Forget The Onion, turn off The Daily Show and Colbert Report, connoisseurs of truly absurd humor know to reach for the letters to the editor page of The Arizona Republic for pure comic gold.
Each day brings a fresh infusion from the fertile minds of the paper's readers. It's amazing how people who don't know anything can have opinions about everything. (I guess that's another one of the things that makes America so great, huh?)
These are folks who couldn't define "socialism" if you gave them all day and a dictionary. But does that stop them from railing against "the evils of socialism"? Hell no! Same thing with the Constitution (especially the Second Amendment), foreign policy, the deficit, illegal immigrants, states' rights, those wicked liberals, nuclear power, unions, American history, World history, and Obama, Obama, Barack Hussein Obama--you name it, some idiot has a completely uninformed or misinformed point of view and he's got a right to express it. As a bonus, these letters are sometimes written by the kind of person who likes to spice up his prose with the occasional "methinks". Well, methinks, that in the 21st Century, anyone who uses "methinks" in anything other than a satirical way is, if I may channel Gilbert and Sullivan for a moment, pathetically pompous and possibly a ponce.
But archaic words and primitive grammar really aren't a problem. The Arizona Republic will gladly print even the craziest of rants. That's what freedom of the press is all about--isn't it? Besides, if you study the Republic's opinion page closely, you'll discover that the letters are usually right in line with the paper's own views. All the more to chuckle about.
PS Mrs Franklin and I are leaving on a short road trip. To communicate with our dear readers, I will be relying on technology that apparently became obsolete soon after we finished paying for it. (Thank you, Mr. Jobs.) So if I'm unable to post for a few days, keep me in your hearts, enjoy the Mission Man, and read a good book, OK? (I recommend 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism, a highly entertaining stroll through the "free" markets of the world by Ha-Joon Chang, who teaches economics at Cambridge.)
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