You Fail At Grammar

I'll save you the trouble of clicking on the following link if you don't feel like vomiting on your keyboard today. Some person named Rae Hart Anderson lost her bid for Minnesota State Senator, so she sent her opponent a concession letter. I'll summarize:

Anderson: Congratulations on your victory. You really should find Jesus before you die and go to hell. LOL.
Chaudhary: ......?

I probably should have mentioned that State Senator Satveer Chaudhary is a Hindu.

Anderson’s letter disturbs me, but not because someone this ignorant ran for office. That's hardly unusual. Nor am I upset that her tone closely resembles a Scientologist sales pitch. Nor am I shocked that some people voted for this lady—herself, for one, and her mother. And yet, even with her supporters behind her, this loony wasn't elected, and that gives me hope for humanity.

No, what disturbs me about this letter is the Minnesota school system's utter failure to teach Rae Hart Anderson how to write. I've seen better compositions in AIM chat rooms. Her letter is poorly organized, uneven in tone, and a grammatical nightmare. Take her opening paragraph, for instance:

"Congratulations on winning the District 50 senate race. Your phone is 'busy'...no doubt with good wishes!"

Anderson's use of quotation marks around the word busy would seem to indicate sarcasm, however the irony isn't supported by the context. If Chaudhary won the election, wouldn't it stand to reason that his phone would be busy? Or perhaps Anderson meant to imply that no one actually cares who won the Minnesota District 50 race. In other words, she is so incompetent that she can't win an election that is so insignificant that if she were to have won, no one would have bothered to call her and offer congratulations. Anderson seems to ponder this grammatical paradox mid-sentence with an ellipsis. Alternately, she was omitting a comment, such as:

"Congratulations on winning the District 50 senate race. Your phone is 'busy', you godless, low-life, election-stealing infidel. I bet you had to sacrifice 30 babies to Zeus or whoever to swing the vote, no doubt with good wishes!"

Unfortunately, her opening sentences are among her best in her letter. From that point on, her crimes against the English language become bolder, more brazen, as she hijacks the noble ellipsis and presses it into service for a variety of purposes normally reserved for the comma, semicolon, or period. She takes similar liberties with the M-dash, so that she may better construct grotesque run-on sentences with impunity:

WRONG: "God in Christ is reconciling the world back to Himself, with offered forgiveness--this is one choice we get to make nose to nose with the living God--fear Him and you need fear no other."

RIGHT: "In the form of Christ, God is reconciling the world back to Himself, by offering forgiveness to all qualifying infidels. This is one choice we get to make nose-to-nose with the living God. Fear Him and you need fear no other. Act now, and you'll also receive a free toaster with each salvation."

Often, she combines these techniques, like she does in this gem from paragraph seven:

"Take some time to get acquainted with this power-filled Jesus...God with us. You could be a temple of the living God, by invitation---yours, TO GOD. :)"

Tisk. Tisk. Let's see if we can make that better:

"State Senator Chaudhary, as a practicing Hindu, you may not be aware of the many high-powered Jesus options available to you. For instance there's Jebus, Disco Jesus, Jesus Marx, Baby Jesus, Personal Jesus, and even Jesusaurus Rex. Did you know that everyone qualifies to be a living temple of God? It only takes one phone call and credit check to sign up! :)"

I think this effectively demonstrates why it's so important that every election require a writing sample from each candidate, to be graded by a panel of bipartisan judges on a holistic scale from one to five. I give this letter a -3.