re: slur

On Sat, Jan 12, 2002 at 08:38:40AM -0800, court court muttered something about:
> 
> Kendall, how old are you?  You've got to get over the
> leftist professors with leather elbow patches on their
> tweed jackets.  The world isn't that simple.

Right, and neither is criticizing our piece: you're going to have to try
harder than making insinuations about my age and my ability for independent
thought, neither of which are relevant.

> Is Bush pretty much an idiot?  Well, of course.  But
> Lincoln and Jefferson weren't running in 2000.  Al
> Gore was a chronic liar, and the country is far better
> off without him.

Again, this isn't relevant to 1) whether he used a racist slur, and 2)
thereby offended millions of American citizens, 3) for which he has yet to
apologize.

> No, Kendall, I'm not "stupid" (your word).  I went on
> "Jeopardy!" and did darn well.

Yes, 'stupid' was my word -- which I used to describe your claim that
Pakistan is a 'brackish backwater country'; surely in your PhD work or
appearance on Jeopardy (neither of which are interesting or relevant, and
yet you keep waving "i'm smart, really" credentials in my face; who are you
trying to convince?) you ran across the distinction between a person being
stupid and a person saying a stupid thing?

You: "I'll take Basic Conceptual Distinctions for $100, Alex"
Alex: "Sometimes it describes a person, and sometimes it describes an action
or utterance of a person; but failing to distinguish between the two, while
bragging about how smart one is, often is a sign of both."
You: uh, uh, uh....
Other contestant: "What is being stupid (or racist) and saying or doing something
stupid (or racist), Alex?"
Alex: "That's right, you control the board, pick a category!"

However, at this rate, if you really *need* me to call you stupid, I'm sure
we can eventually accomodate you.

Kendall Clark