;)
The Commentariat -- May 26, 2021
Tim Arango &
~~~ The New York Times liveblogged how the country is marking the first anniversary of George Floyd's murder. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "Republicans chose a special way of observing the anniversary of George Floyd’s murder. They tried to vote down a highly qualified Black woman who had been nominated to run the Justice Department’s civil rights division.... All but one [Senate Republican] (Susan Collins of Maine) voted not even to allow [Kristen] Clarke a confirmation vote — and, when that failed, voted by an identical tally against confirming Clarke.... [Also,] Republican senators rose in near lockstep to oppose the confirmation of Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, the first Black woman tapped to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Only five of the 50 Republican senators supported this health-policy veteran.... President Biden had set a deadline of Tuesday for Congress to enact legislation to counter police brutality. But while the House passed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act almost three months ago, Republican objections have bottled up negotiations in the Senate.... Racism isn’t just a factor in Republican politics. It is the factor."
Matt Viser of the Washington Post: "President Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin are planning to meet next month in Geneva, the first face-to-face meeting between the two adversaries and one that comes at a time of deteriorating relations. The day-long summit is scheduled for June 16, according to an official familiar with the meeting, and will cover a wide range of topics including nuclear proliferation, Russian interference in U.S. elections, climate change and covid-19." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Nick Miroff & Maria Sacchetti of the Washington Post: "Under new Biden administration rules curtailing immigration enforcement, ICE carried out fewer than 3,000 deportations last month, the lowest level on record. The agency’s 6,000 officers currently average one arrest every two months. ICE under President Biden is an agency on probation. The new administration has rejected calls from some Democrats to eliminate the agency entirely, but Biden has placed ICE deportation officers on a leash so tight that some say their work is being functionally abolished.... The Biden administration is preparing to release its first Department of Homeland Security budget request this week, and immigrant advocates want deep cuts to ICE. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas announced plans last week to shutter two ICE detention centers, but in an interview he said he ... wants to reorient ICE [toward national security & public safety], not shrink it...."
Ellen Nakashima & Lori Aratani of the Washington Post: "The Department of Homeland Security is moving to regulate cybersecurity in the pipeline industry for the first time in an effort to prevent a repeat of a major computer attack that crippled nearly half the East Coast’s fuel supply this month — an incident that highlighted the vulnerability of critical infrastructure to online attacks. The Transportation Security Administration, a DHS unit, will issue a security directive this week requiring pipeline companies to report cyber incidents to federal authorities, senior DHS officials said. It will follow up in coming weeks with a more robust set of mandatory rules for how pipeline companies must safeguard their systems against cyberattacks and the steps they should take if they are hacked, the officials said. The agency has offered only voluntary guidelines in the past." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Peggy McGlone of the Washington Post: “Having ousted four Trump-appointed members of the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, President Biden announced Tuesday that he will replace them with four people who bring 'a diversity of background and experience, as well as a range of aesthetic viewpoints.' Architect Peter Cook, Howard University professor of architecture Hazel Ruth Edwards, Andrew Mellon Foundation program officer Justin Garrett Moore and architect Billie Tsien will join the seven-member commission, an independent agency responsible for guiding the design of the capital city, including renovations of historic homes and the look and scale of government buildings, museums and memorials.... On Monday, the Biden administration sent letters to ... [Trump-appointed members] asking that they resign by 6 p.m. that day or face termination. None of the four resigned.” Trump's appointments made the board all-white and all-male. ~~~
~~~ Marie: If you're interested in the way D.C. looks, or in urban planning in general, this story is for you.
Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: "House Republican leaders on Tuesday broke nearly a week of silence about comments by Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia comparing mask and vaccine mandates to the treatment of Jews by Nazis during the Holocaust, condemning her language but stopping short of punishing her. The slow response by Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the minority leader, to Ms. Greene’s string of anti-Semitic statements reflected the reluctance of top Republicans to take on the first-term congresswoman, who had previously endorsed violent and racist conspiracy theories and whose combative style has made her a favorite of ... Donald J. Trump and his far-right supporters." ~~~
~~~ Make That "Leaders." Ryan Nobles of CNN: "House Republican leaders have condemned incendiary remarks from GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene five days after she first publicly compared Capitol Hill mask rules to the Holocaust, amid a wave of criticism from Republican and conservative critics as well as Jewish groups aimed at the Georgia congresswoman and the party leaders' silence. 'Marjorie is wrong, and her intentional decision to compare the horrors of the Holocaust with wearing masks is appalling,' House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said in a statement five days after Greene's original comments and after she made similar comparisons Tuesday. 'Let me be clear: the House Republican Conference condemns this language.' The No. 2 House Republican, Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, also responded [in a written statement] to Greene's comments for the first time on Tuesday.... Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the newly elected No. 3 House Republican, also responded to the controversy in a tweet that didn't include Greene's name.... Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke out against Greene on Tuesday morning when asked about her latest comments on the Holocaust. 'Once again an outrageous and reprehensible comment,' McConnell ... said." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ Marie: A tweet, Elise? Here it is: "'Equating mask wearing and vaccines to the Holocaust belittles the most significant human atrocities ever committed. We must all work together to educate our fellow Americans on the unthinkable horrors of the Holocaust. #NeverAgain,' Stefanik wrote Tuesday morning, following McCarthy and Scalise's remarks." Wow! I'll bet Margie feels terrible now. ~~~
Vaccinated employees get a vaccination logo just like the Nazi’s forced Jewish people to wear a gold star. -- Marjorie Taylor Greene, in tweeted early Tuesday morning, linking to a news story on a Tennessee supermarket chain’s decision to include a special logo on the name badges of vaccinated employees ~~~
~~~ AND She's Still at It. Mike DeBonis & John Wagner of the Washington Post: “Top congressional leaders condemned Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on Tuesday after the Georgia Republican compared a supermarket’s face-mask policy to the Nazi practice of labeling Jews with Star of David badges.... [In his statement, House GOP 'Leader' Kevin McCarthy said,] 'At a time when the Jewish people face increased violence and threats, anti-Semitism is on the rise in the Democrat Party and is completely ignored by Speaker Nancy Pelosi.'... Following the widespread condemnations Tuesday, Greene posted tweets explaining, but not apologizing for, her remarks. Echoing McCarthy, she accused the media and others of seeking to hide 'the disgusting anti-semitism within the Democrat Party.... Their attempts to shame, ostracize, and brand Americans who choose not to get vaccinated or wear a mask are reminiscent of the great tyrants of history who did the same to those who would not comply,' she wrote.... No elected Democrats recently have made any similar comparison, and prominent party leaders have condemned a spate of antisemitic attacks.” (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times: "Violence between Jews and Muslims in the Middle East is often accompanied by spikes in anti-Semitic activity in the United States, but what’s happened over the last week or so has been different.... What’s new, and more reminiscent of the sort of anti-Semitic aggression common in Europe, is flagrant public assaults on Jews — sometimes in broad daylight — motivated by anti-Zionism.... These apparent hate crimes are, first and foremost, a catastrophe for Jewish people in the United States, who’ve just endured four years of spiking anti-Semitism that started around the time Republicans nominated Donald Trump in 2016.... But this violence also threatens to undermine progress that’s been made in getting American politicians to take Palestinian rights more seriously. Right-wing Zionists and anti-Semitic anti-Zionists have something fundamental in common: Both conflate the Jewish people with the Israeli state." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ MEANWHILE, Steve M., with a little help from Jonathan Chait, explains why -- in the eyes of the "bonkers" right wing, the spate of attacks on Jewish communities is all Democrats' fault. MB: Turns out there is a "logic" to at least some conspiracy theories, but it's a "logic" turned upside-down or inside-out.
Shayna Jacobs & David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "Manhattan's district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict ... Donald Trump, other executives at his company or the business itself should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges, according to two people familiar with the development. The panel was convened recently and will sit three days a week for six months. It is likely to hear several matters — not just the Trump case — during the duration of its term, which is longer than a traditional New York state grand-jury assignment, these people said.... The move indicates that District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr.’s investigation ... has reached an advanced stage after more than two years. It suggests, too, that Vance believes he has found evidence of a crime — if not by Trump then by someone potentially close to him or by his company." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) The AP's story is here.
Shayna Jacobs of the Washington Post: “A federal judge on Monday formally dismissed the fraud case against Stephen K. Bannon, the conservative provocateur and ex-adviser to ... Donald Trump, ending months of litigation over how the court system should handle his pardon while related criminal cases remain unresolved. U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres, citing examples of other cases being dismissed following a presidential reprieve, granted Bannon’s application — saying in a seven-page ruling that Trump’s pardon was valid and that 'dismissal of the Indictment is the proper course.' Bannon was charged with fraud last year alongside three others in what prosecutors described as a massive fundraising scam targeting the donors of a private campaign to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Bannon was accused of pocketing more than $1 million from his involvement with 'We Build the Wall' while representing to the organization’s backers that all of the money was being used for construction.” (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ BUT Judge Rules Bannon Is Guilty. Adam Klasfeld of Law & Crime: “... [U.S. District Judge Analisa] Torres extensively cited case law suggesting [Steve] Bannon’s acceptance of the pardon acknowledged the truth behind allegations that he conspired to defraud donors of the non-profit We Build the Wall and pocketing the loot through money laundering.... '... from the country’s earliest days, courts, including the Supreme Court, have acknowledged that even if there is no formal admission of guilt, the issuance of a pardon may “carr[y] an imputation of guilt; acceptance a confession of it,”' [citing Burdick v. United States].... Quoting another 19th century ruling from the New Jersey Supreme Court, Torres wrote: 'Pardon implies guilt.'”
Cat Zakrzewski & Rachel Lerman of the Washington Post: “D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine on Tuesday brought an antitrust complaint against Amazon, alleging that the e-commerce giant wields monopoly power that has resulted in higher prices for consumers. Racine’s office accused the company of fixing prices through contract provisions with third-party sellers who peddle their products on its platform. The attorney general said that Amazon prevents sellers from offering their products at lower prices or on better terms on any other online platforms, including their own websites, and that that prohibition results in 'artificially high' prices across e-commerce sales.”
Katie Robertson of the New York Times: “The Associated Press has started a review of its social media policy after more than 150 staff members publicly condemned the firing of a young journalist for violating that policy.... The news agency faced a backlash after Emily Wilder, a 22-year-old news associate who had joined the company in Arizona, was dismissed on May 19, three weeks after she was hired. Ms. Wilder, who graduated from Stanford University in 2020 and had worked at The Arizona Republic, said in a statement on Friday that she had been the subject of a campaign by Stanford College Republicans, whose social media posts drew attention to her pro-Palestine activism at the university. She added that her editors had reassured her she would not be fired for her past advocacy work. 'Less than 48 hours later, The A.P. fired me,' she said.” ~~~
~~~ Erik Wemple of the Washington Post: Emily Wilder's firing "points to two emerging facts of life in contemporary mainstream media — one, that editors at large news organizations quake when right-wing actors target their colleagues; and two, publishers’ concerns over ethical appearances and perceptions are reaching irrationality."
The Pandemic, Ctd.
The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Wednesday are here. The Washington Post's live updates for Wednesday are here.
Yasmeen Abutaleb, et al., of the Washington Post: “The United States’ top health official called Tuesday for a swift follow-up investigation into the coronavirus’s origins amid renewed questions about whether the virus jumped from an animal host into humans in a naturally occurring event or escaped from a lab in Wuhan, China. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra told an annual ministerial meeting of the World Health Organization that international experts should be given 'the independence to fully assess the source of the virus and the early days of the outbreak.' Becerra’s remarks, which were prerecorded, signaled that the Biden administration would continue to press the WHO to expand its investigation to determine the virus’s origins.... At a White House briefing Tuesday, Anthony S. Fauci ... said he believes it’s most likely the virus originated from a 'natural occurrence.' But he said a deeper probe is warranted.” The story is free to nonsubscribers. ~~~
~~~ Marie: IOW, one of Rand Paul's many crazy conspiracy theories is at least worth investigating. So not completely crazy. Congrats, Randy! ~~~
~~~ Kylie Atwood of CNN: "President Joe Biden's team shut down a closely-held State Department effort launched late in the Trump administration to prove the coronavirus originated in a Chinese lab over concerns about the quality of its work.... The existence of the State Department inquiry and its termination this spring by the Biden administration ... comes to light amid renewed interest in whether the virus could have leaked out of a Wuhan lab with links to the Chinese military.... Those involved in the previously undisclosed inquiry, which was launched last fall by allies of then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, say it was an honest effort to probe what many initially dismissed: that China's biological weapons program could have had a greater role in the pandemic's origin in Wuhan, according to two additional sources. But the inquiry quickly became mired in internal discord amid concerns that it was part of a broader politicized effort by the Trump administration to blame China and cherry-pick facts to prove a theory." ~~~
~~~ Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post: "The source of the coronavirus ... remains a mystery. But in recent months the idea that it emerged from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) — once dismissed as a ridiculous conspiracy theory — has gained new credence. How and why did this happen? For one, efforts to discover a natural source of the virus have failed. Second, early efforts to spotlight a lab leak often got mixed up with speculation that the virus was deliberately created as a bioweapon. That made it easier for many scientists to dismiss the lab scenario as tin-hat nonsense. But a lack of transparency by China and renewed attention to the activities of the Wuhan lab have led some scientists to say they were too quick to discount a possible link at first." Kessler traces the timeline of the Wuhan Lab theory.
The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Tuesday are here: "Moderna said on Tuesday that its coronavirus vaccine, authorized only for use in adults, was powerfully effective in 12- to 17-year-olds, and that it planned to apply to the Food and Drug Administration in June for authorization to use the vaccine in adolescents. If approved, its vaccine would become the second Covid-19 vaccine available to U.S. adolescents. Federal regulators authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine this month for 12- to 15-year-olds." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) Update: The Times' full story on the Moderna vaccine is here. ~~~
~~~ The Washington Post's live Covid-19 updates Tuesday are here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Beyond the Beltway
Arizona. Jeremy Duda of the Arizona Mirror: "Wake Technology Services, Inc., the company that has been in charge of recounting ballots as part of Senate President Karen Fann’s election audit, has left the audit team. Audit spokesman Randy Pullen told the Arizona Republic that Wake TSI’s contract ended on May 14, when the Senate’s contract with Veterans Memorial Coliseum, where the audit is taking place, was originally scheduled to end. Pullen said Wake chose not to renew its contract.... Wake TSI stood out as the only company [working on the 'audit'] that appeared to have any experience with election work.... [But] Wake’s work in Pennsylvania raised questions as well. Fulton County ... allowed Wake to audit its election at the request of a state senator who’s been a prominent advocate of election conspiracy theories and bogus claims that the election was rigged against ... Donald Trump.... Wake was actually hired by Defending the Republic, a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization run by attorney Sidney Powell, a former Trump campaign lawyer who has spread myriad baseless conspiracy theories and filed unsuccessful lawsuits in several states, including Arizona, seeking to overturn legitimate election results." ~~~
~~~ Mark Phillips of ABC News 15 Arizona: “On Tuesday morning, the Arizona House Appropriations Committee[, dominated by Republicans,] stripped Secretary of State Katie Hobbs [D] of her ability to defend election lawsuits. It gave the power exclusively to the Attorney General [R]. Later in the day, the state's Senate Appropriations Committee[, dominated by Republicans,] passed the same changes. Now these proposed changes are part of the full budget proposal that will be voted on later this week. 'We are meddling with the constitution,' State Representative Randy Friese, (D) Tucson, said. Friese and other Democrats see the move as a response to Secretary of State Hobbs' use of outside counsel to defend Arizona voters from lawsuits filed by the State Republican Party and others challenging Arizona’s election results.”
Nevada. Proud Boy Cast Decidiing Vote in Nevada GOP Censure Resolution. Michael Scherer of the Washington Post: "The leaders of the Nevada Republican Party are facing an internal revolt after an avowed Proud Boys member said he was invited with friends to attend a state party meeting last month and cast the deciding votes in the censure of a state official who concluded that the 2020 election in the state was not tainted by fraud. In the past week, the Nevada Senate GOP caucus and the chairmen of the two largest Republican county organizations have called for an audit of an April state party vote to uncover who cast ballots as seated party members and proxies for a resolution against Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske (R)."
Texas Legislature Goes Wild-West Insane. Neil MacFarquhar & Edgar Sandoval of the New York Times: “... within days, Gov. Greg Abbott is expected to sign a wide-ranging law that will ... [allow] virtually anyone over the age of 21 to carry a handgun, no permit required. The landmark bill would make Texas — which has three of the nation’s 10 biggest cities — the largest among 20 other states to adopt a 'constitutional carry' law that basically eliminates most restrictions on the ability to carry handguns.... Critics, including some senior law enforcement officers, call the new legislation a dangerous retreat from gun control amid a recent surge in gun violence, particularly in a state with a long and painfully recent history of mass shootings.”
Way Beyond
Belarus Hostage Video. Antonia Farzan of the Washington Post: “A video purporting to show dissident Belarusian journalist Roman Protasevich confessing to organizing 'mass riots' has met with skepticism from scholars, family members and human rights groups who say that there is little doubt that he was coerced.... The detained journalist’s demeanor in the video alarmed his father, Dzmitry, who told Reuters that his son’s nose appeared to have been broken, 'because the shape of it is changed,' and that his remarks were out of character.... In the video, Protasevich’s face appears to be marked with abrasions and bruises, suggesting that authorities subjected him to 'torture or other ill-treatment' before recording the supposed confession, Amnesty International spokesman Alexander Artemyev told The Washington Post.”
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Reader Comments (19)
Yesssss!
https://digbysblog.net/2021/05/you-go-grrrrllls/
@RockyGirl: I hate that kind of "music," but I love those little girls and their rage. Thanks for the link.
English Is Too Difficult to Learn. I just heard an adult native-English speaker say (on the teevee), "This seating arrangement allows people to conversate with you."
P.S. I'm probably going to keep doing this. Of course I enjoy it when people make up words to be silly, but when people try to "elevate" their speech by making up longer or more Latinate words, I cringe. Sure, I know what they meant when one guy turned "converse" into "conversate" and when someone else replaced "comfort" with "comfortableness." But please.
Marie: Agree!! whole heartedly. By the way, thanks for explaining what "eighthead" meant.
It's quite a phenomenon, isn't it?––we have a wild child in the House who keeps spewing hateful rhetoric , who is out of control and yet she's the one who is raking up all the $$$$ from donors. She's Fatty's favorite though, so that all makes sense except when–-and it will probably be a long "when"––– Fatty falls –-looking at you grand jury and the criminal probe.
Was pleased to learn that Biden has picked Billie Tsien along with other new picks (he fired Fatty's) to head the Commission of Fine Arts. If you recall I mentioned some years ago that Billie and her husband Todd Williams are the architectural firm in NYC that my son–-the one in Germany–-was part of for many years. It is also the firm that Obama picked to do his library.
Yesterday we had the homage for George Floyd and his family; in Gaza families mourned their children who died in the bombings; and in Texas the Republican governor declared full gun carry for anyone over 21––it defies belief! It is also–- remarkably insane.
P.S. If two bees can open a can of soda one does have to ask why it has taken so loooong–-for human beings–– to open the can of worms this ex president and his minions have wrought.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/bees-open-soda-bottle_n_60add13ce4b019ef10e0dacd
Unfortunately, “conversate” is technically a real word, ie, you can find it in a dictionary. But you can also find the word “trump” in a dictionary, so there’s that. The use of conversate in place of converse (or just “talk”) however, is beastly. Yes, yes, language is always evolving, like nature. But that doesn’t mean every new word or species (or even some older words or species) are all equally useful and pleasing. Think of ideation. Or tweep (!). Beastly concoctions, both, or if you want to sound smart to an idiot, beastliations. In nature, think of stinkweed, or MTG. Both are real things but, ewww.
@Akhilleus: I was afraid "conversate" might be a real and/or archaic word, so I made a considered decision not to look it up. According to the Googles, "Conversate is a nonstandard verb that means 'to have a conversation.' The standard verb (and the one you should use if you want to be correct) is converse."
And that's the last I'm going to conversate with you about it!
Guess there are conservative parts in all of us. We all feel there are some things worth saving and don’t wish to see them overwhelmed by the headlong rush of “new.".
As an Englsh teacher, and someone who has always appreciated language and its uses, I've most often come down on the side of tradition and "correct" usage, and found even admirably intelligent commenters on language like John McWhorter, whom my older son introduced me to some years ago, a little too loose-goosey for me.
There is a hidebound element to my negative reaction to some grammatical and usage errors, I’m sure, and I do recoil at sloppy phrasing especially when it’s my own, but my response to language is also mediated by my “ear.” Some things just don’t sound right.
“Conversate” would be one them. As I noted here a year or so ago “coronate” is another.
BTW here’s the (final?) word on “coronate.” I looked it up.
https://brians.wsu.edu/2016/05/31/coronate/
It is a word, even if my ear doesn't think it should be, but often misapplied.
The use and meaning of words do migrate and I suspect the rapid expansion of media’s capabilities and range has increased the pace of what are for me the many grating changes in language I hear and read.
I know that, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.
I just don’t dislike change so much I’ve of a mind to build a wall. Besides, I know it would be bootless because I'm sure my puny efforts will be overrun.
I remember years back Eric Sevareid referring to the "between you and I generation," and thinking that'll fix 'em. Now his finger in the dike effort seems charmingly quaint.
If I can sneak in here re: the English language: Many years ago someone in the NewYorker wrote a piece about–-and this was his title:
"Fancying Language"–-how people take simple verbs and make them sound posh–-like "I feel badly" which is not only incorrect grammatically but makes your feelings here sound less "bad"––funny how you never hear "I feel sadly" so maybe there's no getting around that feeling of sadness. And that's also the last thingy I is gonna say bout this!
And yes, I know in the sentence above "feel" is the verb and "Bad" is the adverb.
Sir Richard Francis Burton wrote the “Kasida” purposely using medieval and old English words, all of which I had never heard before. Thank goodness for google’s look it up function. The poem is beautiful and the words sound wonderful. Conversate does not sound wonderful. I choose not to use it.
@Victoria: I should have said I have no problem whatsoever with poet's using archaic words or making up new ones to employ in their works. That's part of their job.
What bugs me is ordinary people speaking in everyday conversations who "fancy up" their language in a way that nobody normally uses in those circumstances. It's fine to do it for a joke, but not to show off.
Stop the train! I need go no further (farther?) than conversate. Great point. To use or to utilize, that is the question. My personal favorite is the use of "illumine" by John Milton. I have always thought that is so much better than illuminate. But, then again, he wrote Paradise Lost.
All: Love this conversation about "conversating..." Maybe we can "circle back" with this "skill set level" some more-- my daughter and I fuss about "corporatespeak" all the time...she is new to a corporation and says her 27-year-old "supervisor" (living somewhere else, of course--) blabs like that all the time. I too get apoplectic about "between you and I" and "utilize." Thanks for providing something to read that does not include the words "witch hunt." Oh, and tots and pears...
PD,
I may have posted this before, but here’s Kirk Douglas in “Letter to Three Wives” (written by Joe Mankiewicz, who had a handle on beastly misappropriations of the language) as an English professor declaiming on “feeling badly”. Don’t miss his brief exchange with the husband of the obnoxious radio show matron, when, suggesting that time flies, he says “Temple fugit, right professor?” “Almost” says Douglas. Hahahaha.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uczFRowIfAo
Is Guns 4 Everyone really the best way for Texan confederates to own the libs?
People at the San Jose rail yard might want to weigh in. Oh well, just another bad apple.
Gotta be tens of thousands of bad apples in Texas. All Trump voters.
I've always enjoyed playing with the English language, remembering a description as it being "the result of Norman men at arms trying to make time with Saxon barmaids in eleventh century England, and no more legitimate than any of the other results."
Oversimplified? Sure is. Still it captures the nymphomaniac way the language adopts foreign words and phrases.
Bobby Lee,
Quite. But linguistic canoodling can have its odd offsprings now and again. Recall, if you will, what British journalist C.P. Scott once said about television. “The word is part Latin, part Greek. Nothing good can come of it.”
He must have been envisioning Faux.
Citizen,
Hard to diss old Milton. While both words are useful, illumine is a perfectly baked croissant; illuminate is a hot dog roll. Both handy in their own way.