By David K. Shipler
In a
rare moment of candor and accuracy, President Trump today used the word “incredible”
to describe his press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Upon her announcement
that she will be leaving the post, Trump tweeted, “She is a very special person with extraordinary
talents, who has done an incredible job!”
The
entire White House press corps suddenly found itself in unfamiliar agreement
with a tweet from on high.
Reactions
to the unprecedented spasm of presidential honesty came swiftly from an array
of eighth-grade English teachers. “While the adjective ‘incredible’ has been
corrupted in slang to substitute for such superlatives as “amazing’ and ‘extraordinary,’”
said Mrs. Matthews of Chatham (NJ) Junior High School, “all of my students know
very well that it means, ‘not believable.’ Its root is credo, Latin for ‘I believe,’ and is made negative by the prefix ‘in.’”
For emphasis, she slapped her 15-inch ruler on her desk, her routine method of
keeping her students awake and attentive.
Trump
surely knows the proper definition of “incredible,” several other teachers
observed, because he went for a couple of years to Fordham, a Jesuit college where precise thinking and
respect for language are de rigueur, and then to an Ivy League school, the
University of Pennsylvania.
Jane
Doe, who covers the White House for the East
Overshoe Gazette summed up the feeling among her colleagues: “We just hope
his next press secretary is less incredible.”
In case you’re wondering, this is satire—although the
Trump tweet is real.
Did you actually go back to the Junior High School in Chatham, NJ and SEE Mrs. Mathews slap that 15 inch ruler on the desk?!
ReplyDeleteJust wondering...
Personally I have always been impressed with how Sarah Sanders could defend everything and anything the president said or did - no matter how idiotic or ridiculous! I think it's a special kind of talent, really. She was good at it!
The only true things in this satire are 1) Trump's tweet, 2) the colleges he went to, and 3) the root of the word incredible. Mrs. Matthews did exist in the distant past, as my stern and wonderfully demanding 8th grade English teacher. She did indeed wield a 15-inch ruler in just that manner. It had a metal edge, and one day when she slammed it on her desk, the wood broke but the metal remained, bending as she held the ruler aloft, the broken wooden end dangling crazily, still attached to the metal edge. I am sure, given the precision of her language, that she would have bristled at the sloppy use of "incredible." All that said, too many people take too many of the little fantasies in these little satires too literally, and if I continue with these whimsical efforts I am going to have to figure out some way of signaling folks when fiction comes upon them. We are in an era where reality and absurdity overlap so thoroughly that the line between them is often difficult to discern. This happens not only with humor but with horrible conspiracy theories and malicious lies that damage reputations but stick in the public consciousness. If anybody has a suggestion on how to handle this, I'm open to listening!
ReplyDeleteDave: I love it! When I saw the title I was about to email and ask if old age was catching up with you! I don’t remember whether I had mrs Matthews or someone else for 8th grade English, but I vaguely remember hearing about the broken ruler.
ReplyDeleteHave a nice day.