I Could Care Less . . . But
I could care less if Sarah Palin had a one-night stand with a basketball player when she was a sports broadcaster back in 1987.
I could care less that the player was future Miami Heat star Glen Rice, who was playing for Michigan and was in Anchorage for a tournament.
I could care less that 6-foot-7 Rice is an African-American.
I could care less that Rice is said to have confirmed the tryst for Joe McGinniss for The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin, his forthcoming book.
I could care less that she broke a cardinal rule of journalism in sleeping with one of her sources.
I could care less that the future half-term governor was seeing future husband Todd Palin at the time and is said by friends to have freaked out when she realized what she had done.
I could care less if she and Rice continued their relationship through telephone calls.
I could care less if the salacious allegation was being aired by a less scrupulous reporter than McGinniss, who rented a house next to the Palins while researching the book.
But I do care because Sarah Palin, who endlessly preaches abstinence and has raised hypocrisy and obfuscation among politicians to new heights, remains a contender for president of the United States.
24 Responses to “I Could Care Less . . . But”
As we all know Taxsachusetts is a living hell hole from which only death can save you, after having lived a very long life, getting top rate medical care, a top notch education and a very high standard of living.
By most social indicators (long Life expectancy, high Education, high GDP per Capita, few people living in poverty, very few people without health insurance, low teen-age pregnancy rates, low divorce rate, low crime rate, etc)Massachusetts is in the top 5 States in the country.
If the rest of the country was as well run as Massachusetts is, we wouldn’t be in the USA.
@SD
it is telling that someone with a long term career in journalism misuses the term “couldn’t care less.”
Since he obviously COULD care less, maybe it was a Freudian slip.
“it is telling that someone with a long term career in journalism misuses the term ‘couldn’t care less.’”
Maeve Maddox at Daily Writing Tips writes:
“My article about the loss of Thou received some comments on the use of “could care less” instead of “couldn’t care less.”
My choice to write “Shakespeare could care less” was a deliberate one. I felt that “could care less” was more euphonious than “couldn’t care less” and sounded a bit “cheekier.” I thought that by now either form of the idiom was acceptable.
How wrong can a writer be?!
So wrong that a Google search of the phrase “could care less” garners 1,930,000 hits. Some of the discussions are quite impassioned. Although the newer form of the expression meaning “not to care at all” has been widely-used for some time, many people still regard it as an uneducated error.
Paul Brians, English professor at Washington State University, points out in an interview with Avi Arditti the difficulty of dealing with idioms that are in the process of changing:
the problem is that as [a new idiom] evolves, you get caught as a user between people who are going with the new pattern and those who know the old pattern and are comfortable with it.
Cautions Brians,
some people will disapprove or think less of you if you say it [the new] way.
He concludes that speakers and writers may choose to use the newer pattern, but that they do so at a certain risk because people who are bothered by the new pattern may be in a position to hire them, or grade their papers, or reject them as social equals [or use such to clobber a writer they disagree with---my insert].
The Oxford dictionary already recognizes “could care less” as an American colloquialism. Many people, however, regard it as incorrect since it makes no logical sense (if you “could care less” it means that you care at least a bit).”
I would bet you a ‘donut’ (Allen) that Shaun knows exactly what he is doing, what he is writing it and how he is writing it, but don’t take it from someone for whom English is his third language…
http://www.dailywritingtips.com/could-care-less-versus-couldnt-care-less/
OK then, I don’t got no objection to Shaun’s grammar.
The Chicago Manual of Style is my co-pilot, but as Mrs. Slocum would say on Are You Being Served? “I am ambiguous on the matter.”
“OK then, I don’t got no objection to Shaun’s grammar.”
Nor does me—to his choice of words…his grammar seems OK.
Oh come on, where is Spike Lee when you need him! Where are all the Jungle Fever sordid details and Black Snake Moan moments sublime? This is a brilliant opportunity!
We can tear our congressmen limb from limb for any given intrigue but cannot even scratch the public façade of the self righteous ego manic from Alasker?
We are not allowed to ponder the veracity of Palin’s stated conservative moral values along and together with the details of her not yet denied coupling, splayed open from many a media source, just because she hasn’t declared yet?
It’s that BIG ego she has that threatens our nation if elected. Just how BIG we need to find out.
Hey, I didn’t even get into the other McGinniss tibits like her oomphing Todd’s partner when they had a snowmobile business or her doing lines of Colombian marching powder off of a 55-gallon drum during a party.
Uh, I guess I just did.
Ha ha hahahaha….Shaun please stop I can’t take it…
Conservative Values.
Can any Republican actually measure up to them? They are so much holier than thou than any Democrat. One would think that their Conservative moral values could be demonstrated in their politicians a little more often than ours, but no. They cannot. Why then doesn’t their constituencies hold them to account….
…and what the heck was McCain thinking anyway?
Many business and political leaders are also guilty of SP weakness for the flesh and recreational drugs. Even bloggers and commenters are guilty of similar sins. Just don’t use your position and family to tell me that both are behaviors are immoral or a sign of something…
Rudi-
Yes, there is such a thing as sexual immorality and behavior can be a sign of it.
@Allen
Only when non consenting adults or wildlife is involved. What happens in Vegas…
I don’t really care about Palin one way or the other and agree to the degree of hypocricy.
But I do note that when I try to point out similar hypocritical behavior (IE standing for one thing but doing another) in some on the left the reception is, shall we say less than positive…..
Works both ways gang.
Well Patrick if you are talking in grand generalizations, anything could be anything.
It’s not Equal-Equal.
Republicans espouse more “qualities” and thus because of their own inabilities to live up to their own stupid sales points, fail constantly as leaders, and pretty much always get the grand pass from their silly constituencies for it.
Merely an observation.
I think the reasoning is since Republicans often preach morality and family values, it’s OK to criticize them for doing the same things we shouldn’t criticize Democrats for.
Rudi I hear you.
However the state of law indicates that I have the right to remain free from your sexual immorality and you have a right to be free from my personal condemnation of your, performed in private, sexual behavior. However public demonstrations forfeits your rights, by degree, depending on statutes in jurisdiction. So as you can see, there are limits to sexual immorality which are quite a bit more restrictive than the limits to condemn it. I for one like it this way.
DaGoat-
That’s not it at all.
Democrats don’t make a specific sales point of “better than thou values” which Republicans easily sell to their hypocrite constituencies. So I guess those constituencies feel that Democrats aren’t really trying.
That’s essentially what I said, Allen.
Well Allen if I wanted a generic example I’d cite Al Gore preaching green energy/etc and having a house with a massive footprint.
To me that’s hypocritical but when I point that out I usually get a bad reaction
But as always I welcome your input, even if we don’t always agree I respect your views.
I don’t get it are we not supposed to learn grow and become wiser as we age? If so then there is no hypocrisy at all. I don’t know if any of this is true and really don’t care. I do find the gleefull recitations of tabloid writing a bit nauseating.
A little late here, spent too much time deciding between could and couldn’t. My solution is to say: “I don’t give a flying f—-” about whatever.
However I do, since there is some justice when someone whose main goal is to attract attention is upstaged by a writer whose main goal is to attract attention (as opposed to providing truthful, balanced information). In other words it’s OK to goose the goose and get a gander.
More TMZ on TMV.
hating Sarah Palin is counter productive. you folks really need to get over it…everyone else has.
hating Sarah Palin is counter productive. you folks really need to get over it…everyone else has.
More TMZ on TMV.
Rice’s height and race are obviously very important to the breaking news that Ms. Palin slept with someone a long time ago. If he were white and short and she didn’t sleep with anyone without intent to produce a child (if she weren’t such a SLUT for the black men!), she’d be an awesome president.