Ii isn't nice to make fun of the intellectually disadvantaged. But sometimes they make us laugh, just as children can make us laugh when they try out adult-like thought and expression . The laughter is often at ourselves, because when children imitate adult behavior they often offer illuminating parodies of it. However, the clumsy and inept use of language can be side-splittingly funny. College professors often share ridiculous student papers with each other for the much-needed laughter they provide.
The
following letter-to-the-editor supplied one of those occasions of hilarity. I no longer can run down the office hallway to share a moment of humor with colleagues, so I share it here. The last sentence of the first paragraph could win a Pulitzer if there was a category for T-shirt mottoes. Here is the letter:
Just a short, easy-to-read letter from and to Americans. The recent gossip about impeaching our president of the United States is careless gossip from a few incompetent residents of this great nation. Please let them disappear in their stench.
The best of our knowledge, as American citizens, taxpayers, and regular voters: We the voters of this nation elected Donald Trump as our president. We are thankful for his participation in the leadership of the United States of America. We want him to be able to concentrate on the work of our nation and not have his time wasted by the shallow-headed Americans who cause trouble for our elected president, Mr. Donald Trump. Let's be intelligent enough to support him and the leadership he provides for this nation.
We are faithful citizens of this nation and we are pleased to have a president who, as an American businessperson, was very successful. We support him and we are delighted as citizens and taxpayers to have a competent person at our nation’s leadership, and we want to be rid of forever the sneaky, incompetent and dishonest Obama crowd.
Just citizens of USA.
Arlee and Lyle Berg
Webster
I have often noted how letters-to-the-editor were handled at the last newspaper I worked for. Letters which needed fact-checking, verification, or editing piled up on the editor's desk. He made a habit of clearing his desk on Friday afternoons by distributing those letters to the editors who were expected either to work with the writers to get them into a publishable form or write letters explaining why the letters were rejected, which often involved angry exchanges with the writers. The letter above would have been rejected on the basis of illiteracy and that it would expose the writers to ridicule. The policy was that it would be better to incur the wrath of the writers than be the medium of cruel derision. As I read the letter, it struck me that it could well be the product of The Onion, and the names Arlee and Lyle seemed too alliterative not to be contrived. And the fragmented and incoherent sentences with reverential patriotism in naming the president and the nation are the stuff of parody of the kind of people who revere Trump. So, I looked them up.
There is a Lyle L. and Arlys K. Berg, in their mid 80s, listed in rural Webster in the local phone directories, but other directories list them in Harrisburg, SD, and Elk River, MN. In any event, such people appear to exist. One can picture an isolated couple who were by-passed by education and the more informing aspects of the media and doddered through a lifetime, or perhaps are now experiencing the onslaught of dementia. One can feel a regretful sadness. When bits of student writing were circulated among faculty for their entertainment value, it was done with the knowledge that the writers would be shown what was wrong and provided instruction on how to think clearly and apply the laws of coherent grammar, or their failure to learn those skills would prevent them from advancing further until they did. But here is an example of people moved to an attempt at vituperation of those who oppose Trump, who holds something of a revered, heroic status for them. To them he is impeded by the threat of impeachment from those shallow-headed and incompetent Americans who indulge in careless gossip, part of that sneaky, incompetent, and dishonest Obama crowd. The regret is that the authors are unaware of their silly ineptitudes of thought and the incoherent expression, which others might find amusing.
The tendency is to dismiss such letters and their writers as people lost in the back country where they have little consequence. But as absurd as that letter is, it represents and gives voice to the mentality of many like them who support Trump.
I am among a growing number who believe that the election of Trump represents a drastic and sinister change in the character of the United States. Trump put his defects of character on full display during the campaign, and the media reported his words and behavior. While a few of his supporters may be too torpid to register his depravity, for anyone in even casual communication with the world, a vote for Trump is a conscious rejection of the principles on which America was built, a denial of equality and justice for all. When poll takers and journalists have asked Trump supporters the reasons for their support, the most frequent response is the one Lyle and Arlee give in their l letter: "we are pleased to have a president who, as an American businessperson, was very successful."
Trump's business practices are based upon deception, subterfuge, and posturing. His history of refusing to pay contractors, bankruptcies, and fraud are matters of public record. To his supporters, his wealth indicates success. Ethics, honesty and morality in how he got his money are not even considerations. Trump's election indicates the severity of America's degeneration. The accumulation of wealth and the exercise of power, no matter how immoral and damaging to people is now the dominant measure of value for those who put Trump into office. America has slid into a fascist state with all the principles of its founders and developers cast into the abyss of greed and malice.
Lyle and Arlee are a case study in the decomposition of America. Their letter is an eloquent expression of the stifling ignorance and dimwitted rage that comprises much of the Trump support, aside from those who consciously and deliberately have registered their rejection of liberty, equality, and justice.
However, the mirth provoked by their pretentious ineptitude should not obscure the intensity of the malice that underlies their effort. Their reference to that "sneaky, incompetent and dishonest Obama crowd" seethes with racist animus. And they extend their contempt and hatred to those other incompetents who supported Obama, in South Dakota just 39.9 percent. (61.5 percent voted for Trump.)
if one wants to give American democracy another chance, how does one reconcile with the likes of Lyle and Arlee? Or maybe Thomas Carlyle who did not believe that self-government was possible was right when he said, " I do not believe in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance."
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