Here’s a final post from yours truly before a week of vacation:
Well, lah-dee-dah.
Minneapolis is one of the most literate cities in America.
According to an annual survey cited in USA Today, Minneapolis ranks near the top in six major categories: newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment and Internet resources.
Sorry to sound like a party-pooper, but I’m not impressed.
If Minneapolisans are so smart, how come they live in a place where you can get frostbite checking the mail — in March?
If Minneapolisans are so smart, how come they let the North Stars slip away to Dallas? Hockey is the national sport of Canada and other cold places, for cryin’ out loud. … You’d never see the Cowboys flee Big D for the Great White North.
If Minneapolisans are so smart, how come they live in a state that still hasn’t elected a senator nearly two months after the rest of us yokels managed to pull that off?
If Minneapolisans are so smart, how come they held the GOP National Convention the same day Hurricane Gustav was battering New Orleans and taking away all the national coverage?
Don’t get me wrong; literacy is a nice thing. But who wants to visit Minneapolis to tour its libraries?
You can -- and should -- read anywhere. I’d much rather live in place with a warm beach, a neat zoo or a pro team that actually wins.
Taking a few days off now; see ya on Jan. 5. Be good — or at least don’t get caught.
Friday, December 26, 2008
One last post, then vacation
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2 comments:
Hello Mr. Taschinger,
As the editor of the opinion section of a newspaper for the past thirteen years, I'm sure you're quite aware of how logical fallacies can tear down one's ideas. In particular, how the use of a non sequitur, that is the attempted connection of two logically unrelated ideas, can really eliminate a writer's credibility. Certainly you understand if one writes an opinion piece, avoiding logical fallices like non sequiturs help opinion pieces have credibility. I'm sure as an opinions editor, that's important to you.
I'm sure you took into account how USA Today uses criteria like city population, in this case over 250,000, to determine these sorts of rankings, and that Beaumont's population is under 125,000. I'm sure you're aware that frostbite, professional sports teams, national political party conventions, warm beaches, and neat zoos have little to do with being literate, thus creating non sequitur logical fallacies. I'm sure you did your research and understand many of the issues you write about actually refer not to Minneapolis but to the state of Minnesota (professional sports teams moving away, similar to a situation a professional Texas team had), or St. Paul (the city the GOP national convention was held).
I know I'm not telling you anything you don't already know. I know you want to come off as an intelligent writer and devoid of sour grapes. I just wanted to say thank you for bringing the article to my attention. I plan to blog about it with pride. In the meantime, if you're ever in Minneapolis, email me and we'll go visit our brand-new 353,000 square-foot library downtown.
Nathan, please clarify: WHO has been the editor of the opinion section of a newspaper for the past thirteen years?
-- Mack (my town has three traffic lights, so there)
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