I found this site in my LR&W reading: http://www.plainlanguage.gov/index.cfm
It seems that in 1998, Clinton authored a Presidential Memo stating that all federal agencies must write clearly to their customer...basically incorporating three rules:
1. Reader oriented; clearly showing the author is writing to the customers (ie, writing appropriately for the audience...I talk to yall differently than I talk to Jacob or my two year old neice).
2. Use commonly known words
3. Visually appealing (I guess this could be kind of ambiguous...some might find black with hot pink blinking letter attractive and appealing, personally I find it blinding).
Is it kind of ironic (or just plain sad) that when I visited that site I received an OOPS! 404 Object Not Found error message? Has the government ran out of common words? Yes, I know, they've already ran out of common sense!
