I’m just your average, ex-navy (10 years), conservative, midwestern, atheist. Not exactly a porch swing philosopher.

Oh, and just a note for the sake of clarity because I cannot say this enough. Proofread, proofread, proofread. If three times isn't enough, do it again. Check your spelling, closely. Don't rely on the computer, do it yourself. That way you'll avoid all those pesky little common mistakes that make you look like a moron with a 3rd grade education. You know, saying "loose" instead of "lose" or "there" instead of "their" and "your" instead of "you're". Yeah, I know it's hard to be perfect, but try, you'll thank me in the morning.

By now you're probably asking yourself "What set him off?". Well, I see a lot of good, down home, common sense in many of the posts here. It's why I follow Freerepublic. But when I'm reading something full of errors, I tune out and move on around the 3rd mistake. That means that a lot of what is posted gets missed due to laziness. And I'll bet I'm not the only one that feels that way.

All of the above doesn't even begin to address the most serious (IMHO) malady to affect the English language. Yes, I'm speaking about dictionaries no longer sticking to their guns and correcting ignorance, but taking the easy way out by adopting "common usage definitions". As an example, in the novel (and the DVD) "The Caine Mutiny", the ship was described during a storm as being "in danger of foundering". To founder is a nautical term meaning in danger of sinking, but because of "modern usage", flounder is deemed to be acceptable (except to those of us who know better). This phenomenon is especially noticeable in our colloquial/idiomatic usage. The morons that write for the Bart Simpson Show continually use the term "butt naked" vice the original "buck naked" which comes from the time of our western conquest. It was common (though not PC) to call a male indian "buck" as a derogatory term. The expression "buck naked" meant to be wearing only a breech clout (not breech-cloth) and moccasins as an indian would since we, as a culture, were much more Victorian in our manner of dress.