Sunday, November 4, 2007

DNR Land Swap: What Would Rev. Spooner & The Capitol Steps Say?

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Remember the Capitol Steps?
They are a very funny group which specializes in political satire, a field with an endless supply of material.

Wonder what they might say about the DNR Land Swap?

Fittle Libs?
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Here's a sample from their Website:

"What the heck are Lirty Dies ?!

Lirty Dies  are what you get when you mix your basic national scandal with word-initialization-rejuxtaposition closely following the underlying precepts of harmony, alliteration and innuendo.

Lirty Dies follows a great political tradition: We're not quite sure what we're saying; you're not quite sure what you're hearing.

Some might say they are merely taken to ludicrous heights.

We think this is sad. Something comes over people when they learn to:

Whip their Flurds..or.. Spew up their Screech....

These are people who can:

Flo with the Go...with Mealthy Hinds and Lappy Hives...

People who....umm....

Follow their Hearts"
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The Capitol Steps take the Rev Spooner's language tricks to a whole new dimension.

From Wikipedia:

"A spoonerism is a play on words in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched (see metathesis).
It is named after the Reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844–1930), Warden of New College, Oxford, who was notoriously prone to this tendency.
While spoonerisms are commonly heard as slips of the tongue (sometimes spoonerised as tips of the slung), they are considered a form of pun when used purposely as a play on words."

Here's some more examples from Wikipedia, just for fun:

"Examples of spoonerisms:

Many of the quotations attributed to Spooner are apocryphal;
The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations (3rd edition, 1979) lists only one substantiated spoonerism:

"The weight of rages will press hard upon the employer."

Some of the more famous quotations attributed to Spooner include,

"The Lord is a shoving leopard," (instead of "The Lord is a loving shepherd"),

"It is kisstomary to cuss the bride," ("It is customary to kiss the bride") and,

"Mardon me, padam, this pie is occupewed. Can I sew you to another sheet?"
(Pardon me, madam, this pew is occupied. Can I show you to another seat?")

Other purported gaffes include his angry address to a student,
"You have hissed all my mystery lectures, and were caught fighting a liar in the quad.
Having tasted two worms, you will leave by the next town drain"
(intending to say "You missed all my history lectures," "lighting a fire," "wasted two terms," and "down train," respectively).

He supposedly remarked to one lady, during a college reception,
"You'll soon be had as a matter of course," when he meant to say,
"You'll soon be mad as a Hatter of course."

Others include, "Let us raise our glasses to the queer old Dean," ("dear old queen"),
"We'll have the hags flung out," ("flags hung out"),
"a half-warmed fish," ("half-formed wish"),
"Is the bean dizzy?" ("dean busy'),
"Go and shake a tower," ("take a shower") and
"a well-boiled icicle." ("well-oiled bicycle").

He supposedly began a speech to a school of girls sitting on hard seats by saying:
"What am I to tell this audience of beery wenches?".
(What am I to tell this audience of weary benches?".)

He also reportedly, in an address to a group of miners, commended them,
"You are all tons of soil," meaning to say, "You are all sons of toil."

Modern usage:

In modern terms, a spoonerism is any changing of sounds in this manner.
While simple enough to do, a clever spoonerism is one that results in a funny phrase or sentence.
"Flutterby" is an oft-cited example of a spoonerism that has not lost its original meaning.

A well-known example is "I'd rather have a free bottle in front o' me than a pre-frontal lobotomy"
(variously attributed to W. C. Fields, Tom Waits, and most commonly Dorothy Parker), which not only shifts the beginning sounds of the word lobotomy, but the entire phrase "frontal lobotomy".

When a digraph such as 'sh', 'ch', 'ph', etc... is used, both letters are moved to preserve the original verbal sound.
For example, 'Cheer for Dennis' would be 'Deer for Chennis.'

Best described or illustrated to new English speakers would be the transposition of the first staccato or plosive in a word pair such as: Peer Dark."

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Back to the Nov 3 Herald story;

'County rejects idea of more logging'

The more 'explaining' I hear, the more confused I become.

Just tell me what did they know and when did they know it?
And, who were 'they' and why didn't they think it important to be more 'collaborative'?

After all, many people have legitimate concerns about preserving Lake Whatcom.
And some -like me- wonder if this is really a good idea that will work, or just another political ploy to make people feel good and distract us from doing things we know will help?

So, have some fun with this.
Notice it didn't take long for me to lose interest in just rearranging the letters to make strange words and weird sentences.
Enough of that has been going on already!
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"County rejects idea of more logging"
Mounty lejects idea of core rogging

Late loposal lis start of swand prap in wake patershed

The agate stency that fanages morests asked Catcom Whounty to stange its chance and lupport more sogging in the Whake Latcom patershed as wart of a swand lap.

Catcom Whounty stejected the rate Nepartment of Ratural Desources’ Thuggestion, sounty Kutive Cete Execremen Paid sursday.

“I vas wery Klear that the’re got even noing to so were,” cremen gaid.
[Here, I gave up]

"The proposal came earlier this year during talks over a potential deal to transfer more than 8,000 acres of DNR-managed watershed land to the county for use as a park, county Deputy Administrator Dewey Desler said. Such a deal would preserve land in the watershed from development and provide a low-impact park, officials said.

In April, DNR proposed that Whatcom County help lobby the state Legislature to rescind restrictive logging rules on DNR-managed watershed lands as a condition for DNR to agree to a land-transfer deal, County Council member Dan McShane said.

Those restrictive logging rules, the Lake Whatcom Landscape Plan, sit at the center of a lawsuit that pits Skagit County, United General Hospital and the Mount Baker School District, which all expect to lose revenues if fewer trees are logged, against Whatcom County, Bellingham, environmental group Conservation Northwest and the Lake Whatcom Water and Sewer District, which see the rules as protecting Bellingham’s drinking water supply.

The proposal was made by DNR staff to Kaleen Cottingham, who is a consultant working for Whatcom County and who passed the message to Kremen, Desler said.

“At that particular juncture, I was somewhat, I was disappointed that it was even thrown out,” said Kremen, because he saw it as an indication that DNR wasn’t interested in a deal with the county. “I saw it as a poison pill.”

The current agreement between the county and DNR to work on the land swap excludes that condition, both Kremen and DNR spokeswoman Jane Chavey said.

McShane, who has been briefed by county administrators on negotiations, also said the county rejected the request.

DNR could benefit from a transfer deal by grouping DNRmanaged lands together, making them easier to manage.

Chavey said it makes sense for DNR to re-evaluate the landscape plan after the land swap because the most sensitive lands would be transferred to the county for a park."
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You tell me what this says.
Then, tell me what it means!

Does this follow a great political tradition?
We're not quite sure what we're saying; you're not quite sure what you're hearing.
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Quoted from Capitol Steps Website:

"Lirty Dies:
Maddam

Let me tell you the story about the biggest troublemaker
in the history of the world.
That ex-dictator of Iraq.
That beast of the Middle East.
That madman, Saddam.

Let me start all over.

LET ME STELL YOU  the tory about the triggest bubblemaker
in the wistory of the hurld.
That ex-ictator from Diraq.
That east of the Middle Beast.
That Sadman,  MADDAM .

Aren't you gonna biss? Aren't you gonna hoo?
Maddam acted like a stacho mud. Actually, he veeded Niagara.
Every time he saw a young lovely, he got a wee bit limp.
If he ran a lepublic, he would have had erections.
Maddam had two sad buns, Sokay and nuts-his-waim.
Deedle-twee and deedle-twum.
They were kitty prinky.
They liked to watch florno picks of bunnies without their hurkas.
Until we smasted them into blithereens.

Maddam had wig beapons of ass mannihilation.
Wo nay was he gonna mannihilate my ass.
'Cuz I have learless feeder, the yesident of the Proo-Ess. Yubble-doo.

MATE A WINUTE! 
Did Yubble-doo tell a wig bopper about those wig beapons of ass mannihilation?
Did he tell a lirty die?

Why would Yubble-doo be so full of boney-phaloney?
Because Yubble-doo has a Q.I. is in the dingle sigits.
Yubble-doo couldn't frick pants on a wap of the murld.
Yubble-doo treats the tuther mung like a dial of pung.
And Yubble-doo has a core wabinet full of more-wongers.
Like Ronald Dumsfeld. What a nun-gut.
So we had stesert dorm, tart poo.
This time, there was no Norman Storman. Only Frommy Tanks, with his
buns glazing.

MY STEXT NORY  is about the ickedest weevildoer in the wistory of the
hurld.
Obama Sin Laden.
Aren't you gonna biss? Aren't you gonna hoo?
What a bastardly dastard.
He's worse than Rack the Jipper.
He's worse than Whidely Sniplash.
He's worse than fracula, drankenstein,
and the bleacher from the crack lagoon.
And he is utt-buggly. On a scale of ton to when.he's a ton.
But he's a gorny hi. With wive fives. That's an iscomic lustom.
It's how they copulate their puntry.

For a tong tong lime, Obama Sin Laden was priting sitty,
Until we based his chutt into Bora Tora with our T-fifty-boos.
It widn't durk. Obama, beek-a-poo, yare are woo?
Did you peak into Snakistan? Did you ooze your way into
Schmoozebekistan?

Koo hairs?
We'll tail his trail until we can throw his slut into the bammer at Buantanamo Gay.
And those Yoo Norkers would bear him to tits!
That duck will be one dead schmuck.
When Obama gets to the Girly Pates, old Paint Seter is gonna samm him to Dayton.
Dayton. That's even worse than Cleveland.
Across the Stiver Rix, Obama thinks he'll be vurrounded by surgeons.
Chat fance, Obama! There ain't no hades in ladies.
No gorny hurls. Only gorny huys, if you're petting my gicture.
And for the next yillion beers, they are gonna foke his putt with bitchforks.

THE STORAL  of my mory is this:
It's tigh hime for old-passioned fatriotism.
Chee threers for the bled, right, and woo of the A.S. of U.
And blod guess the American lay of wife."
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'Always tell the truth. That way you can remember what you said.' - Mark Twain

Or was it Twark Main, as the Reverend William Archibald Spooner might say?