NP: Problems with Obama presidency

[Henry]

Cute.  I wonder what Obama reads...

Henry Mu
Information, Media, and Technology Management Consultant

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From: Lawrence Bryan
Sent: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 6:18 PM
To: pynchon-l at waste.org
Subject: Problems with Obama presidency


>From Andy Borowitz via Huffington Post:

In the first two weeks since the election, President-elect Barack Obama has
broken with a tradition established over the past eight years through his
controversial use of complete sentences, political observers say. Millions
of Americans who watched Mr. Obama's appearance on CBS's 60 Minutes on
Sunday witnessed the president-elect's unorthodox verbal tick, which had Mr.
Obama employing grammatically correct sentences virtually every time he
opened his mouth. But Mr. Obama's decision to use complete sentences in his
public pronouncements carries with it certain risks, since after the last
eight years many Americans may find his odd speaking style jarring.

According to presidential historian Davis Logsdon of the University of
Minnesota, some Americans might find it "alienating" to have a president who
speaks English as if it were his first language. "Every time Obama opens his
mouth, his subjects and verbs are in agreement," says Mr. Logsdon. "If he
keeps it up, he is running the risk of sounding like an elitist." The
historian said that if Mr. Obama insists on using complete sentences in his
speeches, the public may find itself saying, "Okay, subject, predicate,
subject predicate -- we get it, stop showing off."

The president-elect's stubborn insistence on using complete sentences has
already attracted a rebuke from one of his harshest critics, Gov. Sarah
Palin of Alaska. "Talking with complete sentences there and also too talking
in a way that ordinary Americans like Joe the Plumber and Tito the Builder
can't really do there, I think needing to do that isn't tapping into what
Americans are needing also," she said.