My husband, the curmudgeon, is a bit of a philosopher. He has a theory which he says explains everything you need to know about the human race and its history. His theory can be summed up in three little words: People are stupid.
The theory has two corollaries:
I am the eternal optimist in the family and I keep trying to find evidence to poke holes in his theory, but, lately, such evidence has been very hard to come by. In fact, everywhere I look, I see nothing but confirmation of his theory. Just to give a few egregious examples of the stupidity that abounds:
1. The stock market. On Monday, it was down by over 600 points. Today it was up by over 400 points. That's more than 1,000 points in one day. Did the world actually change that much in just 24 hours, or do the people buying and selling stocks just really not have a clue?
2. The world is full of English speakers who cannot get the simplest rules of grammar of their language correct. If I hear one more person say, "The stock market's plunge was a real shock to Norbert and I," I may just explode! Would you really say, "The stock market's plunge was a real shock to I"? No, of course you wouldn't, unless you were Marilyn Monroe in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes." So why in the world would you say "Norbert and I" when those words are the OBJECT of a preposition? It's "Norbert and me," people!
3. And then there are the people on the coast, in mandatory evacuation zones, who with a category 4 or 5 hurricane bearing down on them, decide to "ride it out" because it will be exciting. Yes, it will be, and it will probably be the last excitement they ever experience.
4. "Reality" shows on television about which nothing is real.
5. People who use tanning beds. I once knew a woman, a regular user of tanning beds, who was diagnosed with melanoma. She had surgery to remove the cancer and, once she recovered, she was right back on the tanning bed. After several more surgeries and treatment, she is no longer with us. Sometimes death is the only cure for stupidity.
6. Michele Bachmann is one of the leading candidates for the Republican nomination for president. This woman is a certifiable nut job, but a lot of people love her and want her to be president because they want someone in the White House who is just like them.
7. People at town meetings who yell things like, "Keep the government out of my Medicare and Social Security!" Where exactly do they think these programs come from?
8. People who cannot explain anything without saying "I was like..." instead of "I said." Not only do they say "I was like..." but they say it constantly! They can hardly utter a sentence without those words.
9. Rioting in London! What is going on here? We expect our British cousins to keep a stiff upper lip and behave calmly and civilly. Where are Inspector Barnaby and D.S. Jones when you need them to calm people down?
10. People who insist that Barack Obama is a liberal who was born in Kenya and is a Muslim who hankers to institute Shariah law. None of that is true. He is a moderate conservative, born in Hawaii, a state in the United States, who longs for everyone to get along and practice bipartisanship.
Well, I could go on, but I'm just depressing myself, and this is the day of all days when I need to be thinking happy thoughts, for it is the day when I turn a year older. Happy birthday to me.
The theory has two corollaries:
I. Americans are VERY stupid.The proof of his theory, he says, is our politics and the people that we continually elect to represent us. We keep voting against our own economic and cultural interests and then wonder why things don't turn out the way we wanted.
II. Texans are even stupider.
I am the eternal optimist in the family and I keep trying to find evidence to poke holes in his theory, but, lately, such evidence has been very hard to come by. In fact, everywhere I look, I see nothing but confirmation of his theory. Just to give a few egregious examples of the stupidity that abounds:
1. The stock market. On Monday, it was down by over 600 points. Today it was up by over 400 points. That's more than 1,000 points in one day. Did the world actually change that much in just 24 hours, or do the people buying and selling stocks just really not have a clue?
2. The world is full of English speakers who cannot get the simplest rules of grammar of their language correct. If I hear one more person say, "The stock market's plunge was a real shock to Norbert and I," I may just explode! Would you really say, "The stock market's plunge was a real shock to I"? No, of course you wouldn't, unless you were Marilyn Monroe in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes." So why in the world would you say "Norbert and I" when those words are the OBJECT of a preposition? It's "Norbert and me," people!
3. And then there are the people on the coast, in mandatory evacuation zones, who with a category 4 or 5 hurricane bearing down on them, decide to "ride it out" because it will be exciting. Yes, it will be, and it will probably be the last excitement they ever experience.
4. "Reality" shows on television about which nothing is real.
5. People who use tanning beds. I once knew a woman, a regular user of tanning beds, who was diagnosed with melanoma. She had surgery to remove the cancer and, once she recovered, she was right back on the tanning bed. After several more surgeries and treatment, she is no longer with us. Sometimes death is the only cure for stupidity.
6. Michele Bachmann is one of the leading candidates for the Republican nomination for president. This woman is a certifiable nut job, but a lot of people love her and want her to be president because they want someone in the White House who is just like them.
7. People at town meetings who yell things like, "Keep the government out of my Medicare and Social Security!" Where exactly do they think these programs come from?
8. People who cannot explain anything without saying "I was like..." instead of "I said." Not only do they say "I was like..." but they say it constantly! They can hardly utter a sentence without those words.
9. Rioting in London! What is going on here? We expect our British cousins to keep a stiff upper lip and behave calmly and civilly. Where are Inspector Barnaby and D.S. Jones when you need them to calm people down?
10. People who insist that Barack Obama is a liberal who was born in Kenya and is a Muslim who hankers to institute Shariah law. None of that is true. He is a moderate conservative, born in Hawaii, a state in the United States, who longs for everyone to get along and practice bipartisanship.
Well, I could go on, but I'm just depressing myself, and this is the day of all days when I need to be thinking happy thoughts, for it is the day when I turn a year older. Happy birthday to me.
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