May have been posted before, but as good a time as any to bring up the recording of her being informed of her misunderstanding live, on the air, during a radio interview about her later-cancelled book.
Which was a pretty reasonable misunderstanding… unless you’re publishing a book that hinges on the issue, and clearly didn’t look for evidence from more than one source to back things up.
Oh my. Wow. How to be really wrong.
I don’t know anything about that other than what I just heard. But to be fair, logging “death recorded” to mean “no death was recorded and in fact the person was pardoned” is kind of a uniquely British way to screw with the English language. No one could be expected to know the mental gymnastics necessary to get from what they said to what they meant, when they’re that intentionally misleading about it.
Someone really should teach the British how to speak proper English; it would clear up a lot of things like that.
From my (admittedly, brief) reading, the law basically said you had to record the sentence of death, which is what the particular record is recording. The judges just decided to not actually enforce that sentence. I strongly suspect that kind of situation (and documents that then look odd afterwards if you’re not familiar with the context) isn’t isolated to Britain. 
But, this is why you look for other contemporaneous sources… like the newspaper article the interviewer brought up. Especially when one is trying to present oneself as an expert who is “correcting the misconception” that everyone has about a historical fact, anyways…
Following harsh laws to the letter, while finding a legal way to avoid enforcing, them is the primary plot of The Mikado. This use of “death recorded” fits very well into that narrative.
This is who I think of when I see mention of “The Mikado”; I thought the main plot was the tailor trying to fulfill his duties as High Executioner:
All part of the same ball of wax. As Pish-Tush explains,
Our great Mikado, virtuous man
When he to rule our land began
Resolved to try
A plan whereby
Young men might best be steadied
So he decreed, in words succinct
That all who flirted, leered or winked
(Unless connubially linked)
Should forthwith be beheaded.
This stem decree, all understand,
Caused great dismay throughout the land!
For young or old
And shy or bold
Were equally affected
The youth who winked a roving eye
Or breathed a non-connubial sigh
Was thereupon condemned to die —
He usually objected.
And so we straight let out on bail
A convict from the county jail
Whose head was next
On some pretext
Condemned to be mown off.
And made him Headsman, for we said
"Who’s next to be decapited
Cannot cut off another’s head
Until he’s cut his own off.
Some of her other recent unhinged tweets are recorded here for posterity.
Another gem:
Uh, no, on two counts. One, that revenue wasn’t guaranteed. And two, that is not what the word “disenfranchised” means, you jackass.
As an ex-legal secretary, I can’t believe that any secretary worth their salt would even be able to type this up without spitting coffee on it.
The hits just keep coming…
There was a hearing on the MLB All-Star Game lawsuit today. Short version (based on reports, I didn’t listen in): the long-suffering judge ruled, from the bench, against filing an injunction to both force MLB to hold the game in GA and to force the players to play in it without striking. 
Two livetweet threads of the hearing, which sounds like a direct transcript wouldn’t be out of place as a “dumbest thing”:
And, a comment on the ruling itself (which the judge must have already had written, with possibly minor changes, because she came back with it after only a short break):
They’re confusing the folks who are in government with the government itself.
I mean, Nixon & Co. were not supporters of democracy.
All dead but Kissinger.
Ooooh, they gonna have to put a fence around his grave to help prevent vandalism.
Still makes my skin crawl to think women wanted to date him. Blech! No power is that attractive, IMNSHO.
power
