COTD: Area Codes Edition

For a singer whose solo career spanned just a few records, Nate Dogg, who died Tuesday at the young age of 41, has more hits and more importantly, more memorable hooks under his voice than most superstars, including this one with Ludacris. While there's ample explanation for flying cross-country in a Gulfstream for personal appointments (namely, "booty,") other kinds of conspicuous consumption make far less sense, like destroying a Lamborghini with a sledgehammer. Wheatieboy offers one explanation:

In Red China Blues, author Jan Wong described China at the beginning of the '90s as a nation of "Me first onlys". The one-child policy and the desperation of parents to have boys created a population of over-indulged males, incapable of seeing anything beyond their own needs and of really, doing anything for themselves.

When the wave of capitalism hit China in the post-Tienanmen era, this generation now-adult, over-indulged spoiled brats became the nouveau riche of the world's fastest growing population of millionaires. These "super-capitalists" are the rock stars of China's upper-middle class.

Surprise surprise, they act like rock stars.

This most recent display is merely the temper-tantrum that the owner so desperately wants to have, but can't. So he hires the job out.

If you get a chance, read Red China Blues. Yes Jan Wong is a self-righteous pain in the ass, but she's a hell of a writer and the book is fantastic.