The Gap has long had a knack for exploiting cultural detritus and ruining things you love. To wit:

Hey confused Xers and bored boomers, looking for attire to impress everyone else at the community center as you embarrassingly dally in a faux-fad? No? What if we sold it to you with egregious bullet-time shots? People like that sort of thing in 1998, yeah? Nice.

Hey most influential electronic musicians of the decade, want a shitload of money? Yeah? Ok if we let The Other Sister stiffly gyrate in front of you? Sweet.

There’s nothing really noteworthy about The Gap’s latest campaign, other than that it’s presently on television often. All your favorite warmed-over cultural touchpoints are there. The drum-machine. The not-so-coincidental Glee vibe. The flannel, dear God, the flannel.

There’s even a manufactured controversy. In between grooming pundits for various cable news appearances and supportin’ everyone’s favorite hockey mom, the American Family Association found time to launch a boycott of The Gap because of the ad’s shocking, SHOCKING tagline, “Happy do whatever you wannukah.” (What scamps!) Maybe it’s because I’ve seen this ad so many times admist the deluge of Sarah Palin coverage, but it seems there’s some basis for comparison there. On Wednesday, Jon Stewart asserted that we shouldn’t hate Palin because she’s a gerund-defying dolt, but because she’s a walkin’/talkin’ simulacrum, “a conservative boilerplate madlib…delivered as though it were the hard-earned wisdom of a life well-lived.” Gap holiday ads serve a similar function, passing off the discourses of Christmas consumerism as cheeky omnireligiousness. Look, I’m not trying to be cynical. I rocked the hell out of those khakis in my Dawson Leery phase. Just don’t be surprised if, the next time you stop by a Republic of Gap Navy, the store employees have been replaced by smart-alecky mannequins adorned in garish woolen garb. Sounds crazy, I know, but this is a crazy time of year.