network that also provides much of the information used in traffic reports on radio, television and the Internet.  After Washington, the four most congested metro areas in the nation were among the perennial contenders: Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York and Boston. Raleigh-Durham rated as the easiest major city to get around.  Rankings are relative and don’t say much about your personal commuting misery, unless there’s perverse pride in being No. 1 or you’re looking to move some place where congestion isn’t so bad. (Traffic is light in Bakersfield, Calif.)

For the first time this year, the Institute came up with a new metric to salt the wound that is traffic congestion around Washington. It calculates the true meaning of an expression often used on traffic radio reports- “allow a little extra time”- a polite way of telling drivers that their traffic nightmare meter has hit the red zone.  The Institute calls it the Planning Time Index, and this is how Tim Lomax, one of the study’s authors, explains it: “It’s predicated on the notion that your boss will let you be late to work one time a month and you’d better be on time the other 19 days.”  So, the new index compares the time it would take to make a trip in light traffic with the time you need to allow if you want to be punctual for work (or anywhere else) 19 days out of 20.  It’s a new index that tells an old story: No place is worse than Washington, which rates 5.72 and is behind metro Los Angeles and New York. Baltimore ranks 15th among large cities with a 3.81, while Salt Lake City is at the bottom with a 2.02.  What does that mean?  If you had a 20-minute trip in light traffic, 20 times 5.7 is almost 2 hours that you ought to allow for a really important trip in the middle of rush hour,” Lomax said. “That’s the combined effect of weather and bad crashes and special events and construction, and in y’alls cases, presidential motorcades. It’s everything rolled together.” 

The Institute provided a plan for addressing congestion that applies to the Washington region and the rest of the nation. It was a collection of ideas, many of which are already in use.  It included addressing immediate traffic problems- such as having tow trucks poised to sweep away wrecks and stalled vehicles, and using metered freeway on ramps to modulate traffic flow — and obvious goals of increasing capacity, encouraging transit use and embracing flexible work schedules.  “You should be able to call the boss and say ‘Traffic’s bad today, how about if I telecommute for now and come in two hours later?’ ” Lomax said. “And you need to take advantage of those options when they make sense for you. Don’t just get stuck in the rut of ‘I drive my car to work every day because that’s just what I do.’”  Pete Ruane, the blunt-spoken president of the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, said the area had a double-barreled problem.  “Washington, D.C., has the dubious distinction of being number one in two areas. It is the capital of partisan gridlock, and now traffic gridlock,” he said. “The real news in the report is the projection that traffic congestion costs will balloon another 65 percent by 2020 if we maintain the status quo. The number of hours of lost time will also skyrocket 55 %.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/washington-rated-the-worst-for-traffic-congestion--again/2013/02/04/125be724-6ee3-11e2-8b8d-e0b59a1b8e2a_story.html?wpisrc=nl_buzz

Bearing With Coke: Soft Drinks, Hard Choices

I agree with a lot of what is being said here, out of context though because I don't think there is a direct connection between the manufacturing of Coke and the plight of polar bear habitats.  And has the writer of the piece never heard of Cherry Coke Zero?

Bearing With Coke: Soft Drinks, Hard Choices

(By David Katz, Huffington Post, 26 January 2013)

Responding to our justifiably increasing preoccupation with widespread obesity, the Coca-Cola Company has released a masterful television ad on the subject. They characterize their own efforts, and invite us all to "come together" to combat this scourge. The whole "come together" concept receives great emphasis, with evocative images from the (presumably) good old days of: "I'd like to buy the world a Coke..."  Predictably, the collective response of my friends and colleagues in public health has been less than warm and bubbly. Sensing a blend of propaganda, evasion, hypocrisy, and desperation in Coke's efforts, my clan has largely reacted with their own blend of dismissal, derision, and disgust. In essence, they have invited us all to lose this lunch, and roll our eyes.  I confess, I am sorely tempted to join them. But before we can lose our lunch, we are perhaps obligated to chew on it. And before rolling our eyes, we may need to read the writing on the wall -- fine print, and all.

Before that chewing and reading begins, I do want to insert a disclaimer. I am the furthest thing from a food industry apologist. I have devoted years of my life to the development of programs for children and adults alike that reveal the all-too-often lamentable truth about the so-called "food" supply. At every opportunity, I have highlighted the fact that "betcha' can't eat just one" was far more than a clever ad campaign; it was a threat to public health, backed up -- at least in the case of Kraft -- by nutritional biochemists and neuroscientists using functional MRI scans to determine how to maximize the number of calories it takes for us to feel full. And I have noted repeatedly, as I will continue to do, that as we got fat and our kids got diabetes -- somebody was chuckling about it all the way to the bank.

Nor do I have even a little love for the Coca-Cola Company. I consider their flagship offering a chemistry experiment in a cup. I haven't had a soda in some 35 years since I first saw that light. Coca-Cola has systematically opposed public health campaigns to reduce soda consumption, deflected criticism, denied epidemiologic truths, and distorted their own contributions to epidemic obesity. I have -- at least in moments of private rage -- considered them an evil empire. Regarding my brief encounter with their CEO, I can only say I felt the dark side of the Force was strong with him.  And when it comes to polished and compelling ads that obscure any semblance of truth, Coca-Cola has an impressive track record. They have given us polar bears enjoying Coke as they frolic in their winter wonderland.

This is wrong in so many ways it's hard to know where to start. For one thing, polar bears don't drink soda. For another, that's not likely to help them much -- because we are blithely destroying their winter wonderland. And guess what? Concocting chemical potions in factories to drink out of plastic bottles when a glass of water would do nicely is part of the reason -- as such industrial activity contributes to global warming and the melting of Arctic ice on which the livelihood of real polar bears depends. So, no -- Coke is not offering polar bears a drink. It's part of the reason they may have nothing left to eat. But, of course, only part of a much bigger reason.

Reacting to Coke's misleading depiction of polar bears, the Center for Science in the Public Interest engaged musician Jason Mraz, to give us the "real" bears. I fully support this campaign to show what might happen if polar bears actually did drink Coke. But of course, these aren't "real" bears -- because as noted, polar bears don't drink soda. So, the "real" issue is that we may not be smarter than the average bear after all. Bears are still eating and drinking what bears should eat and drink -- to the extent we aren't making it impossible for them. We, on the other hand, have been drinking Coca-Cola out of ever-larger containers.  This just isn't about bears and the choices they make. It's about us, and the choices we make. And we apparently have some hard ones. We have water, but choose to drink Coke. We have broccoli, but choose to eat bologna. There are no bears involved. We have met the enemy -- and it is us.  Yes, we are also the victim. Yes, the food industry really has manipulated us with foods engineered to specifications born of functional MRI scans. But come on: Does anyone think Coke is good for them? Does anyone not living under a rock think you can drink a gallon of that stuff daily and not suffer any consequences? Is there really anyone left who has not heard the rumors about sugar? And does anyone bemoaning the unbearable (pun intended) burden of a soda tax truly not know where to find a water fountain?

Coke is quite right about one thing: We are all in this together.  Consider that when McDonald's -- another good contender for the food industry's evil empire award -- gave us McLean Deluxe, we didn't buy it. The product expired not for want of supply, but for want of demand. Folks, that's not McDonalds' problem. It's yours, and mine. It's our kids' problem.  Similarly, remember Alpha-Bits cereal? If you haven't seen it lately, here's why -- courtesy of some inside information. Post reduced both the salt and sugar content, actually making the product more nutritious -- and people stopped buying it. Sales plummeted from about $80 million a year, to $10 million.  Most product reformulations that allegedly give us better nutrition are actually lateral moves -- fixing one thing, breaking another. Salt is reduced, but sugar is increased. Sugar is reduced, but trans fat is increased -- and so on. I have an intimate view of all this, courtesy of my work with the NuVal program, which has established a detailed nutrient database for over 100,000 foods it has scored. All too often, banner ads implying better nutrition are entirely misleading. Low-fat peanut butter is substantially less nutritious than regular. Multigrain breads may or may not be whole grain.

But on those rare occasions when the food industry actually gives us better products, we don't buy them.  Which brings us back to Coke: What, exactly, do we want from them?  As I see it, against a backdrop of a growing burden of national and global chronic disease in which they are complicit, Coke has four options. They can (1) ignore the public health problem, and keep on keeping on; (2) acknowledge the public health problem, but say it's not their problem -- and keep on keeping on; (3) confess their corporate sins and absolve themselves with ceremonial suicide; or (4) change.  Choices one and two have pretty much run their course. Shareholders are unlikely to bless option three. Which leaves us with option four: change. Change their product formulations. Change their inventory. And change their messaging. Stop talking about frolicking polar bears, and start talking about obesity. And while we have cause to be suspicious about Coca-Cola's motives, that's just what the new ad appears to be doing.

Yes, they sell us chemistry experiments in a cup. Yes, they help us become fat diabetics. But they are also a large company, employing a lot of people. If we simply want to drive a stake through their corporate heart, the result would be a lot of newly-unemployed people, still prone to obesity and diabetes while drinking Pepsi, or Mountain Dew, or Dr. Pepper, while perusing the want ads.  And yes, the new ad about obesity is only in response to mounting pressure from a concerned public, and restive federal authorities. But is it bad or surprising that supply-side changes are responsive to a changing demand? The business of business, after all, is business -- and keeping the customer satisfied.  If we want truly meaningful changes in the quality of our food and drink, we will in fact require changes in both supply and demand. It won't help if they build it, and we don't come. There are ways to propagate a shared taste for change, and such a course might allow for substantial improvements in the public health without blowing up the Fortune 500.

Admittedly, the new Coke ads addressing obesity are slick. Stunningly slick. In other words, they are just plain good -- working over the chords of emotional response exactly as intended. A testimony to what really deep pockets and top advertising talent can do. This could be just another reason to hate Coke, I suppose.  But on the other hand, the simpler times when Coke was an innocent pleasure are not a Madison Avenue fabrication; they actually happened. We baby-boomers lived through them. There was a time before ultra-uber-gulps and widespread childhood obesity, and soda seemed an innocuous pleasure -- whether or not it ever really was. If that has changed over time, then so must we -- and so must Coca-Cola.  What would such change look like? Probably something like the new ad.

As a closing aside, I attended the meeting of my local school district wellness committee this week, as they took on the task of complying with Connecticut nutrition standards. The gentleman who runs the high school store noted that by complying with the new regulations, he would lose business to the array of fast-food outlets accessible to the students just across a parking lot. And, I suspect he's exactly right.  I share my colleagues' visceral opposition to everything Coke. But I think we may be letting our abdominal viscera get the better of vital organs situated higher up. Soft drinks do exist; they are big business. Doing something about that involves hard choices.  Change -- incremental change -- is the most promising and plausible of them. So we have to allow for it if what we want is progress. If we won't accept change without calling it hypocrisy, then we don't really want progress. We want revenge.

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-katz-md/coca-cola-ad_b_2556952.html?utm_hp_ref=health-news&ir=Health%20News

Is Mitt Romney The New Nostradamus?

(By Michael Dorstewitz, Bizpac Review website, January 20, 2013)

Romney in Boca Raton: “Mali has been taken over, the northern part of Mali, by al-Qaida-type individuals.”  The last two weeks should go down as a period of vindication for former GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney and earn him the nickname, “soothsayer of the Western World” — a modern-age Nostradamus.  On Jan. 14, Chrysler’s CEO acknowledged that Jeeps would be built in China, confirming a statement that unfairly earned Romney the moniker “liar of the year.”

Score one.

Then, when forces linked to al-Qaida captured the government-held town of Konna, Mali, on Jan. 10, they drove home a statement Romney made during the second presidential debate in Boca Raton, nearly three months earlier.  “With the Arab Spring came a great deal of hope that there would be a change towards more moderation and opportunity for greater participation on the part of women and — and public life and in economic life in the Middle East,” he said then. “But instead we’ve seen in nation after nation a number of disturbing events.”

Describing violence in Syria and Libya, he added this kicker: “Mali has been taken over, the northern part of Mali, by al-Qaida-type individuals.”  This prompted, according to TheCommentator.com, a Bill Maher tweet: “Mitt, you do know that most of America thinks Mali is one of Obama’s daughters, right?” What far-left loon Maher doesn’t seem to understand is that it doesn’t matter if he knows what Mali is, so long as our president does.

Score two.

This week saw another Romney prediction come to pass — that a re-elected Obama would infringe on our Second Amendment rights.  “In a second term, he would be unrestrained by the demands of re-election,” Romney said at an April 2012 National Rifle Association convention in St. Louis, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “As he told the Russian president last month when he thought no one else was listening, after a re-election he’ll have a lot more, quote, ‘flexibility’ to do what he wants. I’m not exactly sure what he meant by that, but looking at his first three years, I have a very good idea.”

Referring to the right to bear arms, Romney told convention-goers, “If we are going to safeguard our Second Amendment, it is time to elect a president who will defend the rights President Obama ignores or minimizes. I will.”  The president’s signature on 23 executive actions on gun control this week, as well as his acknowledged support for a ban on certain weapons and magazines, show how right Romney was.

Score three.

Finally, Romney was ridiculed for using “binders of women” to describe what a Romney Cabinet would look like. Instead of mocking the poorly worded phrase, we should have listened to the words themselves.  The president’s announcement of his second-term Cabinet prompted ABC’s George Stephanopoulos to ask on Jan. 10, “Where are the women?” Apparently, they’re all still in Romney’s binders.

Score four.

In retrospect, this should come as no surprise to anyone. Romney is, after all, a businessman — a very successful businessman. What separates success from failure in the business world is an ability to assess a situation and to predict what will happen next.  This is called reality. Obama’s hallmark is “hope.” See the difference?

 

http://www.bizpacreview.com/2013/01/20/is-mitt-romney-the-new-nostradamus-15715

Beyonce, Lip-Syncing And The Question Of Authenticity

(By Chris Richards, Washington Post, 23 January 2013)

Moments after President Obama recited the oath of office Monday, Beyonce floated to the podium on the steps of the Capitol — golden tresses spilling onto her shoulders — to deliver our national anthem. Both acts were largely ceremonial. He had been officially sworn in the day before; she allegedly mouthed along to a recording made Sunday with the U.S. Marine Band.  Now, the president is back at work and the pop star is busy ignoring torrents of criticism. Fans flooded social media with praise for Beyonce’s agile rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” on Monday, and then replaced it with harrumphs on Tuesday when we all learned she might have been lip-syncing.  If anything, our disappointment shows how confused our culture has become over its wobbly standards of authenticity.

Whether we’re channel surfing or grocery shopping, Americans consistently and zealously demand “real.” But not really. Instagram filters our memories, Cherry Coke Zero involves zero cherries, and the friends we collect on Facebook are rarely people we would invite into our homes. So why draw the line at Beyonce?  Pop music has always been a place where fantasy and reality have ground up against each other to create hot sparks. From artists’ mythologized narratives to the actual transactions taking place up onstage, deception plays a huge role in how we consume this stuff. Was Paul dead? Has Taylor Swift ever used Auto-Tune? Does Bruce Springsteen sing from a teleprompter? Did Rick Ross once work as a correctional officer? WasWhitney Houston’s 1991 gold-standard rendition of the national anthem lip-synced, too? (Answers: No, not sure, yes, yep and uh-huh.)

When it comes to live performance, contemporary pop fans are caught in a riptide. We expect kinetic concert experiences filled with lung-monopolizing choreography. Meanwhile, a dozen seasons of “American Idol” have made us all connoisseurs of acrobatic, soul-inspired pop vocalization. How many times has a “little pitchy, dawg” thought bubble involuntarily bloomed above your head? Too many.  We want it both ways, and we demand that it all be real. To paraphrase author and thinker David Shields, our culture craves reality because we experience so little of it. Social media have scrambled our perceptions of friendship, fellowship, and, thanks to the recent and galactic humiliation of Manti Te’o, courtship. Add that to a century of pop culture built around the principle of suspension of disbelief, and it becomes tricky to be honest about when we’re okay with being deceived.

We blew our whistles at Mike Daisey and James Frey because we laid our money — and secondarily, our trust — down for one thing and were given something else. A pop concert operates on a similar kind of contract, even though the fine print often remains unacknowledged. We all expect Madonna to lip-sync. Yet, somewhat illogically, many of us would be aghast if Adele did it.  Or maybe not. At Adele concerts — or any pop concert — fans are quick to raise handheld phones to capture the performance on video, their eyes locked on a small, glowing screen instead of the three-dimensional humans up onstage. We often prefer not to experience the real thing even when it’s right there in front of us.

Regardless of what happens out on the dance floor, live pop music has always been a compromise between stagecraft and spontaneity. And considering the occasion, our disappointment with Beyonce this week is steeped in our muddled, unflagging desire for the latter.  Because this was a once-in-a-lifetime gig. Hundreds of thousands assembled to cheer history along. An ocean of flags flapped in the January cold. Before finally retreating to the warmth of the Capitol building, Obama paused for a moment to soak the entire scene in.

Beyonce was seeing it, too, right? That’s why it’s reasonable to hope that the images landing on her retinas were influencing the sounds bursting from her throat. It’s what ultimately invests us in a live performance: the idea that our presence plays some kind of role in the outcome.  Instead, the lip-syncing allegations punched a tiny hole in the fantasy of Monday afternoon. They made an uplifting mass gathering feel like hyper-scripted ritual — which, like so many big, beloved, all-together-now pop culture moments, it absolutely was.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/music/beyonce-lip-syncing-and-the-question-of-authenticity/2013/01/23/60bd0e4c-64df-11e2-9e1b-07db1d2ccd5b_print.html

Which State Is Better: Maryland Or Virginia?

Which State Is Better: Maryland Or Virginia? Washington Post Bloggers Square Off
(By Tom Jackman and Michael Rosenwald, Washington Post Magazine, 10 January 2012)

 

Perhaps it started during the Civil War, when they took opposite sides. For whatever reason, Maryland and Virginia have a rivalry as long and deep as the Potomac River that divides them, and control of which they’ve fought over. “Given the ideological split,” lobbyist Charlie Davis once told The Post, “God probably got it right putting the Potomac where it is.”  “Virginia is for Lovers” was met by “Maryland is for Crabs.” Virginia welcomes “y’all”; Maryland calls you “hon.” Virginia bans gay marriage; Maryland allows it. Virginia taxes cars; Maryland taxes, well, everything. Virginia discourages unions (the professional ones, not just the gay ones); some observers say Maryland is run by them.

Post bloggers Mike Rosenwald (Rosenwald, Md.) and Tom Jackman (The State of NoVa ) got together for a beer in neutral territory, a bar in the District, and immediately began comparing their respective states. Things started off politely enough. But gradually, the conversation turned, and the insults began to fly. The exchange went something like this:

***

Tom (Va.): Hey, Mike, sorry I’m late. Didn’t want to give up my parking spot on the Beltway there at Tysons Corner.

Mike (Md.): Well, at least you didn’t have to dodge the speed cameras, since Virginia doesn’t have them. In Maryland, even our speed cameras have cameras, to prevent vandalism.

Tom: Don’t feel too bad. Virginia is always devising new forms of Traffic Hell. Now we’ve built HOT lanes. This means you can pay good HOT money to sit in traffic. But only on the Virginia side, I guess. In Maryland, you can sit in traffic for free.

Mike: Not true! I pay $6 on the new Intercounty Connector for the advantage of bypassing the Beltway and cutting a whole six minutes off the time it takes to get to my in-laws’ in Baltimore. Why does it cost so much?
I think it’s because the underpasses have dark, luxurious bricks. Officials call them “earth-toned.” The road is basically an extension of Whole Foods, with Whole Foods prices.

Tom: On the inner loop in Virginia,
I have seen people take up smoking, become addicted and then quit all in one trip. We call this showing state spirit.

Mike: Well, tobacco always has been important to Virginia.

Tom: Yup. Just look at our great monument, the towering cigarette shrine outside the Philip Morris plant on I-95 in Richmond. We are here to fill all your tar and nicotine needs.

Mike: Don’t feel too bad. At least you have decent wine to enjoy along with those cancer sticks. You have almost four times as many wineries as we do, and they turn out a better product. Maryland vintages are lucky to be labeled “table wine.” And if you want to buy wine in a grocery store over here, you will basically have to amend the state constitution.

Tom: You know, if we were meeting at a bar in Northern Virginia, I could keep my handgun legally stuffed in my pocket. Just in case some drunk, or Orioles fan (or are they the same thing?), wanted to give me some lip. Are there any bars over in Maryland where I can pack heat?

Mike: No. We prefer to settle our disputes by lobbing insults, sometimes on our license plates, such as that Redskins fan’s CWBYSUK tag, which made the news a few months ago.

Tom: And I thought it was Virginians who were the gentlemen.

Mike: Besides, we don’t have that many bars anymore, as you probably define them. We’ve grown out of them. We have tasting-menu places, though. They serve a lot of artisanal, locally grown haricots vert. So, you might not be able to pack heat, but you can pack wine. The corkage fee is about 10 bucks.

Tom: They charge you $10 to take the cork out of the bottle? If we still used corks, that would really hurt. Twist-off technology has taken root here in the Old Dominion. After all, we’re classy. Look at Michaele Salahi. First, she went uninvited to a White House state dinner, then she was a “Real Housewife,” then she dumped her wannabe winemaker husband for an over-the-hill Journey guitarist. Thankfully, she left the state, but we’re still stuck with her ex, Tareq Salahi, who, get this, is running for governor.

Mike: Hey, you have the Salahis. We have Dan Snyder. In classiness terms, he makes Michaele Salahi look like Condoleezza Rice.

Tom: At least you have Snyder’s Redskins. We have them only for practice and office space. Oh, and on our roads, because they mostly live over here, where they keep our cops tied up issuing traffic tickets and arresting them when they get out of their trucks to punch someone in the face.

Mike: That reminds me. I’ve been meaning to ask you what’s it like to not have a major professional sports team. You know what other state doesn’t have a pro team? North Dakota. Also, Idaho.

Tom: Virginia had a pro team once, the Virginia Squires of the ABA. Dr. J and George Gervin played for them. But there was not enough cocaine in all of Virginia for the Squires, so they folded. That was never a problem for Maryland, where the Bullets spent many years.

Mike: Speaking of crime, your major export, according to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, is guns. Are you trying to get rid of them because you secretly agree that they’re sort of, oh, ... deadly? Over here, the subject of guns is generally limited to conversations such as: “Did you know the NRA is based in Virginia?” Reply: “Oh, my God. It makes sense if you think about it.”

Tom: What does Maryland export? Chickens to China? If some drunk doesn’t kill 70,000 chickens at once, as happened this summer. You wouldn’t catch a Virginian doing that.

Mike: But you have no compunction about killing criminals.

Tom: You’re right, we do excel at that. Why do you think that, when the D.C. snipers were arrested, they were sent to Virginia for prosecution, though they did most of their killing in Maryland? Because we get the job done. Seven years later, John Muhammad was dead. Proposed motto: “Virginia: You Kill Us, We’ll Kill You Back.”

Mike: You already have a bloodthirsty motto: Sic semper tyrannis. I looked it up. It means, “Thus always to tyrants.” I wonder: Is that why you allow guns in bars?

Tom: Yes, though if you want to mirror the motto, you want to use a sword, not a gun, to stab the offender then stand on his chest. That’s the image on our state seal and state flag, a woman with a sword standing on someone’s chest. But it’s got character, at least. Your flag looks like a second-grader threw up on a spinning paint wheel. What is that thing? And your motto is “Fatti maschii parole femine.” Know what that means? “Manly deeds, womanly words.”

Mike: It’s our unofficial state motto. And don’t start with me about manliness. You guys love bragging about being patriots and about your eight presidents. But I never hear a peep about William Henry Harrison, the Virginian who didn’t wear a hat in the cold rain during his inauguration. He caught a bad cold and died 31 days later. Embarrassed?

Tom: I’ll take eight presidents, including the founders of our country, over zero. Maryland hasn’t had any presidents because its top politicos — Marvin Mandel, Spiro Agnew,Jack Johnson, Jack Johnson’s wife — get indicted first. Your state motto should be “Maryland: You wanna play, you gotta pay.”

Mike: Speaking of playing, at least you can gamble in Maryland. The only gambling Virginia has is under-the-tailgate betting at those Gold Cup horse races held outside in a giant pasture, where you have to wear weirdly large hats or pants with suspenders.

Tom: You do more than gamble. You’re trying to make gaming a new Maryland sport. But your casinos have electronic blackjack tables, where cards are dealt on a screen by an avatar. Who is going to leave West Virginia for that?

Mike: I have one word for you: “Macaca.”

Tom: And the blurter of that word promptly lost an election he had in the bag. Maybe he was taking tips from William Donald Schaefer, who was never shy with an insult. He called one of his opponents Old Mother Hubbard.

Mike: Okay, enough about politics. As a fat guy, I want to talk about food. For a “Southern” state, your barbecue isn’t that good. Actually, I’ve squeezed better barbecue sauce out of a McDonald’s packet.

Tom: What? Virginia’s got all sorts of great food, in addition to our Chesapeake Bay crabs, which I’m told they have in Maryland, too. We’ve got the world-famous Smithfield ham, the renowned Virginia peanut, our 200-plus wineries and many great apple farms. Virginia is one of the biggest apple-producing states in the nation, and Winchester is called “the Apple Capital of the World.” Farther east, we’ve got great seafood. Farther west, we’ve got great moonshine. And you’ve got ... crabs.

Mike: Yeah, well, if your state is as tasty as you allege, then why is your official state beverage ... milk?

Tom: Nice try, Food Boy. So is yours.

Mike: Okay, why do Virginians insist on making Maryland kids envy Virginia kids? I mean, why would my kid like your kid if your kids don’t go back to school until after Labor Day?

Tom: We don’t see any use in overdoing the whole “education” thing. So, we’ve passed a law that public school cannot start before Labor Day, which allows folks plenty of time to pay good money to have their stomachs upset on the rides at Kings Dominion. An amusement park vs. school. C’mon, if you were a child, which one would you choose?

Mike: There’s that word “dominion” again. Old Dominion, Kings Dominion. You guys seem to have a strange affinity for it, considering that you lost the Civil War.

Tom: You mean the War Between the States? Maybe. But y’all lost the tourism battle. Thousands of people have flocked to Prince William County the last two summers to re-create the spectacle of our Southern soldiers scoring upset victories over the visiting team from the United States in the first and second Battles of Manassas.

Mike: Don’t you mean first and second Bull Run? The winner gets to name the battles, you know.

Tom: Whatever they’re called, we’re making money off them. We like to look on the bright side of trying to start our own country. It’s called leveraging our losses.

Mike: Leverage. Isn’t that the favorite term of every U-Va. biz school grad? I heard that word a lot during the financial crisis, which reminds me: Why do you guys foreclose on houses so fast? Is this another feature of “Sic semper tyrannis”?

Tom: Maybe in Maryland it’s okay to buy a house you can’t afford, not put a dime down, then squat there indefinitely. In Virginia, however, we discourage that. As a result, our economy is moving on, while Maryland’s languishes. I’ll take moving over languishing.

Mike: Let’s get back to tourism. Every time I see a “Welcome to Virginia” sign, the seventh-grader in me wants to point out the word “virgin” in Virginia.

Tom: Is that the best you can do? This is turning into a rout. Sorta like the Battles of Manassas, both the original and the rematch.

Mike: You mean Bull Run.

Tom: Fine. Whatever. I’m tired.
I’m possibly also out of material.

Mike: Me, too. I mean, using “virgin” as an insult? That was just weird.

Tom: I’m going home.

Mike: See you in traffic.

Tom: Watch out for those speed cameras.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/which-state-is-better-maryland-or-virginia-washington-post-bloggers-square-off/2013/01/04/a07465dc-fcfa-11e1-8adc-499661afe377_story.html

To Be or Not to Be Fairfax County?
That Is the Question Residents, Leaders Ask in the Increasingly Urban Suburb

(By Sandhya Somashekhar and Amy Gardner, Washington Post, July 5, 2009)

 

Fairfax County has long been viewed as the ultimate burb, where Washington goes to walk the dog and water the lawn. But the more residents look around, the more they see what many have tried to avoid: high-rise offices, blight, crime and housing that's more likely to have a balcony than a back yard.  That changing reality came into focus last week when County Executive Anthony H. Griffin raised the possibility of officially making Fairfax a city, prompting discussion among county supervisors about whether the community of more than 1 million residents should highlight its status as an enormous jobs center that is rapidly urbanizing or embrace its classic suburban nature.

The basis for the idea is largely tactical -- under state law, cities have more taxing power and greater control over roads than counties do -- and it led to more than a few snickers about the thrilling nightlife in downtown Fairfax (punch line: there isn't any).  Regardless of whether the county changes its status, a process that requires approval from voters, the state and courts, the discussion underscored a growing tension within Virginia's largest jurisdiction. What does Fairfax want to be? A giant urban expanse like many new Sun Belt cities? Or more of a residential suburb, with a handful of urbanized pockets sprinkled in?

The Fairfax of today is somewhere in between. Its 400 square miles include a sea of cul-de-sacs, parks, pools and soccer fields, especially in its southern and western stretches. McLean and Great Falls remain high-end havens for some of the region's most exclusive addresses. Clifton still feels like the country.  Meanwhile, dense, Arlington County-style urban villages are quickly claiming the skylines of Vienna, Merrifield and Springfield, and county plans envision those and other developments ballooning over the next decade. Tysons Corner is already an economic and commercial behemoth, and it's only going to get bigger as development clusters around the Metrorail extension. The Route 1 corridor and other pockets are increasingly marked by blight.

On an uncrowded weekday afternoon at Old Keene Mill Swim and Racquet Club in Burke last week, Fairfax's still-shining suburban glory was on display. A gaggle of children with rackets under their arms ran up a hill to tennis courts. A mother coated her daughter with sunscreen by the pool, where a few dozen kids splashed and adults sat under giant umbrellas. Another mother walked from her car with packets of hot dogs and buns toward the club's grills and picnic tables.  "I personally would hate to see any more of a city feel to Fairfax County," Nancy Ohanian, 52, said while floating on foam noodles with her 9-year-old daughter. "We're losing so many trees. And I sure don't want to see my taxes go any higher."

For these families, Burke is their corner of suburban bliss, a community so complete that they rarely venture more than a mile or two beyond their homes.  "It had all the ingredients that I wanted for my family," said Mary Holden, 46, a mother of four. "My kids' schools, their sports teams, their friends, the shopping -- it's all here. I can go a whole week not ever leaving Burke, quite happy."  Holden and others probably would be quite unhappy if they ventured about 10 miles north to Merrifield. There, two sleek new five-story apartment buildings rise from a weedy parking lot. The bottom floor of one building is taken up by restaurants, a jewelry store and a tailor. The sound of nearby traffic roars as workers in scrubs from the nearby hospital brush past women with strollers and groups of young men.

It was in Merrifield that county leaders celebrated their newest "park" last month -- a brick-lined plaza with a fountain and some benches centered between new apartment buildings.  It's just that kind of urban feel that attracted residents such as Duy Anh Huynh. "I definitely think of Fairfax as a city. It's awesome, very vibrant," Huynh, 34, said after picking up dinner at a burrito joint within walking distance of his apartment.  Many policymakers and planners believe Fairfax has no choice but to continue to grow along the Merrifield model. The alternative is for the same suburban development patterns to worsen traffic, pollution and sprawl -- or for the growth that is expected to continue regionwide to pass Fairfax by. After that comes decline, they say.  "What would you rather do, leave it the way it is?" asked Robert E. Lang, author of the book "Edgeless Cities" and co-director of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech. "It's neither fish nor fowl. They are going to be out-citied by Arlington and out-countried by Loudoun."

None of this means that redevelopment of Tysons or any other corner of Fairfax guarantees success. Politicians, planners and nervous neighbors are acutely aware of the perils of building up: more traffic if commuting patterns don't change; higher taxes to pay for the massive foundation of infrastructure that must be built; and, eventually, blight if Fairfax's new urban spaces or overall economy don't thrive.  So far, Fairfax has been fortunate to escape many of the downsides of urbanization. The percentage of people living in poverty has declined slightly this decade, and average income, fueled by an explosion in federal contracting and the technology industries, has risen.  Crime, notably robbery, ticked up in 2007, the most recent year for which data are available, but it followed a national trend and remains well below national averages.

The one typically urban issue Fairfax is grappling with is neighborhood blight. Old neighborhoods such as Kings Park along Braddock Road or Huntington along Route 1 have been struggling with decline. Unkempt rented homes and falling property values dot these landscapes. Some areas, such as the partly vacant mall in downtown Springfield, have developed such an unsavory reputation that several of the mothers in Burke said they do not allow their teenage children to go there.  County leaders say their plans to redevelop such places as Tysons and Springfield will help reverse such decline rather than precipitate it. They say the central perils of building up are the impacts on surrounding neighborhoods, not rising crime or declining schools.  "Whether we like it or not, change is coming to Fairfax County," said Supervisor John C. Cook (R-Braddock). "We are urbanizing. That doesn't mean that anything has to change for the residents of Clifton or Braddock, but staying static is not an option."

In reality, an official redesignation from county to city is no simple task. Experts say it would be the largest such effort in modern Virginia history, and county leaders might prefer a more subtle route to achieve their goal of improving their transportation network, a task they say the state has failed to do.  If Fairfax does become a city, it would instantly become one of the largest in the nation, the size of San Antonio or San Jose.  It would also diverge dramatically from the stereotype of the gritty metropolis. Fairfax enjoys many of the benefits -- wealth and jobs -- and few of the detriments -- crime, troubled schools -- of a large urban center. With a median household income of $105,000, it is the wealthiest large county in the nation. Among large school systems, it boasts the highest test scores. And it has the lowest murder rate among the nation's 30 largest cities and counties.

Still, the city label doesn't quite fit for some community leaders. Supervisor John W. Foust (D-Dranesville) represents the largely suburban area around McLean and Herndon, where some residents worry that transformation in nearby Tysons will worsen traffic in their neighborhoods. The cul-de-sac lifestyle they have chosen is still the one that defines Fairfax, he said.  "I think the county form serves us pretty well," he said. "Future growth will be more urban, but we've got a huge population that has chosen a suburban model."