78-07-B7
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Miscellaneous[edit]
Transcript[edit]After being gone for three weeks my desk has blossomed with some interesting little items. For openers we're indebted to National Review. It seems that the school authorities in St. Petersburg, Florida decided to test applicants for teaching jobs instead of just looking at their diplomas. The test was pretty simple: they wanted to find out if the applicants could read, write, add and subtract. Out of the first 15 tested, four flunked. The New York City fire department has a minor problem to solve, too. One of its retirees won a race up the stairs of the Empire State Building in February. In April he entered the Boston Marathon--26 miles--and finished 133rd out of 4,600 entrants. The problem is, he's retired on a nearly $12,000 a year pension for a back injury he sustained several years ago. Department officials think maybe he's well enough to return to active duty. Meanwhile in Washington they are still trying to straighten out bureaucracy's language problem. The Secretary of Transportation sent out this memo: "Regulation means a statement of general or particular applicability and future effect for publication in the Federal Register and designed to implement, interpret, or prescribe law or policy or describing the organization, procedure, or practice requirements of the initiating office of the department, except that if such statement implements a financial assistance program, it need not be published in the Federal Register to come under this definition." Did you follow that? Well, yo u'll be interested to know the Secretary sent it out as a memo on how to write clear and simply regulations. You know it could be that all Washington really needs is a good plumber. The Bureau of Standards received a letter from a New York plumber who wrote to tell them, "I find hydrochloric acid good for cleaning out clogged drains." The bureau wasted no time in telling him by mail that "The efficacy of hydrochloric acid is indisputable but the corrosive residue is incompatible with metallic permanence." The bureau got a fast reply. The plumber wrote: "So glad you agree with me." To which the bureau responded: "We cannot assume responsibility for the production of toxic and noxious residue with hydrochloric acid and suggest you use an alternative." The plumber replied with enthusiasm that he was tickled pink they agreed with him. This time the bureau answered in the kind of language that real people use. They simply wrote: "Don't use hydrochloric acid-- it eats the blankety blank out of the pipes." Of course they weren't on radio so they used a shorter term than "blankety blank". Just in closing--the President received a wire signed by some 40 popular musicians and singers including names familiar to those who follow radical movements, telling him nuclear power is a grave threat to life on this planet. Scientists they are not. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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