Hoarded at http://www.scn.org/newspeak Celebrating cutting edge advances in the Doublethink of the 90's Written by Wayne Grytting

Heaven Can Wait

Many of you are undoubtedly used to racking up frequent flier mileage whenever you fly. Have you ever wondered what happens to people who die far away from home and must have their bodies flown home? I mean, who gets the frequent flier mileage? At least one airport, Daytona Beach International Airport, has taken this problem to heart and come up with a program to deal with the problem. The Florida airport has a deal with Delta Airlines that will award funeral directors 500 miles for every body shipped. And for every $5000 worth of business a funeral home generates, Delta will award two round-trip tickets. Can't you just imagine them sending out notices of a death to relatives beginning with the phrase "We have some good news and some bad news for you. The good news is your husband has just earned 500 frequent flyer miles, the bad news is..." (AP 7/16/99)

Double Your Pleasure

Canadian race car fans who viewed the Molson Indy race on television may have been treated to a sight denied to fans at the event. While fans at the scene would get to watch cars racing under two bridges in Toronto, plans were in the works to allow TV viewers to see the cars race under three bridges. Molstar Sports and Entertainment has been working with the Canadian Broadcasting Company to add a computer generated bridge to the broadcast. With commercials limited to a mere 12 minutes per hour, Molstar executives plan to use the virtual bridge to post virtual advertisements. Although Molstar has been superimposing ads in the backgrounds of sporting events since 1995, this represents the first attempt at building a piece of architecture to expand the frontiers of commercialization. Stay tuned. (Toronto Star 7/16/99)

"Les Miserables" Dept.

Gregory Taylor of Los Angeles may have set the Guinness record for earning a lifetime jail sentence for the most trivial offense. The 37-year-old Mr. Taylor was sentenced to 25 years in prison under the state's "three strikes" provisions when he was caught, according to police, "trying to go in the (church) kitchen to get something to eat." His previous offenses were almost as serious: purse snatching and attempted robbery on a street without a weapon. The last was 14 years ago. However, Prosecutor Dale Cutler put things in a little different light. Noting that Gregory had not only failed at drug rehabilitation but had been befriended by the priest at the same church he tried to rob, Mr. Cutler emphasized "What he violated was the trust of a man who showed him nothing but kindness over a nine-year period." Let's see if we all get this correctly. If you are a nearly homeless drug addict who breaks a trust, life in prison is appropriate, but if you are a politician who breaks a trust... (AP 7/17/99)

Beyond Privacy

The federal government has a fine program in place to locate and seize the assets of divorced parents who skip out on paying child support. Every three months, banks are required to search their databases for names on lists provided by state agencies of deadbeat parents. Unfortunately that costs money, and when state agencies fail to fund it, banks are often resistant to infringing on their profit margins. So they've found another solution within the law. They are simply handing over their entire financial records to the state so public agencies can do the searching. In California, for example, 197 out of 388 reporting financial institutions have simply turned over their customer databases to the state Franchise Tax Board. And that is without even being asked to do so. Think what cooperation the state could get if they said "please" and "thank you" or "Hand it over now." (LAT 6/16/99)

Special thanks to Cynthia Bock-Goodner and Ann Ramage for spotting quality Newspeak. Send in your own examples, harass the author or subscribe by e-mail to wgrytt@amouse.net