Pullum makes some good points! That’s why the Chinese have never managed to do anything of any historical consequence (run an empire, build a culture, write literature, discover scientific inventions, lift several hundred million people out of poverty, build the world’s most sophisticated internet censorship system, and so on).
Wait, what, they did these things? Well… that must have just been because they copied them from someone else. You know, those Chinese, they’re great imitators. Not like the English, who invented their own alphabet (that’s why it’s called the English alphabet!), their own numbers (that’s why they’re known as English numerals!), even their own word for the place you go to eat a nice dinner out (in French they call it a “restaurant,” those idiots).
… It’s good to see that Donald Trump now writes for the Chronicle language blog, and that he has such a distinguished pen name!
— Eric Hayot <ehayot@psu.edu>