Some interesting(?) history stuff...

"David Snedeker" wrote in message
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"Wolfgang" wrote in message
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"David Snedeker" wrote in message
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"Wolfgang" wrote in message
...

We aims to please.

Actually you aim to **** off folk.

Some.

And allot cheaper than dealing with the
obvious mental effects (and affects) of your own origins.

My origins? Nothing very remarkable there. Born of woman, in the
usual way........or, so I'm told. You?


You know precisely what I am referring to.

I do. On the other hand, you have no more idea what I'm saying in this
instance than you ever do. Some things don't change, huh Davie?

Your comments frequently suggest to me very much the thought
processes and history dismissive attitudes of the thankfully deceased
Paul De Mann. What things suggest to you is a source of endless
fascination to me.
I've missed out little chats lately. Have you been terribly busy?


Too busy to waste time on you.

And yet.........

But I have noticed that you seem to have a
real pain in the ass since your week at the Ramrod.


Whatever that might mean, one is almost forced to wonder how you would come
to that conclusion......what with being to busy to bother and all that.

De Mann, a prominent Belgium Nazi in his youth, managed to hide this
fact most of his life, while building a very successful career in U.S.
academe
in large part around a scholastic assertion of the impenetrability of
historical fact.

Interesting. Sounds like the kind of guy who would see Israelis
lurking under every rock.

You just love to over compensate

For what?

by parroting the most narrow-minded slogans
at the drop of a hat.

Slogan? Did I utter a slogan and not notice? Perhaps you could give me a
hint?

You are too ignorant to know that close to half of
Israeli adults share my views on the need to return most of the occupied
lands to the Palestinians, as does an increasing portion of non-muslim
Americans.

I'm not so ignorant as to believe anything you say without substantial
corroboration. Moreover, having grown up among rabid anti-semites, I know
the smell when I encounter it.

Well, I have a legitimate excuse........I'd never heard of ( DeMann)him
before
now. What a pity that YOU didn't tell him about his options.

Claspy's spelling is the correct one: de Man"

So? Did *I* misspell the man's name?

Wolfgang
who considers it quite normal for people to be uninterested in a nut
case's grandiose illusions of olympian descent.


What is "Olympian" about having a Spanish diplomat as an ancestor?

Did *I* mention a "Spanish diplomat"? Did I mention someone who may or may
not have had a "Spanish diplomat" for an ancestor? Do I look like someone
who gives **** who may or may not have had a "Spanish diplomat" for an
ancestor? Do I, for that matter, look like someone who might care what you
might have to say about someone who may or may not have had a "Spanish
diplomat" for an ancestor, or what you might have to say about what I might
or might not have to say about such an individual with or without a "Spanish
diplomat" for an ancestor?

He was
mainly trying to describe how he was able to penetrate a bureaucratic
mindset and touch a bit of personal history.

He? Who? dick? So? Is there a point to any of this?

Wolfgang
who, if he were going to try to convince a literate audience that the object
of his rage had inserted a parenthetical comment (say, for example, a
misspelled name) when he had actually done no such thing, would probably at
least remember to insert a space between the bogus insertion and the next
word.

The guy obviously pegged you for an aggie, then he saw the crayons in your
pocket and of course he got nervous. \


wrote in message
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Since I have some 3-4 hours to kill while my SO does what ladies call
"getting dressed to go out" and men call "trying on every garment they
own...three times," my reply to Chuck Spanish bureaucrats brought to
mind an interesting, at least to me anyway, story of old bureaucrats
meeting new. Several members of my paternal Grandfather's family came
to the US as diplomats/businessmen and among them was the Ferdinand's
representative to the US. He presented his papers to then-Sec. of
State, Thomas Jefferson, who, albeit a friend of this ancestor and an
educated, worldly man himself, couldn't seem to get his "writer's mind"
around the concept of names differing in French, Spanish, and English -
for example, Jacques, Diego, and James all being interpretations of the
same name. Jefferson was apparently a poor speller, who also apparently
thought, well, close was good enough for government work when it came to
spelling and even names - i.e., John Smith might become "Jno. Smythe,"
"Jon Smit," and "Jm. Smith" all in the same writing. This has led some
to come up with all sorts of interesting, but totally incorrect,
theories regarding this particular ancestor's geographic origin, etc.

In any case, while our family copies of certain documents are clear, the
"official" versions are in the Jefferson collection at the Library of
Congress, which contains 1000s of important and, like the documents in
question, not-so-important documents. On a trip to the Library, I
decided to go look at the "official" copy. The first person I met was
a/the curator of the Jefferson papers, who acted like I was asking to
dry my hands with the Declaration of Independence or something.

While the file and papers in question are historically interesting, they
are not historically significant, and I suspect my request was the first
such in years, so the "too much handling" initial objection seemed,
well, like (bull) . Then came the "there are transcripts..." objection.
Yes, there are, but the transcripts of the document are at odds. Then
came the "it's on film, on the internet" ploy. Again, true, but the
microfilm version is not clear. Yet, he insisted, HE, being
oh-so-familiar with Jefferson's handwriting, could read it. So he
tried. He got it wrong, but still refused to budge, my seeing the
actual documents. He acted like it would take cutting miles of
bureaucratic red tape and literally, an Act of Congress, to gather the
senior personnel together who had access to the codes needed to bring
this stuff up through several airlocks from some cryogenic storage deep
under DC. I was imagining scenes from "National Treasure" or something.

Well, I thought, vaults and airlocks be damned - I wanted to see this
copy now more than ever, so I appealed to his boss. I made my case, he
agreed the microfilm version was unclear, and said I could see the
documents. He asked me to wait a moment and he'd be right back. I
expected him to return with special suits, respirators, a team of
security people, etc. Nope. He returns in about 90 seconds with what
appeared to be a normal file folder, opens it, and hands me the
documents, which were simply stored in it like any other government
paperwork.

TC,
R

"B J Conner" wrote in message
news6cQd.7097$uc.659@trnddc01...
The guy obviously pegged you for an aggie, then he saw the crayons in your
pocket and of course he got nervous.

I'm guessing it wasn't so much the crayons as the fact that they weren't yet
blunted.

Wolfgang

My Grandpa had a dog named Zero :-)

bruce h

"bruiser" wrote in message
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My Grandpa had a dog named Zero :-)

Hell, that's nuthin'.

Wolfgang

On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 19:56:56 -0700, "bruiser"
wrote:

My Grandpa had a dog named Zero :-)

Was he a Japanese diplomat?

well, I found the story mildly interesting on a slow day. Of course, as a
lay-person, you could have no way of knowing that they were storing the aged
documents in archival-quality manila folders. Look just like the cheap-ass
kind at a glance. Only the real pros get their hands on them for
Jeffersonian era documents and suchg. I'm sure the file cabinets are
climate controlled as well......
I return you to your continued abuse,
Tom

On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 19:38:19 -0600, "Wolfgang" wrote:


"B J Conner" wrote in message
news6cQd.7097$uc.659@trnddc01...
The guy obviously pegged you for an aggie, then he saw the crayons in your
pocket and of course he got nervous.

I'm guessing it wasn't so much the crayons as the fact that they weren't yet
blunted.

Like I said, they weren't crayons, and I don't need Viagra...blunted,
hell, 12 bald eagles can perch on it...

OK, OK! So the last eagle has to stand on one leg...

wrote:
On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 19:38:19 -0600, "Wolfgang" wrote:

I'm guessing it wasn't so much the crayons as the fact that they weren't yet
blunted.

Like I said, they weren't crayons, and I don't need Viagra...blunted,
hell, 12 bald eagles can perch on it...

OK, OK! So the last eagle has to stand on one leg...

Padishar, Re your question about the NY Times article....

On Tue, 15 Feb 2005 01:19:31 GMT, "B J Conner"
wrote:

The guy obviously pegged you for an aggie, then he saw the crayons in your
pocket

Those weren't crayons in my pocket, I just don't need Viagra...