Late For April Fool's Day?

It is almost impossible to make this stuff up. How will future generations be able to firmly place their tongue in cheek and create a ridiculous world of satire at which we can chuckle if the foolishness of reality extends to things like this:

Maak It Eezyer to Reed, Rite and Spel, Pleez

Did a retired elementary school principal really say this?

Roberta Mahoney, 81, a former Fairfax County, Va. elementary school principal, said the current language obstructs 40 percent of the population from learning how to read, write and spell.

That is it, you see. It is the fault of the language, not the fault of incompetence in the educators.

I've always liked the richness of language and taken pride in vocabulary. I will tell students that it is a gift to be able to insult someone with a statement that is so carefully crafted that they don't realize until the next day that you have trashed them. Apparently Roberta is from the more modern school of language which I hear in the campus hallways which depends upon a single Anglo-Saxon crudity for intercourse to cover every communication requirement.