I have just found the most incoherent item in print since the Unibomber

[ThomWV]

I read this today and thought it was bizarre. It reminds me of something the Unibomber would come up with. Here's the background. Preston County, West Virginia has a free weekly paper. It has no news, just some local advertising, notice of auctions, congratulations to new graduates, and a small free classified section. It comes out friday and is delivered by the post office to everyone. What I am about to type from a paid space in the paper. All the places noted are local, the newspaper named in it (Dominion Post) is located in a neighboring county.

"PRISONERS OF WAR IN PRESTON COUNTY

When the Citizenry rebelled and displayed orderly civil discontent, the powers in charge had to have a show of force. There had to be total control of the populace. This rebellion had to be put down in a very obvious way. The movement to repress had to be swift, orderly, and with the appearance of lawfulness in order not to disturb the masses. The secret meetings had to be fruitful; the planning had to work. Much was at stake, The control of the land and its people had to remain in the hands of those who had for so long controlled jobs, housing, crime and education. Nothing short of success would work.

Meetings were held in secrete places: in buildings and ships normally used for commerce. They had to make their move soon. Much was at stake. Large sums of money were on the table, The opportunity to capture the gold was fleeting.

They made their move. With swift and decisive action they moved o the first building, which housed a large number of the enemy. The action was swift, with the cooperation for he central powers and some of their employ. A smoke screen was raised. Fear swept through the building and families. Thinking the building was to fall they ran; they ran into what they thought was a safe haven, but in truth it was a trap; a well-planned trap. The controlling powers had managed to run the innocents and the leaders of the opposition into what has become their prison."

/// it goes on incoherently like this for a half a dozen more paragraphs and then a paragraph partially explains the thing ///

"The prisoners are our children, the children of Preston County. The commissioners are your county commissioners and the board of education. Where is our Prosecuting Attorney, why is he not addressing the condition of the prisoners? There are to be more. Masontown, Tunnelton, it is rumored Terra Alta, all to be systematically and methodically ignored until death. Would the Geneva Convention apply? Name tags have replaced tattoos."

It finishes with: "You must speak!! These children are not being educated. There school was criminally taken away from them. You must stand up for the children. They do intend to throw more children out into the streets. For there is no question many will not survive this ordeal. How can the marginal students endure this? This is abuse, flat out abuse."

All I can say is WOW! I have no idea at all what this person is ranting about, I have no idea at all why this little paper published this thing. I'm just all amazed as one person can be by it.

[crispini]

1. In the proud tradition of Lee Mercer!

(all three) :patriot:

At some point, you know, it does become hard to tell the difference between "needs medication" and "Thomas Pynchon." Is it paranoia or performance art?

Hmm..... :think: Just got an idea for an interesting monologue.... :D

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

2. Money Line:

"you know, it does become hard to tell the difference between "needs medication" and "Thomas Pynchon." "

You assume there is a distinction there? Just askin'... ;-)

[crispini]

10. Hee! Who knows.

But Pynchon at least manages some interesting and beautifully written paranoid works. :D

[NOW tense]

3. Phewww I thought it was

one of my rants.

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. "flat out abuse" Don't guys pay a lot of money for this?

[Cleita]

5. One of my admirers when I was a bartender used to write me

incoherent rants in perfect English and he had them printed not typed (in an era before PCs). He also made up tables of arithmetical algorithms and statistics that only made sense to him, but he had them printed and laminated to give to little me. For some inexplicable reason he called me Beatrice (not my name) in those rants. Since the text made no sense, I couldn't tell you what was going through his mind. He was an old vet, maybe Korean War, so I smiled and accepted his printed gifts graciously. He was harmless. But to this day, I have no idea what was going on in his mind (conversation was equally as nutty) other than he was upset with me for some reason and this is how he let me know it. He seemed relieved when I took the rantings from him and thanked him until the next time. One day, he stopped coming in and I can only assume that he moved away or died. I think the newspaper just took the money of the poor soul who wrote that for an ad, just like Sir Speedy took the old vet's money to print his compositions and number charts. This is what war does to some people.

[madmom]

6. Did someone take away their school vouchers?

[ThomWV]

7. Not that I know of. My thought was maybe a school was closing but who knows?

It was just too much to type but nothing that followed made any more sense than what I did type. This was about a quarter page ad in total. There was an attribution line to an obvious alias but no phone number, no address, no website. Hell, I'd have sent a contribution just to read more.

[Staph]

8. Though the rant is somewhat incoherent,

it is based on a large and long-standing controversy in Preston County. At one point there were nine high schools in this county of 30,000. Starting in the early 1970s, the county began a process of consolidation, ending up with a single county-wide high school in the early 1990s.

Many of the locals were opposed to the consolidation. Small town high schools become a point of pride for the town, and the county board of education was taking that pride away by forcing the students to be bussed to another school in another part of the county. We've seen that in many of the rural counties in this state.

[we can do it]

9. Thanks - My Mom Was Born In That County and I Wondered What Was Up