Sep 03, 2013
RAY: This comes from Paul Mulick. He writes, "In the official police handbook for the Springfield Police Department, there are two pages printed in Hungarian. The rest of the book is in English. None of the men or women on the Springfield police force is Hungarian. In fact, not one person in the entire city of Springfield speaks or understands Hungarian."
The question is, why does the official police manual include two pages in Hungarian. Here's a hint: the fact that no person in Springfield understands Hungarian is one of the reasons that Hungarian was chosen.
RAY: Here's the answer. You will remember that some time ago you and Berman and I were going to NPR in Washington.
TOM: I remember it!
RAY: We were at South Station and we met some law enforcement people. I think they were in the process of strip-searching Berman, but I'm not sure.
TOM: And they had dogs.
RAY: Right. And the fellow to whom we were speaking-- once he got the dog off your leg, that is-- said the dog understood only French. That's why the police manual has these pages in Hungarian because the police dog understands only Hungarian. There're two good reasons for that. Number one, they were probably trained where? In Hungary. And number two, commands can be given only by the person handling the dog. For example, a would-be felon couldn't tell the dog to sit, stay, roll over or play dead.
