On Language

Aristotle, when outlining his philosophical ideas, felt that knowing the language you speak was important to understanding everything about you. In fact, he felt that you could not argue your point effectively if you did not have an excellent grasp of language. I would assert that Aristotle was prescient and somehow predicted the Politically Correct Orwellian double-speak of the Progressive Liberals.

To understand exactly what your opponent is saying, you must understand the words they put forth. Libs love to baffle you with bullshit. How else do you explain hyphenated Americans, or that suddenly the word Diverse means united?

I will admit this, there are writers I adore simply because of their use of language. David Mamet and Dean Koontz come immediately to mind. Koontz became one of my favorite writers just based on an interview he gave on Tom Snyder's show back in the early 90s talking about one anal retentive Hun editor he once had. The editor got hung up on someone having a heating unit in their garage and kept haranguing Mr. Koontz to remove that aspect of his story. Dean Koontz refused and kept embellishing the description of the heating unit, and making it a much larger part of the story than the offhand reference it had been originally. I think it was one of the funniest stories I've ever listened to.

The ability to take words and bash your opponent with them is an art. Which is why Libs try to avoid using any words that aren't code or tacitly understood as something else. If one of them had to actually come out and say something they would freeze up, their little minds refusing to state an actual fact or opinion. They simply cannot do it. Don't believe me? Watch Obama this past week admitting that "shovel ready" jobs weren't so "shovel ready". He tries to smile but actually chokes out each syllable. He is literally choking on his words. Because he cannot admit what even he knows is reality.

Eschew obfuscation. Remember, one of my fun phrases.

I think this is why Sarah Palin, Herman Cain and Thaddeus McCotter are so popular among the populace. They are all plain speaking people who say exactly what they mean. To the people inured by LibSpeak they are difficult to understand, because they are always trying to figure out what they are "really" saying. Why? Because they don't understand the language they speak each day. Try to ask any teenager a question and they will stall as their public school addled brains try to "decode" what you are really asking. Just watch and listen. Their eyes go momentarily blank, their jaws slacken and then they will ask you to either repeat your question or they will parrot your words back as their brains, denied all knowledge of vocabulary and sentence structure try to grasp your interrogatory. You can smell their confusion. This isn't on the Standardized Test which is all they are taught anymore. No one has told them what this might possibly mean and they have been denied all methods of parsing your words for the "true" meaning.

Then you just nod and say, "No, I don't want fries with that", and collect your change, distributed by a machine instead of making the sheople at the counter actually have to count anything or have a rudimentary knowledge of math and the money system of our country.

When I was a child I learned to love words, because I liked to read. Because children's books were not so numerous in those days, I often read adult books to keep my reading skills up. I always had a dictionary handy and a thesaurus. My parents made these tools available to a curious child with far more questions than they could ever answer. I started doing the Sunday Crossword when I was in my early teens. I would steal the section from the neighbors newspaper after one too many fights with my mother over the puzzle. The neighbors were knuckle-dragging mouth breathers who could not even read, so I'm pretty sure they never missed that section. I would do the daily puzzle in the school library newspaper. The cafeteria had horrible food, so I would spend my lunch time immersed in words. The librarian adored me because I was a book worm.

As I became more mature I learned that I could easily use words to take someone down a peg or two and they would never know quite for sure, because they had no idea what the words coming out of my mouth meant. I was not speaking a foreign language, even though I could. I was speaking THEIR language but they couldn't figure out what I meant. Because they had never bothered to learn any more of their language than was absolutely necessary to get a bag of burgers at the local fast food restaurant. I will admit, it's become my favorite past-time to nail ignoramuses who insist on butchering the beautiful English language. I'm always making fun of them, but they don't quite get it.

So, for all of you who say "should of, could of, would of" it's "should HAVE, could HAVE, would HAVE" or contracting the two words, "should've, could've, would've". Also, irregardless is not a word. You can look it up. It is what is referred to in the language biz as a disambiguation. You can look that up, too.

Oh, and one more thing, just so that I never, ever again have to witness this when reading a book, the correct phraseology is "I could NOT care less" connoting that there is no further level of apathy to which you can drop. If you could care less you care a little... OK? Got it? Good.