Dave Barry Slept Here: A Sort of History of the United States Read Online Free PDF Page A

confused, had inflicted heavy casualties upon each other. So England won the war, and on October 8 the French king, Louis the Somethingth, signed the Treaty of Giving Away Canada, under which he gave away Canada. “Que enfer,” he remarked at the time, “cest seulement Canada” (“What the hell, it’s only Canada.”).
     
    DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
    1. How come, if the country is called “Holland,” the people are called
    “Dutch”? 2. Have you ever noticed that on those rare occasions when you do need
    turpentine, the can, which you bought in 1978 and have been moving from
    household to household ever since, is always empty? 3. Do you feel that people who insist upon referring to themselves as “doctor”
    simply because they hold Ph.D. degrees, which are about as rare as air
    molecules, tend to be self-important weenies? And what about the use of
    the word “professional,” as in “automotive sales professional”? Does
    that make you want to puke, or what? Explain.

CHAPTER FIVE
The Birthing Contractions of a Nation
    What caused the American Revolution? This is indeed a rhetorical question that for many years historians have begun chapters with. As well they should. For the American Revolution is without doubt the single most important historical event ever to occur in this nation except of course for Super Bowl III (Jets 16, Colts 7. This historian won $35.).
     
    One big causal factor in the Revolution was that England operated under what political scientists describe as “The Insane Venereally Diseased Hunchbacked Homicidal King” system of government. This basically means that for some reason, again possibly the food, the English king always turned out to be a syphilitic hunchbacked lunatic whose basic solution to virtually all problems, including humidity, was to have somebody’s head cut off. There was one king, Henry “Henry the Eighth” Viii, who could barely get through a day without beheading a wife. It reached the point, with Henry, where the clergyman had difficulty completing the wedding ceremony:
    CLERGYMAN: I now pronounce you man and … WATCH OUT! (SLICE)
    This style of government was extremely expensive, especially in terms of dry-cleaning costs, and as a result the kings were always trying to raise money from the colonies by means of taxation. This was bad enough without representation, but what really ticked the colonists off were the tax forms, which were extremely complicated, as is shown by this actual example:
     
    To determineth the amounteth that thou canst claimeth for
    depreciation to thine cow, deducteth the amount showneth
    on Line XVLIICX-A of Schedule XIV, from the amount
    showneth on Line CVXILIIVMM of Schedule XVVII … No,
    waiteth, we meaneth Line XCII of Schedule CXVIILMM …
    No, holdeth it, we meaneth …
     
    And so on. In 1762 the king attempted to respond to the colonists’ concerns by setting up a special Taxpayer Assistance Service, under which colonists with questions about their tax returns could get on a special toll-free ship and sail to England, where specially trained Tax Assistors would beat them to death with sticks. But even that failed to satisfy the more radical colonists , and it soon became clear that within a short time—possibly even in the next page—the situation would turn ugly.
     
    THE SITUATION TURNS UGLY
     
    One afternoon some freedom-loving colonists known as the Boston Patriots were sitting around their locker room, trying to think up ways to throw off the yolk of colonial oppression. Suddenly one of them, Bob, had an idea: “Hey!” he said. “Let’s dress up like the locals and throw tea into the harbor!”
     
    Instantly the other Patriots were galvanized. “What was that?” they shouted. “A galvanic reaction,” responded Bob. “Named for the Italian physiologist Luigi Galvani (1737-1798), who conducted experiments wherein he sent electrical currents through the legs of frogs.”
     
    But the Boston Patriots were not the only