more the engrish!

AS OTHER THINGS WERE PREOCCUPYING YOUR CORRESPONDENT'S MIND EARLIER IN THE BLOGGING DEPARTMENT, he forgot to include The Compleat Scoop from the Minnesota State Fair Daily News of Day 9 earlier.

So, lest complaints and angry e-mails ensue, he will now comply:

The Education Superintendent says that Patty makes the best chocolate chip cookies in the world!

Well, you can tell Kermit is a little slower since his 80th birthday. Now it takes him an hour and a half to watch "60 Minutes."

The three wise men on Machinery Hill want you to know about "Grumpy's Grill," look for the sign.

Vicky was seen wearing a 100-year-old MSF pendant given to her by Al.

A big 'dill-lightful' thank you to all my picklettes in the Gedney booth! Until we meet again--relish the days!!--Debra

Dude! I can only read abbreviations!--Matt from the Fish & Chips in the Food Building.

Teflon looking good!

Blue tag people make the mistakes so black tag people can take awards away. Payback.

Where or when is my bride to be?? Saw you in the parade though ... you drove the golf cart very well!

BD when are we ever going to get that apple stuff?

Jess--we know we are crazy, but did you have to go to Japan to hide from us?

DB--today is your day and only today is your day.

BES you are like an iceberg that can't melt you're so cool!

De'Anna has hypnotized me with her beauty.

BM thank you for ll of the food! I actually feel like I ate something healthy for the first time in about two weeks!

Happy 64th birthday to "peg leg" Cheryl Ann in the Magnet Booth. We love you.

The 2008 MSF Marketing staff rules!

Carie: have a great time at school, we know you will do so well! We'll miss having you for the next few days down here but we know you're going to have a blast!

KF someone thinks that you are the cat's pj's....

Loving the stuff in Heritage Square ... all should go and check that out!

Day 9 Day 9! Where has the time gone, we had all better start living it up here at the fair!

Barb: welcome to marketing! we are oh so happy to have you here! Just hope you can put up with us.... 

Hopefully, things out to be back to normal tomorrow.

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IN CASE ANYBODY ASKS ABOUT THE SIGNIFICANCE, HOWBEIT REMOTE, OF THE IMAGE @ THE HEAD OF THIS BLOG ITEM, allow me, in a way:

People For the American Way wants you to know The Inconvenient Truths About Sarah Palin, over and above the fact than an overzealously charismatic display of perkiness can easily conceal psychopathic intentions (as numerous studies down the years will attest).

As if that weren't enough, Right Wing Watch makes note of the latest attempt @ bizarre Religiopolitical Right meme explaining why the Great Unwashed fail to see the proverbial forest for the trees vis-a-vis Sarah Palin:

Kevin Burke, co-founder of something called Rachel’s Vineyard - a “post-abortion healing ministry” run by the right-wing group Priests for Life - offers his explanation of why people might not like Sarah Palin.  It turns out that they are all traumatized by the “collective grief, pain and guilt” they feel over their pro-choice views:

The very personal and often uncharitable criticism of Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin and her family evident in recent media coverage, and the lack of support from many feminist and child advocacy groups, may have a relationship to the collective grief, pain and guilt from personal involvement in the abortion of an unborn child.

When an issue strikes at a deeply repressed sensitive wound in a person, often the initial reaction is anger.

…

Seeing the Palin family, in a very visible public forum, with an uncompromising and public pro life philosophy arouses deeply repressed feelings in post abortive parents, as well as media members, counselors, health care professionals, politicians and others who promote abortion rights, especially the abortion of children with challenges such as Down syndrome.

These powerful repressed feelings of grief, guilt and shame can be deflected from the source of the wound (i.e., abortion) and projected onto an often uncharitable focus upon the trigger of these painful emotions…the Palin family.

And all this time I thought it was because she was a one-term unknown whose sole qualification for John McCain’s ticket was her appeal to the GOP’s right-wing base.

Come to think of it: Haven't we had enough of the anti-abortionist meme about abortions causing psychoemotional grief, trauma and guilt when studies are extant disproving any perceived connexions? 

Mr. Jerome Corsi
c/o WorldNetDaily.com
PO Box 1087
Grants Pass, OR 97528-1017

Dear Mr. Corsi:

It's well-known and well-established that you've produced a highly-specious and laughable farce of "investigative journalism" whose purpose and intent is to undermine the Presidential campaign of Democratic candidate Senator Barack Obama by questioning his racial, religious and moral fitness against various "tests" lacking any serious credibility.

However, it's emerged that you've also published attacks in the "swift boat" vein against Republican Presidential candidate John McCain, howbeit during the primary season (in case you've forgotten about them by deliberate ignorance or otherwise, may I refresh your memory) by making equally specious claims against Senator McCain such as those suggesting that:

• McCain's fortune has direct connexions to criminal syndicates;
• the McCain Presidential campaign is receiving substantial support from al-Qaeda-affiliated organisations;
• Mcain is secretly receiving money from George Soros;
• McCain has serious credibility problems vis-a-vis lobbyists; and
• McCain's advancing a "Mexico First" agenda on international trade.

Which, in either case, is lacking any semblance of substantiation, let alone credibility.

And, IIRC, said atacks are designed (by your own admission) to serve the campaign of the Constitution Party's Presidential candidate, Mr. Charles (Chuck) Baldwin by name.

The fact of which, and the interconnexions thus raised, raises some serious questions which we Right-Thinking Americans want to ask of you:

• What assurances have we that your claims are sincere, genuine and in good faith, knowing (un)consciously all the while that these same claims you present as authentic are false or misleading?
• How do we know that your sources don't include certain weird and/or unwholesome types whose credibility is traditionally regarded as dubious or suspicious, among them:
• alcoholics?
• drug addicts?
• chronic spendthrifts and gamblers?
• those with known police records?
• sex fiends and maniacs?
• those with histories of mental and/or emotional disorders?
• racists, white-supremacists and bigots?
• veterans with Bad Conduct, Dishonourable, Less than Honourable or Section 8 discharges from the military?
• Have you done any careful and cautious background checks on your sources for the sake of credibility? If not, what prevents you from so doing--were you "only following orders" not to question their credibility, and accept their stories @ face value without question or reservation?
• What prevents your conducting careful and thorough research and cross-checking of claims made in these works prior to publication, online or otherwise, including careful and thorough substantiation from @ least two independent and impartial sources?
• Did you offer your sources any consideration, in cash or in kind, to supply such information, knowing full well their credibilty cannot be challenged because you were "following orders"? If so, what was offered, how was such paid, and were they instructed to keep the details quiet?
• Is the Constitution Party and/or the Chuck Baldwin Presidential campaign paying you to advance these rather incredulous (absent credible substantiation) attacks? If so, how much? How often were you paid? In what forms?
• Are your paymasters in the Constitution Party and/or the Baldwin Presidential campaign (if such be the case) asking you to keep quiet about any and all payments for the sake of advancing these unsubstantiated smears and attacks? What reasons are they giving you for such silence?
• Who exactly are these paymasters with the Constitution Party and/or the Baldwin Presidential campaign as are asking you to smear Barack Obama and John McCain for the sake of the Constitution Party's efforts and endeavours?
• Are you now, or have you ever been:
• an alcoholic?
• a drug addict?
• a gambler?
• a chronic and habitual spendthrift?
• a spousal and/or child abuser?
• a sex fiend, degenerate or maniac?
• a coprophile (in the sense of being addicted to pornographic or otherwise obscene materials)?
• a sufferer of a loathsome mental or emotional disease or disorder?
• a sufferer from veneral disease?
• known to the police (in other words, had a police record)?
• on probation or served time in prisons or mental institutions?
• discharged from the military on a Bad Conduct, Dishonourable, Less Than Honourable or Section 8 such?
• unemployable for extended periods for reasons other than because of illness, incapacity or disability?
• a card-carrying member of a known and notorious subversive or otherwise conspiratorial organisation(s)?
• Have you no sense of Decency, Sir, @ long last?
• Have you left no sense of Decency (let alone Morality)?
• What stands in the way of your providing clear, honest and logical answers to the preceding? Money?

We are entitled to an explanation of these issues thus raised, and based solely on facts rather than on carefully-scripted and -manufactured bromides and platitudes such as you're probably being advised to use. Until then, we cannot expect to reagrd your claims as authentic, credible or sincere.

sincerely,
ILUDIUM PHOSDEX
(die egte artikel--aanvaar geen plaasvervangers)

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FIRST OFF, MAY I CALL YOUR ATTENTION TO THE NEW LOGO FOR THIS WEBLOG @ THE HEAD OF THIS PAGE: Your Correspondent has taken the liberty of so redesigning in the interest of ensuring some continuity of imagery vis-a-vis this weblog and the merchandise on offer in its own freshly-launched online boutique, The Exaggerator Collection.

Thus, minimising confusion while still having the desired effect of calling attention to this blog among especially such of you seeing T-shirts and sweaters as "walking billboards" for this blog (cf. Stew Leonard's shopping bags and Wall Drug Store's signage), particularly so in "tourist trap" districts of the highest order. And remember, you're helping to support Your Correspondent and this weblog with your purchases from The Exaggerator Collection or any of the e-tailer affiliates this blog hath.

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ON TO BUSINESS, NOW, SHALL WE?

For starters, the big meme-generator currently in Indecision 2008is that inspireth by GOP VP wannabe Sarah Palin's bound-to-be-hackneyed line about the difference between a "hockey mom" (such as she hagiogaphically presents herself to be) and a pit bull (or, for that matter, some other class of vicious dog) is lipstick.

Prompting Democratic Presidential wannabe Barack Obama to respond by saying "if you put lipstick on a pig, it's still lipstick"--which the McCain/Palin camp quickly saw as Having Subversive Tendencies (as in implying that such was a veiled smear of Palin), and Obama responding by denouncing such as one with "lies and phony outrage and Swift Boat politics."

As if that weren't enough, it's emerging that McCain "himself" was himself using the "lipstick on a pig" metaphor-crossing-into-meme himself in Congressional debate several times just last year.

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AS FOR JOHN McCAIN'S NOTION THAT BARACK OBAMA IS SOMEHOW "NOT QUALIFIED TO BE PRESIDENT," SUCH A REMARK LEAVES YOUR CORRESPONDENT WONDERING if what McCain means as "qualified" is one meeting various (howbeit unconstitutional) acid tests to determine their willingness to receive superdivine revelation from G-d A-mighty and expect Congress to act as "rubberstamp" therefor.

As in expecting the President to be more in the vein of "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" who can be expected all the while to avoid dropping hints of hallucinogenic substances really being used to achieve the effect of being in such a mental state to receive Divine Pronouncement.

Which brings to mind the Assemblies of God's particular disapproval of such a notion as part of their general objections to "Latter Rain" teachings as expressed thus in their 2000 position paper "Endtime Revival--Spirit-Led and Spirit-Controlled" based on the risk of such crossing over into the undemocratic and dictatorial while all along claiming Biblical authority and power:

It is very tempting for persons with an independent spirit and an exaggerated estimate of their importance in the kingdom of God to declare organization and administrative structure to be of human origin. Reading in the Bible that there were apostles and prophets who exerted great leadership influence, and wrongly interpreting 1 Corinthians 12:28 and Ephesians 2:20 and 4:11, they proceed to declare themselves or persons aligned with their views as prophets and apostles. Structure set up to avoid a previous structure can soon become dictatorial, presumptuous, and carnal while claiming to be more biblical than the old one outside the new order or organization. Proponents of apostles/prophets leadership stop too soon in their reading of the Ephesians 4 passage, overlooking the high calling of every office and minister of the Church: "It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ" (Ephesians 4:11,12, italics added).

In Ephesians 2:20, Paul is talking about the historical fact of Jews and Gentiles having come together to form the Church. The aorist participle in verse 20 is best translated "having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone"–a past occurrence. The reference to apostles and prophets in Ephesians 3:5 speaks of their role in recording the inspired Scriptures as a past occurrence. The leadership of the local church, according to the Pastoral Epistles, is in the hands of elders/presbyters and deacons. These are the last of Paul's epistles. There is no indication in these last writings of continuing offices of apostles and prophets, though the ministry functions still continue.

Prophets in the New Testament are never described as holding an officially recognized position as in the case of pastors and evangelists. They spoke prophetically to the body for edification and admonition. When they prophesied under the inspiration of the Spirit, their ministry was noted. They could indeed have been called prophets without designating them as filling an office. A self-proclaimed prophet who dropped into a local church setting would certainly have been suspect until he was better known. And to guard against such abuses, Paul taught that all prophetic utterances should be tested by the Body (1 Corinthians 14:29). The humility that Paul taught and modeled should be a primary character trait of every spiritual leader. We affirm that there are, and ought to be, apostolic- and prophetic-type ministries in the Church, without individuals being identified as filling such an office.

The Shepherding Movement, a term not used as frequently now as earlier, is still a practice with close ties to the apostle/prophet excesses described above. The random and wrongful substitution of mutually appointed apostles and prophets to replace existing divinely appointed and duly chosen leadership is a circumstance open to abuse. In the past the shepherding teaching led to an artificial pyramid system of accountability, with each person responsible to a personal shepherd. The shepherd in turn is accountable to another shepherd for his guidance, accountability, and control. Although the example of Paul mentoring young Timothy is a good pattern for today, there is no biblical basis for a network requiring every believer to have a personal shepherd. The pastor, as shepherd of a local church flock, along with the spouse, can deal with even the most personal matters. The pastor in turn has a district superintendent, chosen for the position through a divinely blessed process, from whom help can be sought when needed. But to seek randomly, and with a sense of obligation, for someone to be a personal shepherd is not biblical. God-ordained leaders, chosen by Spirit-led colleagues seeking to build and edify the body of Christ, have the needed maturity, stability, and gifting by the Spirit.

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YOUR CORRESPONDENT ANNOUNCETH THE LAUNCH OF HIS VERY OWN CAFÉ PRESS STORE FOR THE EXAGGERATOR, henceforth to be known as "The Exaggerator Collection" by name and stylee.

Which, in case you ask, offers what could best be described as "wearable billboards" for this rather bombastic excuse for a weblog ... as well as coffee mugs, caps, wall clocks, journals, bumper stickers and even computer mouse pads for the discerning fan of this weblog. All helping to support Your Correspondent and this weblog, understand.

Come to think of it, these "wearable billboards" could be something of a fashion statement in all the popular "white trash" resort areas, certain to attract attention of the Johnny Bravo/Kanker Sisters crowd. Reports of sightings would be greatly appreciated--as would, most importantly, your purchases.

Soooo ... if you love The Exaggerator, you're sure to love The Exaggerator Collection! (And it might not hurt to get your end-of-year holiday shopping done right now, saving yourself bedlam and confusion in the process.)

Thank you for your support and patronage in advance. Now shop for once!

NO PUN INTENDED: NORTH KOREA'S SO-CALLED "GREAT LEADER" KIM JONG IL MAY BE ILL HIMSELF, what with his absence from ceremonies in beautiful(?!) downtown Pyongyang marking the 60-year anniversary of the so-called "Democratic People's Republic of Korea," replete with the inevitable displays of exaggerated military bravado in equally-exaggerated military lockstep and various missiles on 1950's-vintage heavy trucks.

No official details have been forthcoming from the highly-secretive Stalinist state; however, intelligence reports have it that "Great Leader" suffers from diabetes and heart disease, and may have suffered a stroke recently.

(His last documented public appearence was on August 14th.)

Some Japanese tabloids of a highly-incredible sort are reporting that the "real" "Great Leader" died in 2003 and that the regime was using lookie-likeys in public appearences to create the aura of stability and unity through deception and trick. Especially absent any clear signs of who may be considered "Dear Leader" (to use Kim Jong Il's pre-1997 title, when his late father Kim Il Sung, now considered "Eternal Leader," held the "Great Leader" title) to the extent of being capable enough to succeed Kim Jong Il in case the inevitable ensues.

That, and "Great Leader" being the subject of an officially-sponsored mythology as would make all the hagiographically-glowing excesses being force-fed on the Great Unwashed about Sarah Palin look like your typical Hanna-Barbera flicktoon for Saturday-morning FreeVee broadcast.

*************

THAI PRIME MINISTER SAMAK SUNDARAVEJ'S HOSTING A WEEKLY TV COOKING SHOW styled Tasting and Grumbling has been found to be in violation of a Constitutional proscription on working a second job while holding high office.

Ergo, according to a Thai court, Sundaravej and his cabinet will please resign their offices posthaste.

*************

MEIN INNKEEPER FRIEND IS OF THE OPINE THAT, IN THE EVENT OF A McCAIN/PALIN VICTORY COME NOVEMBER, we should essentially let things deteriorate all the further socioeconomically so things can eventually get better.

In effect, letting the debaucheries of His Fraudulency's Great Within run their course, mindful all the more that we maintain the que vive on the Government.

Breathes there a more logical argument of the need for realistic change come November?

============

BUT THEN AGAIN, ON THE OTHER HAND, WE AS A "MORALLY SUPERIOR" SOCIETY NEED TO BE ALL THE MORE WATCHFUL OF ELECTORAL INTEGRITY AND PURITY, especially so in light of the following videos released by the Security Group of the University of California/Santa Barbara as reveal where "touch-screen" voting machines are prone to hacking and manipulation as can only undermine electoral intgrity:

In support of these videos is this report which explains the modus operandi of the tests, and the damaging revelations.

Which no doubt confirms the apocryphal remark of Soviet-era dictator Josef Stalin suggesting that "it's not the one who votes that counts; it's who counts the votes."

Enough, then, to call upon such states still adamant in their use of touch-screen electoral technology to decertify said machines with celerity and dispatch, in light of the clear and present dangers so exposed as undermines electoral integrity and purity--and, to a larger extent, democracy per se. Especially when weird and unwholesome elements are involved in their programming and vote-counting, all the while expected to keep quiet and, if and when asked to explain, deny any and all knowledge thereof.

And, in the process, call upon them to reinstitute hand-counted ballot papers to ensure electoral integrity and purity all the more.

Unless they happen to have some cheap and cheerful patsy they can use to avoid liability ... or are otherwise asked to leave the country incognito and keep a low profile, reinforced by substantial "hush money" retainers.

For now, though, tell your friends.