Thinking outside the taco shell

Watching the Rose Bowl today, I couldn't help but notice the glut of Taco Bell commercials. Apparently, strenuous physical activity and greasy, freeze dried ground beef (read: "shoe leather") go hand-in-hand. I also noticed the fact that Taco Bell hasn't changed their slogan since the Reagan administration. We get it, Taco Bell. You don't sell hamburgers. Very subtle. Congratulations to you.

My question is a simple one: Why exactly is it supposed to be a good thing that Taco Bell doesn't sell hamburgers? Was there some sort of anti-hamburger summit I missed? Or perhaps it was more of a pro-GI-tract-erosion type thing. And when are they going to get off their asses and come up with another slogan? ("Fourthmeal," being a non-word, doesn't count.) I suppose it's hard to come up with a slogan that doesn't paint Taco Bell in a dysentery-inducing light.

Actually, I've come to the realization that Taco Bell only has eight ingredients. Somehow, they have a 900-item menu that consists of slight variations in the combination and proportion of those ingredients. That's quite an amazing feat in my book. I can just imagine that somewhere in the heart of the gringo-style Mexican food revolution, there exists a highly paid statistician whose sole function is coming up with new combinations of which they haven't yet thought. He's just sitting in a basement somewhere in the Midwest with a graphing calculator and a ream of scratch paper, exhausting all possible combinations of beef, chicken, lettuce, cheese, microwaved beans, rice, and debilitating self-loathing. By my calculation, they have nearly 70,000 as yet unused dishes. That's one combination for every man, woman, and child who actually eats there.