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The State Of The Union Is... Dumber
Since James Madison's 1815 Address, the 'linguistic standard' of the State of the Union speech has plunged. As The Guardian notes, the lowest on record was George H.W. Bush's 1992 address - only just beating Obama's 2011 address for 'dumbest' speech ever. Whether this is representative of the American people as a whole or the lowest common denominator is unclear but one thing in this evening's speech comes to mind; if you were the President, would you invite, as your personal guest, a CEO who 1) has overseen massive wealth destruction in the last six months, 2) refuses to spend his massive cash hoard in the USA, and 3) outsources his manufacturing to china? Dumb and dumber indeed...
Using the Flesch-Kincaid readability test the Guardian has tracked the reading level of every state of the union
and the Top 20 (or Bottom 20 we guess) Lowest average readability test scores for the Presidents...
P.S. in case you didn't know AAPL's CEO Tim Cook is the above-mentioned guest of the President...
Source: The Guardian
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Idiocracy!
upidSt-a-ocracy-a
"Upgrade" for President or is it going to be President Comacho's State of the Union address: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCWqQ6EDjqw
The state of the union is the same as it's been since the civil war: enforced at the point of a gun.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactive/2013/feb/12/state-of-the-uni...
duh
That's UpgrayeDD. The double D is for a double dose of pimpin'!
There are 24,761,380 UpgrayeDDs listed. Brought to you by Karl & Jr.
Kick back and suck up a Brawndo (the thirst mutilator)
President Camacho: Now I understand everyone's shit's emotional right now. But I've got a 3 point plan that's going to fix EVERYTHING.
Congressman #1: Break it down, Camacho!
President Camacho: Number 1: We've got this guy Not Sure. Number 2: He's got a higher IQ than ANY MAN ALIVE. and Number 3: He's going to fix EVERYTHING. [/President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYpfHBicjQk
+1 Great movie on so many different levels. A view of current societal attractions.
It was a true thought exercise.
Consider how in today's America, intellectual pursuits are shunned and even ridiculed, with high-schools having a culture of worshiping those who are good at sports and shunning those who are good at learning and thinking, to the point that most of the US' scientists have to be imported from abroad.
You can see it here in ZH often enough, with some otherwise brilliant people seemingly incapable of building a structurally robust logic building, falling for rethorical falacies, name-calling and emotional appeals and, worse of all, blindly parroting ideas which they never really investigated with any level of skepticism.
Is it thus any surprise if the level of rethoric of American presidents has trended down, towards the simpleton level and American politics has become a contest of who shouts the loudest or has the better show rather than a contest of witts?
A MUST SEE: Detach Ment, a movie by with Adrian Brodie. See that and all your questions will be answered.
"Consider how in today's America, intellectual pursuits are shunned and even ridiculed, with high-schools having a culture of worshiping those who are good at sports and shunning those who are good at learning and thinking, to the point that most of the US' scientists have to be imported from abroad."
Exactly. And I explain why this has happened in my new book here:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Homo-Negro-James-OMeara/dp/1935965484/ref=sr_1...
So what would be the score of President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho's State of the Union address?
So Obama is worse than GWB and GHB is worse than both (edit: worse than all of them).
I want to see Uncle Ted and the illegal immigrant go hand to hand. That's real tv.
WaaaaaaannnnnnGoooooooZeeeeeeeeeeTaaaaaanGoooooooooooooooooo!
...+1 wiping coffee off my comp screen.......again.
Country is brimming with dumbass numbnuts.
Big words make brain mine hurt :(
State of the Dis-Union by the Divider In Chief.
Prepare for more Divisiveness - and DOW 16,000
"Our children is learning".
well, when you are trying to get poor, uneducated people to vote for you, you don't want to go over their head
Hey the most "educated" people I know voted for the promise of utopia on earth.
No way!
http://news.yahoo.com/ohio-mom-charged-helping-kid-class-brawl-132351459...
Predict Barrack Obama's Word Cloud: Let me be clear, revenue, We tried that and it didn't work, Jobs, we still have alot of work to do, Make no mistake, we stand, alot better now, for the first time, guns in the hands of criminals, assault weapons, children, women, has to stop, Iran cannot defy the world community, sanctions in place are working, people are back to work, the other side thinks, market is near alltime highs, and blah blah blah blah f-in blah!
Bush
Just to clarify, are you referring to presidents or pussy? Just wondering...
Hope, forward, all work together, making the world better, evil, stand together, opportunity, revenue, can't go back, change, I, me, myself, future, and blah blah blah blah blah f-in blah blah!
...let me be perfectly clear...laser-like focus...work ceaselessly...we can all agree that...no one would dispute that...me....my....i....more work to be done...
the douche-bag will do more damage and burden the citizenry more than any prior President, by far
I think he covered all my word-cloud in the first 15 minutes, a new record!
Hey, don't diss the O...it's part of the deal. The O's staff trolled CEOs and Tim came up with the best trade.
Tim's gonna give him the first off the boat from China ...Official Dick Wrist Communicator.
APPL to $2000...everybody's gonna line up for the Dick Com...
Wait for it. "We can't protect you unless we take away all those evil firearms".
Fuking dumb assed logic.
Tim Cook for Treas Sec! Timmmmeeeehhhh!
think of how stupid the average American is.......then realize that half are DUMBER than that
"Now, there's one thing you might have noticed I don't complain about: politicians. Everybody complains about politicians. Everybody says they suck. Well, where do people think these politicians come from? They don't fall out of the sky. They don't pass through a membrane from another reality. They come from American parents and American families, American homes, American schools, American churches, American businesses and American universities, and they are elected by American citizens. This is the best we can do folks. This is what we have to offer. It's what our system produces: Garbage in, garbage out. If you have selfish, ignorant citizens, you're going to get selfish, ignorant leaders. Term limits ain't going to do any good; you're just going to end up with a brand new bunch of selfish, ignorant Americans. So, maybe, maybe, maybe, it's not the politicians who suck. Maybe something else sucks around here... like, the public. Yeah, the public sucks. There's a nice campaign slogan for somebody: 'The Public Sucks. Fuck Hope.'"
BS - Don't blame The People - It's the System, and the $2 Billion dollars spent on the Presidential campaign - where does it go....?
To CNN, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, FOX, ABC, Current... Is it any wonder we are always in an election cycle - and that;s what you will see tonight, the official kick off of the 2014 interim election.
As for the actual presidential vote - Starting with the rigged up primaries - By the time the primaries get to California and Texas - It's already over... When Florida moved up thier primary date - Florida lost half thier delegates, The two parties actually tried to force Florida to change the date back, but - the Democrats and Republican parties have no status to dictate the date of such primaries, but they do. You call this a fair vote? You want to fix the presidential election - have 3 primaries across splitting all 50 states into 3ds - drawn in a lottery.
Restricting the amount of $$$ that networks can take in, in campaign revenue, would clean it up too.
It's ultimately up to the people to change the system.
When George Carlin is getting junked out of the room you know your site has jumped the shark
i think they call them 'birthers'? but then again, taxpayers paid for this 50% rich boy's education, with a little help from the cia. he done good the boy did.
The Zh'ers are apparently not much better. Why? See below... This article is actually interesting, and may even imply fundamental changes to us as a species. At the very lest the implications suggest our society, and or our politics, is changing.
The Chris Dorner Article had approx 30,000 reads, this one 400, at the time of starting this post.
not only is time money......but it helps when comparing # of reads per article
http://trendybull777.blog.com/2013/02/12/world-new-orderin-russianwhat-t... injoy your last freedoms,read why in the near future you all will be leaving under much worth leader that Stalin was,Elite should prepare testoments,your last days counted FED,prepare for changes,working for change!Because most of you worthening midlle class conditions,you are blind in your greedy habits to leave some change to poor and middle,then you will loose all like it was many times in hystory under the New Order which not you,others will do very soon!
Wording please do the makings henceforth to the structure in sentence. Comprehendabilted givings with gracious aplomb.
OHHH, you're trying to pretend your RUSSIAN! My bad, It looked like faux Chinese at first. Any relation to Boris Alatovkrap?
(A Russky with a lisp-now that IS a new one! -worthening)
Hey, Boris is funny!
Can't wait to see all the finger pointing and big ups these assholes give each other in destroying this country. In other news, money management alone will save the monetary system for all who religiously abide by it. In other news yet, the state of the union is as it's ever been: fubar'd. More loquacious patriotism and the future of 'murica will make things right. Drinking games, live tweets, and fat poli-analysts jawjacking for the cheap seats!
i am just glad Makers Mark is ripping us off dropping to 84%.....less of a hangover
well, go get ya self a Bud...improved with 8% additional water (after brewing).
dont worry the sol address will come with instuctions on what to think
Is AAPL directly getting taxpayer/Fed/borrowed money?
IF NOT, they are quite within their rights (and quite sane) to NOT invest in the expensive and overregulated US and to outsource to more efficient suppliers.
Yeah, The can fuck us in more creative ways somewhere else cuz thats the rulz.
I...errr ahhh, would like to thank the NEA for ummm errr ahhh, making all this possible.
Do I really have to listen to the Choomwagon-in-chief's State of the Disrepair speech? Meh.
I must borrow that lovely sobriquet of affection you used for the Dictator of Debt! I've added it to my list of about 200 titles for Bathhouse Barry.
Here's what he won't say: more freedom, anti-depressants, value of the dollar, GITMO, we are bringing our troops home, shovel-ready projects, jobs council, Green Energy, Keystone Pipeline, michele's bangs, Ted Nugent, Ben Bernanke, German Gold, Drones, Illegals, and anything else you can think of!
Benghazi, Syria, Senator Menandez and Superstorm Sandy recovery and FEMA Maps
Tim Geithner, jobs saved or created, Dodd-Frank, NDAA, Black Panthers, Brian Terry, Constitution, Chris Stevens, Paul Krugman, the Marine Corp Honor Guard having their bolts removed from their guns while walking behind him at inauguration, Beyounce lip sync, Keynesian, socialist, crony, East Anglia.
...prosecutions for financial crimes, fast and furious, rule of law...
I thought him having the Marine Honor Guard "disarmed" was quite telling, more so than Beyounce lip synching, which we pretty much have come to expect, from both ;-)
Taxes, deficit, GDP, Drone, war, wrong on so many levels, police state, solvency, Gold, Audit the Fed, Silver, Birth Certificate.
And... 7.8% unemployment still, Michele's Fat Ass, Navy Seals, Pakistani Doctor we betrayed, no money left to refuel, Chinese enablers, Student loan bubble, jobless students, Detroit, Chicago, Chris Dorner, Tim Geithner, Taxes, my friend Bill Ayers, Uncle George, Mali, Libya, Apple, ...
And...my college transcripts, V.A., legalize it, Greece, securitizing rentals, Americans have more money, Chrysler in China, GM Bondholders, Walmart, cheapest Obamacare family policy 16-20k, California needs doctors, My good friend Rick Perry, Boeing, NLRB, 4 years without a budget, ....
Bone crushing statist regulation, DHS firing blanks from helicopters over Miami interstates, 27 million on food stamps, women & black unemployment higher than in 2009, Kai (the surfer hatchet guy...just for laughs), Christine Roemer, Peter Orzag (now with Citigroup).
As an aside, why is there an OMB? They never present an actionable budget. This year they submitted nothing for next year.
We can cut out its funding source right now & save people from more taxation...but I digress.
Fucking Forward!
and.... 17 trillion in debt, America's AAA rating, S&P Moody's, hyperinflation, food stamps, Ray Lewis, Skeet-Shooting, I'm a Lefty, European banks need help .....
Ronnie the Limo Driver.
Need moar drinking game.
Just drink whenever the idiot says "we"; knowing full well that we are not the "we" he is referring to.
Christ, I thought he was saying 'oui' ... and now the vodka bottle is empty.
LOL, I have a couple moar bottles if you need one. Is the ass-in-chief done blubbering yet? I ignored the fuckrod altogether but I am ready to crack one open after dealing with domain name transfers. What a bunch of bullshit that all is. 60 days I have to wait because my DNS host is not the same as my hosting service? I did that for a reason. I see what they did there. Pricks.
At least I listed the reason for the site as a "support group" in the "what is this bullshit you are up to" section of the host registration process. If nothing else at least everyone who has experienced a horrific boating accident has some time to write up an apocryphal and hyperbole ridden short story of how they lost their guns, PMs and anything else valuable.
Cheers!
You think that's bad, try tracking the comprehension level............
Gee, why don't they score Biden?
It is politically incorrect to make fun of the mentally challenged. Seriously.
"Everybody knows...for a treatable illness like asthma...if you just gave them a breathalyzer..."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbpWonUzlrc
Which one of his accents will this Dickshit speak with tonight?
You mean the Teleprompter Tyrant is giving ANOTHER speech?
"Here comes the orator, with his flood of words, and his drop of reason." -- Benjamin Franklin
How did Ben know that Obama was coming?
Yeahhhh we may be more kinda you know sorta dumblike than those stupid fuckers 100 fuckin' years ago but we get ta stream more porn than those dumbasses becuzz our internet is lyke way faster than their shit wazz.
So who'z fuckin dumber now you Woody Wilson votin' fucktards?
People actually listen to this lying POS? Amazing.......
Personally I've adopted a "balanced approach" to listening to his speeches...I listen to what he says and then wait to see how long it takes for the public to parrot his ideals, timeline is getting way shorter. Free thought is long gone.
Based on my observations, few people are equipped for free thought.
We're fucked!
Idiocracy was supposed to be set 500 years into the future. My how time flies.
What his voter base will hear:
Gibsme, Obamaphone, keeps in President, swag, free, free 40 oz malt liquor in every pot, free pot, loquacious, shaneequa, eek, ook, ??????, Gibsme moar, time for a flash mob to celebrate, ohbama is my knockout king, saviour, speech is over time to get the burglar tools rounded up.
Before I begin my tirade, let me say that Tylers comment from above regarding the guest that Obama invited to the State of the Union address, I thought he meant someone besides Tim Cook. When I read the statement "P.S. in case you didn't know AAPL's CEO Tim Cook is the above-mentioned guest of the President...", I thought he was referring to Jeffrey Imelt.
Well I have to thank the English for showing how far we have descended. From the profile of the people that we see and what their respective grade levels are, our education standards have fallen. There is also the fact that the grade levels for linguistic standard are also not the same for the Presidents of the late 20 and 21st centuries as compared to the presidents of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Just remember the public education system with all of it's flaws is producing students according to the plans of the education schools at the major universities.
the top 4 most murderous presidents - 9/11, vietnam, afghanistan, drones, et al, plus the tungsten barron occupy the first 5 spots....crime and complex expression seem to go together like oil and water.
yes, but who actually wrote the speeches? originally these speeches were given to congress, right? but after the invention of radio and tv they were really addressed to the public. you always speak at the level of your audience, right?
This article, the accompanying graphic aid, and our subsequent discussion, serve to illustrate a very important point: we as a people have been conditioned in Pavlovian fashion to react to key words and memes in a relatively predictable fashion. The majority of the citizenry is obsessed with trivial matters that are not virtuous, and cannot exercise critical thinking in its basic form. At the core of the issue is distraction and intellectual laziness, coupled with an inability to exercise logic (in the old-world sense of the word), which does not allow us to recognize sophistry when it is presented to us for consideration.
Most of us simply accept massaged "facts" which are presented to us by the gatekeeper intermediaries (media at the service of whom ???) and form opinions, which we scream at the top of our lungs like a righteous prophet, because we have been conditioned to "express ourselves", even when our opinions are based on a humongous pile of factual excrement, fallacious thinking, and are not worth considering.
The preceding two paragraphs have:
25% passive sentences
19.2% FK reading ease
21 FK grade level (beating Woodrow Wilson's 15.6 by a country mile)
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I could have easily gotten the point across just as clearly with a much lower FK grade score.
If you want to be clear, concise, and ensure that your audience understands what the fuck you are saying, you may end up with a relatively lower score. The governing principle for clarity is that one should not make it any more flowery or complex than it has to be.
A state of the Union speech is (should be, anyway) a report and a setting of the agenda going forward. Subsequent debate and discussion hammers out the devilish details.
A low score does not necessarily mean that the content of the message is "dumber", or not effectively communicated to the receiver. It just means that the sentences are shorter and the words used have fewer syllables.
Of course, the flip side to that is that when truly dealing with a complex subject, precise (maybe longer) words are used. Sentences may also be longer in order to effectively and coherently convey the message.
The belief that a high score is good and a low score is bad is incorrect. The key is finding the correct balance, not an arbitrary FK score. A high or low FK score in itself is not the main factor. It is just another indicator.
If you are still reading this post, I congratulate you. You probably have a longer attention span than the average Joe or Jane. I know I would have probably quit after the second paragraph.
I sincerely apologize for the preachy and pedantic nature of this post. In my defense I will say that if I did not write this, my head would have exploded.
I strongly believe that sloppy thinking and lax intellectual discipline go to the heart of many issues we face as a society. It shares a larger part of the blame than many of the "usual suspects" that are frequently rounded up.
Anyway, 'nuff said about intellectual rigor and critical thinking. We now return you to the scary Dorner, Kardashian's delicious ass, and the political pageantry of the country...
-----------------------------------
The second half of the post has:
0% passive sentences
64.3% FK reading ease
8.2 FK grade level (spectacularly "dumb" right?)
Know the damned difference!
Betcha Mrs Lincoln was upset after the play.
Other than that, how did you enjoy the play, Mrs. Lincoln?
What kind of system would be run by creatures such as Sheila Jackson Leigh, Obanana, Lindsey Graham, John McCain, Charlie Rangel, Chuck Schumer, Joe Biden, GW Bush, Hillary Clinton, et alia? A sewer system -- a system that needed a full flush and a deep scrub to remove the skid marks. The Republic is o-v-e-r.
The tens of millions of Muricans on food stamps is the soup line. A very lengthy soup line. In conjunction with true unemployment likely to be at least 18%, this translates into indicators of a Depression gathering momentum. I don't expect a craven politician to give voice to such truth. But it enrages me that such intellectually decrepit scarecrows expend great energy to convince the servant class that conditions are improving. If justice exists, or will exist, then the political class will be hung with their lies.
Lets blo moar on edumacation.
/
I cannot bring myself to watch the delusional idiots ruining this country. As the assholes parade in smiling, patting each other on the back, thumbs uping and high-fiving like they are winners.... just makes me sick. The country is in the worst condition ever and they are all congratulating each other.... FUCK Them all.
The graph drifts downward over time with the expansion of the voting franchise. The biggest drop is after the passage of the 19th ammendment.
You don't need big words when your job is to promise free birth control, mammograms, and daycare.