23% of America is Illiterate.  This should come as no surprise to anyone who regularly cruises the interwebs.

Some of the worst – and I mean the very worst offenders inhabit the comments section on Youtube.  Here, see a few examples from that and a few other sources, all reproduced exactly as written, spelling, punctuation (or lack thereof) reproduced exactly:

“I had a brain fart when righting that”  (Actually one of the more articulate comments.)

“well lesson learned:never and i mean never ! scratch iron man’s paint job !”

“i dont wast my time watching youtube i already have the cd”

“hahahahahahaha that funny the way it ran away gezzz thats crap an anmila tha big running like that lol i think itd run like an elephant or rhino not like road runner hahaha”

“GREAT TO LIVE LIFE AS A BLESSED son OF GOD!!! PTL. HEY!!!!!!!!! GOLD AND SILVER BUY TODAY!!!!MY STOCKS LOOKING PRETTY GOODV TOO PTL.”

“Christianity be against nelumbo nucifera pagan paranormal sensory”  (WTF?)

And the grand finale, from Facebook:

“Okay so if u know me u know i smile like all the time right….well i just relized tht smart ppl n gernral make me smile alot more than most and its not cuz i like smart ppl more its cuz usually whn they talk idk wtf ther talkin about….lol go figure!!”

I cry for the death of written English.

Speaking of tales of the bizarre, how’s this:  Student Gets Low Grade, Sues University.  No shit.  Excerpt:

Megan Thode isn’t the first Lehigh University student who was unhappy with the grade she received in a course. But she may be the first to sue to get it changed.

The C+ that Thode was given scuttled her dream of becoming a licensed professional counselor and was part of an effort to force her out of the graduate degree program she was pursuing, said her lawyer, Richard J. Orloski, whose lawsuit seeks $1.3 million in damages.

Orloski said his client is the victim of breach of contract and sexual discrimination, and a civil trial began Monday before Northampton County Judge Emil Giordano over the claims. They’re nonsense, said Neil Hamburg, an attorney for Lehigh University.

“I think if your honor changed the grade, you’d be the first court in the history of jurisprudence to change an academic grade,” Hamburg told Giordano.

Call this another argument for a loser-pays tort system.  (Feel free to apply the term “loser” advisedly in this case.)

Is there a correlation between marginal literacy and a massive sense of self-entitlement?  Maybe there’s an opportunity for a government-funded study.  Anyone know a good grant writer?  No?