Essay: New but Not Necessarily Improved

In the noisy confluence of publicity pronouncements, news bulletins, market analyses, gadfly lawsuits and expert pontifications on the momentous Coca-Cola controversy, the Republic seemed to shudder for an instant last week, then right itself and face toward the flag. In the midst of all the foaming and burbling, though, Americans demonstrated some interesting reactions toward the whole process of change.

Some things, clearly, they would rather not have changed at all, no matter what any market surveys seem to predict. "Baseball, hamburgers, Coke--they're all the fabric of America," cried Gay Mullins, the much quoted Seattle real estate man and triumphant noisemaker...

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