Function getAdCookie(name) { var regex = new RegExp('(?:^|; )' + name + '=([^;]*)'); var value = regex.exec(document.cookie); if (value && value.length > 1) { value = decodeURIComponent(value[1]); } else { value = ""; } return value; } function getFrameDocument(fr) { var doc = fr.contentWindow || fr.contentDocument; if (doc && doc.document) { doc = doc.document; } return doc; } function closeDoc(doc) { doc.close(); } function closeOpenDocuments(openDocs) { for (var i=0;i < openDocs.length; i++) { closeDoc(getFrameDocument(document.getElementById(openDocs[i]))) } } function isIE() { return /msie/i.test(navigator.userAgent) && !/opera/i.test(navigator.userAgent); } function setHash (element, hash) { if(element.hash) { element.hash = element.hash + "," + hash; } else { element.hash = hash; } } function renderIFAd(holderID, adID, srcUrl, width, height, hash) { setHash(document.getElementById(holderID), hash); document.dcdAdsR.push(adID); if (ie) { var sizePart = srcUrl.substring(srcUrl.indexOf("sz=")+3); sizePart = sizePart.substring(0, sizePart.indexOf(";")); var multiSizes = sizePart.split(","); var minSize = multiSizes[0]; if (multiSizes.length >

“Hold fast to dreams/For if dreams die/Life is a broken-winged bird/That cannot fly.” African-American poet Langston Hughes  published these poignant words  in 1930, but they didn’t appear in countless yearbook inscriptions and on dorm room posters until the ’60s and ’70s, when pursuing one’s dreams became the cultural imperative. Following your personal dream meant different things to different people, but it commonly involved rebuking the unified “American dream” everyone had previously agreed upon: marriage, family, a home (one you owned, in post WWII America) and a car. And as Americans became more focused on their personal states, the ones they lived in became distinctly less united.

In “Christmas Waltz,” the latest episode of “Mad Men,” we find out that cars are part of the dream for ad agencies, too – a sign that they’ve arrived, just as owning a car was once a sign of achieving adulthood, something that the staff at SCDP also hasn’t done yet. Instead, like teenagers, they’re stealing money from their corporate parents’ wallets, driving other people’s cars too fast, napping when they should be working, drinking too much, throwing tantrums (and other things) and having sex with near-strangers. And just as it did in America as a whole, this behavior is taking its toll on their personal unions – or will do so before long.