This is just like Pinkwater’s middle school classmate, fictionalized as Alan Mendelsohn, who caused an uproar by proclaiming to everyone that he is a Martian.

Students across the state are still scratching their heads over an absurd state test question about a talking pineapple.

… Where kids are asked questions about the Pinkwater fable “The Hare and the Pineapple”. (a re-editing of the Pinkwater fable “The Rabbit and the Eggplant”.  Apparently the test-masters didn’t want the kids to get confused in not knowing what eggplant is.)

Daniel Pinkwater: “Nonsense topped upon Nonsense“.

Responding to 8th Grade complaint that he is a sell-out.

Boing Boing: Absurdist kids’ literature hero Daniel Pinkwater is at the center of an appropriately absurd kerfuffle.

Pinkwater Controversy erupts on Standardized Test Question about Borgel.

“Flunks the test of Common Sense”

When Pineapple Races Hare, Students Lose.:
A reading passage included this week in one of New York’s standardized English tests has become the talk of the eighth grade, with students walking around saying, “Pineapples don’t have sleeves,” as if it were the code for admission to a secret society. […]

While the furor over the test passage seems to have achieved phenomenal proportions in New York — one boy has already posted a picture on his Facebook page of a T-shirt with the motto “Pineapples Don’t Have Sleeves” — it has caused similar ripples across the country.

Sheesh.
But students and educators were divided over whether the passage, which is a parody of the “Tortoise and Hare” fable, is amusing or disturbing.
“It was kind of funny and a little weird,” said one student.
“That article about the pineapple and the hare was stupid and absurd,” said another.

NPR story.

More commentary.

If ever there was a reason to pull a stop on standardized testing mania, it’s this story.

From the mouth of babes: “What the heck,” my kids wanted to know “was Daniel Pinkwater doing writing about a hare and a pineapple? Everybody knows the story is supposed to be about an eggplant.”

Ken Jennings: ) In fact, it reads like one of those random, fill-in-the-blank “Mad Libs” stories that seven-year-olds annoy everyone with on family vacations. A ninja and toothpaste? What does that even mean?

Sigh.

Laughing My @$$ off.

C Hartley Grattan, “Red Opinion in the United States”, Scribner’s Magazine Novemeber 1934

How far Left can one go without ceasing to be a member of His Capitalist Majesty’s Opposition?  That is a hard question to answer, for the gradations around the point where the final step is made outside the capitalist pale are infinite.  […]
Assuming that the fatal steps of which we speak is made somewhere in the socialist ideology we may line up the parties of the Left as follows: (minor additional examples will be cited later):

SP – AWP – CP (Opposition) – CLA – SLP.  What do these mystic letters mean?  They mean Socialist Party, American Workers Party (familiarly known as the Musterites), the Communist Party of the Right Opposition (familiarly, the Lovestoneites), the Communist Party USA (Section of the Third International), the Communist League of America the Left opposition of the CP (familiarly known as the Trotskyites), and the Socialist Labor Party (familiarly known as the De Leonites).  The Right and Left oppositions of the CP are not recognized as such by the CP.  They are built around expelled members of the CP and have connections in other countries with groups ideologically closely similar and standing in the same relation to the CP.  The Socialist Party also has international affiliations.  It is a member of the Labor and Socialist International (familiarly known as the 2 1/2 International) with headquarters at Zurich.  The AWP and the SLP are not affiliated with international bodies nor are any of the minor groups to be mentioned incidentally. […]

Any ardent communist controversialist can give a bourgeois writers lessons in invective.  Nothing like it has been seen in America since the decline of personal journalism in the nineteenth century.  The abuse exchanged by the communist groups far surpasses in violence anything leveled against them individually or collectively by the bourgeois press.  Arnold Peterson of the Socialist Labor Party denies the right of the Communist Party to the designation “Communist” and unifromly refers to the group as the “Anarcho-Communists”, arguing that they are corrupted by the ideas of the Russian anarchist Bukunin against whom Marx fought tooth and nail, and describes them thus:  “They represent a hopeless mixture of pure lunacy, almost unbelievable imbecility, unscrupulous crookedness, brazen insolence and total contempt for the intelligence of those whom (presumably) they desire to reach.”  (Virus of Anarchy p 24).  Not content with repeating this, the SLP again through Peterson, its chief ideologist at present, puts out a pamphlet entitled WZ Foster — Renegade or Spy? recounting Foster’s career, quoting from his testimony before the Senate Committee which investigated the steel strike of 1919 (which is pretty damaging) and developing in general Daniel De Leon’s characterization of him as “a preambulating lump of erratic contradictory foot-in-the-mouthedness.”  Let us look at some Communist Party characterizations of opponents.  In New Masses, February 20, 1934, an anonymous editorialist, writing under the title “Disguised as Marxists,” tried to dispose of a group of Left parties […]

Of course these blasts are returned in kind by the men and parties attacked.  The vigor of the attacks is almost in direct ratio to the power and influence of the men and parties being attacked and they are also tempered or intensified by political necessity.  The Socialist Labor Party, being abjudged unimportant, is rarely mentioned in the Left press, but that only intensified the SLP’s attacks.  The Lovestoneites (Communist Oppositon) temper their criticisms because “The Communist Opposition fights for its readmission into the official party . . . ” (BD Wolfe, What Is the Communist Opposition? p 5), but Wolfe in the same pamphlet can say “Foster writes a book — Toward an American Communism — which might as well have been written on Mars for all the reflection of American realities.”  (17)  This group is also in favor of the readmission to the official party of the Communist League of America (the Trotskyites) but only if they give up a substantial portion of their ideas and in any case it is a pretty empty gesture since the Communist Party and the Trotskyites are worse folks still, “counter-revolutionaries”.  […]

Social-fascism is, then, a term used to denigrate any thing, tactic, or argument which deflects the attention of the working class from the revolution which is alleged to be in the keeping of the official Communist Party.  In America the Communist Party contends that this is true of the AWP, the Socialist Party, and many other groups and individuals.
The proof of the contention is difficult to prove short of an actual stifling of an actual revolution but the Socialist Party certainly does play down the class struggle or tries to, rejects the dictatorship of the proleteriat, and hopes and argues for a peaceful transition to socialism.  Indeed the Socialist Party is jockeyed by argumentation into the position of the “third party of capitalism”.  Under the drum fire played upon it from all sides, for the Communist Party is not alone in attacking the Socialists as we have seen [–]

There seems to be some confusion on the post I did about Shopping for Pop Tarts.    So, to expound on the whole “Pop Tart issue”… and now that  I think about it The Pop Tart issue dove-tails right back to Cosmopolitan.  Let’s compare the two most recent Pop Tart box designs.

I would say the Pop Tart on this box is reasonable in dimensions.  There is no great bending of spatial relations going on here.  The perspective is not surreal.

But now let’s look at this most recent box design.

Forced perspective, I would say.  Watch how the pop tart quickly slides into nothingness as it approaches the “Disappearing” line.

What’s the Cosmopolitan relation here?  Well… we see models getting photoshopped into similarly surrealistic proportions.

Glad I can clear this matter up!

Time to look through the Multnomah County Voters’ pamphlet and sees whats we gots:

Secretary of State.  Paul Damian Wells, the challenger who will not come close to knocking off Kate Brown.  His voters pamphlet statement has him a single-issue candidate: he likes the Top 2 Primary Election system in place in neighboring Washington and California — top 2 primary vote getters move on to general election regardless of party affiliation.  I’m neutral on this.  But you do have to wonder about his argument — he cites the Libertarian Party losing a lawsuit once — this should get the Democratic Party vote, how?

State Representatives.  Go to the 50th District and Greg Matthews lists his community service background.  Cited in a list: emcee for The Teddy Bear Parade and emcee for a sock hop.  I don’t know that I want that in a state legislator, quite frankly.

The County Commisioner race: surely Wes Sederback could have found a better photograph?
District #3:  Interesting that Patty Burback cites prior governmental experience going clear back to her middle school class veep victory.

The big race, of course, is the mayoral race.  Normally we have it set that the race is decided to a final 2 “real” candidates of viability.  The task in the primary becomes deciding amongst the also runs in wait for a real decision in the general election.  This year, we have 3 “viable real” candidates decided for us.  I suppose one’s vote could go to deciding who to thrust forward and who to sideline in the three, but unfortunately I have to grit my teeth at all of them, and can’t stomach this game.  So it is we go to the list of others and what do we find?  Steve Sung announces himself the “People’s Mayor”; Loren Charles Brown calls himself the “People’s Mayor”.  Michael B Largley draws a laugh with his pledge to “revitalize downtown with more diversified businesses — not just food carts, non profits, and coffeeshops.”  (Hm.  In the new economy, it’s this or non profits and Wal-Marts).  Scott Rose and Howie Rubin make no pretense of their governing approach ala pandering:  the former will “Continue to root my belief in what you say to me”, the latter wants “to enable you to do the things you do.”  Max Brumm makes the funny on the question of his viability ala inexperience (he’s a teenager):  “it’s a knee jerk response, but what do you expect from jerks who’ve brought Portland to its knees?”

Finally, there’s Tre Arrow and Cameron Whitten.  I lump them together for this reason and this reason only: Tre Arrow cites his 2000 nomination for Congress by the Pacific Green Party.  I remember hearing from radio host Rick Emerson about the Green Party Convention in 2000: you get Ralph Nader making a speech, than another veteran of public power causes for a statewide office, and then… you just kind of wince and look away when Tre Arrow comes to the podium.  Anyway, 12 years and I guess the party has come to the same conflusion.  Written in Cameron Whitten’s profile is an endorsement by the Pacific Green Party, as well as the Portland Chapter of the Oregon Progressive Party.  (A Party which formed in 2008 for the transparent purpose of getting Nader on the ballot.  Now that that’s over, I don’t really understand why it doesn’t just merge with the Green Party — but they can do what they must.)

I endorse Cameron Whitten.  Why?  Only because he’s the only candidate who I’ve happened to see and spoken with.  I asked him how his campaign was going — he said he had some trouble at the Lloyd Center Mall regarding his bullhorn.  Sorry everyone else — you just didn’t pound the flesh.

There are, like, 13 Republicans in the Oregon 3rd Congressional District, represented by Earl Blumenauer.  They will decide the primary contest between Delia Lopez and Ronald Green.  It’s a tough choice for you all — the first candidate to 7 gets the nod.

Delia Lopez will get Victoria Taft’s support.  She’s running against the Obama Hitler.  And I assume will make the same basic campaign as she did last time around.

Ronald Green gets the Oregonian’s endorsement.  No mention of Hitler in his campaign material.  I do see that he’s fond of Transcendental Meditation.  And he describes himself as a Republican in the mode of William Mckinley — which is at least novel.  He means it in terms of trade policy (tariffs is he), but I fear another Spanish American War should he get too far in power.

He does kinda look like McKinley.

Have fun voting!

The Time Magazine throws out a cover — “Rethinking Heaven”, which, you know, I’m sure they’ve come up with a concept for Heaven that’s novel and new, never been discovered in the millenia of theology on the subject.
Meantime, Newsweek runs a Jesus story, from Andrew Sullivan.  “Quit the Church and Follow Jesus”, or some such.  This is a lag effect which serves to point to the problem of print:  these are your Easter themed magazines, sitting on the shelf while Easter recedes into memory.    The curious thing about the “Quit Church” article is that its message is opposite to one found in a USA Today headline about “Church Reversions” — coming back to your religious faith, which — I suppose these trends are all heading in all directions.

Across the dias, I note the latest issue of Cosmopolitan touts itself as… now get this… “The Sex Issue”.  Which is, of course, every since of this magazine since it was bought by that “Sex and the Single Woman” writer.  (Occasionally you will find references to a serious article or serious writer appearing in the 40s or 50s).  This Sex issue sits across from an issue of Esquire which isn’t a “Sex Issue”, but does have the word “Sex” blaring on its cover.  Well, these two magazines are monthlies, so have to go with something less time-specific than the weeklies’ Religion features.

In other curiosities of Supermarket shopping… I note some redesigns in a few soda bottle shapes.  I assume a lot of market research went into showing that it gets more purchase, but it’s all arbitrary to me.  What they should do is stamp the word “Sex” on the bottles.
I’m also amused by the design on the boxes of Pop Tarts.  I can’t quite explain the pop tarts shown on the box, and from what perspective they’re rendered.  You’re staring at them from above and from a sideways angle — and the pop tarts bend down toward their disappearance line.  It’s all kind of confusing.  It’s why I’ve stopped buying them and have gone over to the generic brand of toaster pastries — at least I know when I’m eating those, my spatial relations won’t slide into a distortions.

I.  I don’t know that I’m all that interested in Scott Gaulke, who, if you’ve missed it, is a deplorable Internet Troll.    But here’s what I do find fascinating.
 LaRouche has been notified many times over about Scott Gaulke’s bizzare behavior. They have washed their hands of him. They suggest we do the same. Attornies are involved. All in time.

THIS is what I find interesting.  I think the evidence with factnet stacks up against such a proposition.   Still, it’s curious to see a suggestion of a disavowal.

While we witness to how larouche is greeted by a new audience:
 LaRouche is like Ron Paul mixed with neo-Nazi leader Frank Collin.
The man once set up a blog entitled “Justice for Jeremiah”, name matching the site that  which resembles his more permanent creep-tastic blog on a different subject than defending Larouche… 9 years later – Jeremiah Duggan.

II.  I note that KP George has left a message on this blog.  Which depresses me somewhat, as it suggests an element of responsibility in coming up with something substantial and meaningful to throw out there.  But I just don’t think KP George — assuming he campaigns at all — will lose to Kesha Rogers.

I’m more distressed by New Jersey, and Diane Sare.  Why?  Well, she is campaigning… seemingly effectively… Howie G has a Diane Sare photograph.  And another.  AND more importantly…

Diane Sare –Given that the only candidate to even have a functioning website is the LaRouche Democrat, Diane Sare I’m not at all confident that they’ll be long lines at the polls come June 5.

That is a bad sign, isn’t it?  Yes, I know there’s this… Diane Sare not invited to candidates’ forum. … But… the signs are just a little too spotty for comfort.  Watching how much money the Larouchies let siphon into the Sare campaign.

In other “NOT Democrat” news… this.  And … complaining about Daily Kos — which is, a self described partisan blog… like it or not.  This is rather hperbolic:
In order to put the techniques used by the Daily Kos to quell dissent on their website into perspective, you have to understand that they are an extension of the Democratic Party media machine.  These types of manipulative media bursts are designed to distract readers or viewers from party dissent in order to keep loyalists in the fold.
No.  Mostly they’ll play standard tricks in usage of Larouche fools.   Looking over the sidebar at his blog here — Sinclair News –, I see a right of center Republican site.  Maybe this was just picked up for use here for that basic purpose (“Daily Kos Censored me!”) — from his website, which… is… if this means anything to larouche watchers out there — solonsays dot com.  Hm indeed.

III.   Jacques Cheminade updates.  The campaign continues.  I, uh, love the translations I’m picking up.

Jacques Cheminade, out of his whims and conspiracy theories, is adamant: “We are open, always, in the crisis.” The evidence he said: “The tourniquet that requires Greece“.

Jacques Cheminade: ready to shake France.

Telegraph:   Now daytime viewers can learn perhaps more than they ever wanted to about maverick candidate Jacques Cheminade’s plans to build a “thermonuclear corridor” between the Earth and Mars. Rules apply until April 21, a day before round one.

Making Waves
Fortunately, there is Jacques Cheminade . This type, which is a repeat offender, managed to get through the cracks sponsorships. He finds himself an official candidate, with exactly the same space of media exposure that the outgoing president. […]

And then there’s mind-boggling stuff. Colonize the moon and Mars, or build a large Eurasian land bridge, it’s so wacky that pinched by believing dreaming. Yes, this is a candidate for the presidential election in France. But if there was it. His program is filled with pearls like this : “The acceptance of others and defining with it a desire to live together is the foundation of all human society.” Receive every man with a beautiful face, “says Treaty Avot (Fathers), I, 15. It is from this right foot that Jaures saw in secularism, which postulates originally a common human reason, “the end of the damned” “or” The real purpose of this project is to create conditions for a click culture through which any citizen can stand on the border of his own identity and of human knowledge. As such, the spirit who presides over cultural project and the educational project is the same. One and one are just two sides of a single stone. “

How not to laugh out loud? This is even more fun than the speech sounds in my ears like a pastiche, ultimately very successful (voluntarily or not, I do not know) the style of some quarters who use and abuse of jargon. Cheminade is not more incomprehensible than them. Some proposals are demagogic, but when we look at other programs (even those candidates of the governing parties) we realize that Cheminade simply just to make tons, but many of his proposals can be found at most low doses, in other programs. The character itself is a clown, but again, this is one of degree, not of nature, with its competitors. It is no different, it’s just “over”.

Sigh.  Newt Gingrich got this same treatment.   will not have shaken off his reputation as the wacky candidate, even if he revealed a knowledge of culture and science that few other candidates could match. With undisguised relish his questioners asked about his proposal to fund a space programme aimed at colonising the planet Mars.  “That’s only 20 pages out of 368 in my programme,” he pleaded. “It’s much more important to end speculation.”  But most viewers will probably remember the plan to conquer the cosmos … and the blown-upcover of the Tintin book Destination moon looming over the studio while the matter was discussed.

Making waves.  Jacques Cheminade, the candidate of Solidarity and Progress, is to overlook a detailed answer: he simply has not enough support to react in time before April 22 as he explains in his letter.

Jacques Cheminade SPEAKS OUT!
Except for some few honest journalists, most of national and international media are spending their time to make French voters believe that I’m a weirdo or an extremist.  […]  The media tries to misinform the people about me and my program but it is now backfiring against them.
point five percent, right?
Four million French viewers tuned in last Thursday to see Cheminade appear on a special election edition of “Des paroles et des actes” (“Words and Actions”), a political TV show on the public network France 2. Later that evening, it was Trotskyite Nathalie Arthaud’s turn to present her party platform. Arthaud wants to abolish the free market economy, and sings the praises of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Both are Trotskyite sects, aren’t they?

IV.  TOUR.  Spanning the Globe.

GOOD COMMENT LA ROUCHE HAS COMMENTED ON THE SAME AS INTERALPA GROUP OF BANKERS WHERE ASMICHEAL HUDSON HAS BUT THE SAME AS FINALLIZATION OF ECONOMY. BUT ILIKE ANTAL FEKETEWHO HAS BUT SOME WHAT CORRECT WHY CENTRAL BANK WAS ELABLISH. AND REAL REASON WHY GOLD STANDARD FAIL AND HAW GOLD IS ULTIMATE EXTINGUISHER OF DEBT.BUT THERE NEED TO BE UNDERSTANDING THAT FOR SOCIETY TO FLOURISH HEALTHCARE SYSTEM ALSO NEED TO BE RIGHT . PPLESE LEARN AYURVEDA HAVE FAITH.

Dateline Sierra Madre …
Actor Barry Schwam took a one man stand against the hatred being spead by the Lyndon LaRouche campaign and makes some compelling arguments why we should not listen to such propaganda:
“Everyone has a right to protest and to state their opinion; that goes without saying. But the Laroush psychotics (really, that is what they are; psychotics) are as brainwashed as their message. You cannot argue with them, as the basis for their arguments are not in truth, but belief in their “god” Lyndon LaRouche. LaRouche is an ungracious, charismatic loudmouth, full of hate. And that is the perfect leader for a psychotic. And it would be funny, if it weren’t so degrading to the Presidency, that they equate President Obama to Adolf Hitler. It is funny, because their own “leader” LaRouche, is followed blindly by them, in much the same way the Hitler youth followed Hitler.
My wife is a psychologist, and I understand psychoses. It is a mental disease that weakens the soul and the mind, and is the basis for so many of movements and campaigns of all sorts, that run our society.
So stand strong everybody, and hold on to your common sense. Know what you know, and see what you see. All will balance out in the end.”

Dateline Shrewsbury

The fliers they handed out asked to impeach Obama because of his recent attack on the Supreme Court, where he told the justices to leave Obamacare alone.
You have to earn respect. This man is an usurper in the white house, hes lied and violated the constitution, he must go

Dateline Hopatcong
“World War 3 will kill a lot of people,” he said. “If we get into a nuclear conflict with Russia, it’s going to be a hell of a lot worse than World War 2.”

V. CREDIBILITY OUTLETS

Prison Planet uses reference to EIR conspiracy.  Because… Alex Jones… hearts Lyndon Larouche.
Sean Stone alongside Alex Jones returns the love.   Skipping over it, I jump to Stone narrating over Obama welcoming the British Prime Minister with “The President sides with the British Imperialists”.  And so goes the man who introduced Jones to Larouche… so he said.
And we see the “Obama Circle of Death” conspiracy mongering.  Andrew Breitbart didn’t like Obama.  Now he’s dead.  Coincidence?  I think not.

Mossad Did it part … five million.  Iran TV.  Russia TV.

Hm.  WTF?