Noted: Phony Erudition
Wonkette operatives read The Note so Wonkette doesn't have to. One operative in particular draws our attention to some recent reflexive snobbery. The Note wrote:
"The Chicago Tribune's Jan Crawford Greenburg writes about friendship between two SCOTUS potentials: Messiers Luttig and Roberts."
Comments our operative:
"The correct plural form is 'Messrs' It's a bastardized version of the French 'MonsieursMessieurs'* To spell it out as 'Messiers' is illiterate, while of course also unbearably pretentious. That is all."
"That is all?" No, no, no it isn't.
The Note gets schooled after the jump.
* Our operative is totally gonna get his money back from that community college...
Our operative was easily egged on, especially once we brought up some bastardized Greek thing they did we didn't understand the first time around :
Oh, yeah. They tried to lead one day's dispatch with the phrase "In the wake of the kerygma of the Tom and Katie engagement" or somesuch. [It was actually, "In an homage to the kerygma of Katie and Tom, and to the ethos of Page Six, which is always 'Just Asking . . . . ']
Well, Kerygma means "herald" and refers more generally to the content of the New Testament (sorta like the Gospel). Its original meaning was acutally as a verb--to be a herald, which of course makes no sense here. And there is also a more general usage to denote the content of a pronouncement, which could be what the writers meant here--except that the announcement having already occurred, no real content is being referenced. (Not unlike the Note itself in that respect.) This is clearly a way for Note writers to let you know they enjoyed pricey Ivy League educations without having gone to the bother of paying attention in the classroom. . . .
Wonkette operatives, of course, went to school in log cabins and scratched out their Latin lessons in the dirt.
That is all.— WONKETTE
On a Big Roll Now [ABC]