If they can make Ke$ha seem sort of appealing, and wholesome, and communitarian, they can sell anything:
A project I'd really like to take on at some point is to watch all of The Simpsons, from the beginning. Of all the things things I regret missing from a childhood spent largely isolated from pop culture, The Simpsons is probably the thing I'm saddest about. I think my mother fell into the Bart-might-be-a-bad-influence camp, but I think middle school might have been a lot easier if I'd had Lisa Simpson as a role model. It was one of my assistant debate coaches, who drove far faster than was prudent (but fast enough to be quite exciting) and who had lots and lots of the episodes uploaded on his computer in the early aughts before everyone did things like that, who introduced me to the show, and I'll be forever thankful.
But if someone with a Simpsons education as patchy as mine can see something like this, and immediately get all the jokes, it's evidence of how deep the show's penetration into our culture is. I'm glad they've mostly stuck to selling things like Coke, otherwise I don't know what I'd be irrationally charmed by. With great power comes great responsibility!
