Word of the Day

… courtesy of Merriam Webster, with slight modifications by me:

The Word of the Day for July 16, 2010 is:
bandbox • \BAND-bahks\ • noun

1 : a usually cylindrical box of cardboard or thin wood for holding light articles of attire

*2 : a structure (as a baseball park) having relatively small interior dimensions

Felix’s Example Sentence:

In a famously detached town, the U.S. Congress is physically and in its members’ capacities a bandbox in a huge and complex world.

Did you know?

In the 17th century, the word “band” was sometimes used for ruffs, the large round collars of pleated muslin or linen worn by men and women of the time period, and the bandbox was invented for holding such bands. The flimsy cardboard structure of the box inspired people to start using its name for any flimsy object, especially a small and insubstantial one. But people also contemplated the neat, sharp appearance of ruffs just taken from a bandbox and began using the word in a complimentary way in phrases such as “she looked as if she came out of a bandbox.” Today, “bandbox” can also be used as an adjective meaning “exquisitely neat, clean, or ordered,” as in “bandbox military officers.”

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Word of the Day

… courtesy of Merriam Webster, with slight modifications by me:

The Word of the Day for July 15, 2010 is:
ab initio • \ab-ih-NISH-ee-oh\ • adverb

: from the beginning

Felix’s Example Sentence:

The obduracy of the Republican minorities in Congress regarding the victorious Obama was obvious ab initio; from the day after the election, leaders of the opposition party made every effort to obstruct all legislation supported by the new Administration.

Did you know?

We’ll tell you right from the beginning where “ab initio” comes from. This adverb was adopted at the end of the 16th century directly from Latin, and it translates, unsurprisingly, as “from the beginning.” (“Initio” is a form of the noun “initium,” meaning “beginning,” which gave rise to such English words as “initial,” “initiate,” and “initiative.”) “Ab initio” most frequently appears in legal contexts, but our example sentence is not out of the norm. Recently, people have also begun using “ab initio” as an adjective meaning “starting from or based on first principles” (as in “predicted from ab initio calculations”).

Word of the Day

… courtesy of Merriam Webster, with slight modifications by me:

The Word of the Day for July 09, 2010 is:
struthious • \STROO-thee-us\ • adjective

: of or relating to the ostriches and related birds

Felix’s Example Sentence:

Faced with the irreconcilable goals of increasing taxes or reducing spending, with the concomitant reductions in government services, most politicians adopt various struthious evasions and duplicitous devices to avoid both measures.

Did you know?

“Struthious” can be scientific and literal, or it can be figurative with the meaning “ostrich-like,” as in our example sentence. The extended use suggests a tendency to bury one’s head in the sand like an ostrich. But do ostriches really do this? No — the bird’s habit of lying down and flattening its neck and head against the ground to escape detection gave rise to the misconception. The word “struthious” has been fully visible in English since the 18th century. “Ostrich” is much older. Anglo-French speakers created “ostriz” from Vulgar Latin “avis struthio” (“ostrich bird”); Middle English speakers made it “ostrich” in the 13th century. Scientists seeking a genus word for ostriches turned back to Latin, choosing “struthio.”

Uncivil Discourse

Unlike a number of parliamentary governments in the democratic societies, the Congress of the United States almost always preserves orderly and mostly polite behavior on the floors of the House and the Senate. There was that rasslin’ match forty or so years ago between Texas’s Ralph Yarbrough and South Carolina’s Strom Thurmond. Thurmond, a fitness wonk, whipped Yarbrough’s ass. That was all in fun, however, and occurred in the doorway of a committee room. Both senators laughed and went on about their business.

Another  South Carolinian, Representative Joe Wilson, last night engaged in verbal assault, this time on the floor of the Congress, targeting the President of the United States, calling out in the middle of President Obama’s speech on health care reform, “You lie!” Pressured by his leadership, Wilson apologized promptly, while maintaining the untruth of assertions by the President regarding illegal aliens being excluded from receiving health care.

While the leadership of the Republican Party acted promptly to correct a faux pas by Wilson, I suspect that Wilson is now the darling of the right-wing blogs and talk radio militants who have so influenced political debate in the past thirty years. After all, Joe Wilson was just showing solidarity with the town hall shouters who have dominated the debate on health care over the past month or two.

The fight over health care reform, like most every issue dividing the parties in Congress, appears to me to be advance campaigning for the elections of 2010 and 2012, especially on the side of the party that is “out” at the moment. The business of politics is getting and keeping electoral dominance, a power search far more absorbing than seeking solutions to issues that affect all the voters, not just those who can be counted on as one party or another’s “base.” It’s all about the patronage and PAC funds, baby.

Political Venom

The outpouring of sympathy and expressions of loss on the death of Edward Moore Kennedy this week have been much in evidence on the news networks, newspapers and magazines. In the blogosphere, there have been many similar expressions of admiration and regret. There have also been appallingly nasty, vitriolic and apoplectic rants against Teddy, Jack, Bobby, their father, and all “Dems,” “leftists,” “socialists,” “Marxists” and “libs,” in an orgy of hatred.

I am not surprised. The past twenty years have marked the ascendancy of scorched earth commentary, sometimes even spilling over from the internet to more mainstream venues. There have certainly been such excesses from both ends of the political spectrum. But the electoral success of the Republican Party in relying on the most extreme elements in the body politic has been much more pronounced.

The campaign for reform of health care has seen such disregard for the truth and pandering to town hall bullies on the part of the Republicans that even overly partisan Democrats like Nancy Pelosi look statesmanlike. The Obama administration seems mired in defensive rhetoric which does nothing to advance their causes, on health care or anything else.

Among the other journalistic memoirs of Ted Kennedy is a Newsweek article by Elsa Walsh, telling of Kennedy’s counsel helping Bill Clinton come back from the debacle of the 1994 mid-term elections. Kennedy successfully urged  Clinton to stick to his basic political agenda, especially raising the minimum wage and a scaled-down partial reform of health care. The Senator urged the President to carry the fight to the Republicans, hammering them on insensitivity to the poor and working class  citizens. The strategy worked, Clinton won re-election and some seats were regained in the 1996 elections, although the Republicans retained legislative dominance.

It seems to me that attacking the Republicans on the same points would be effective this time, as it was in 1995-6

Word of the Day

… courtesy of Merriam Webster, with slight modifications by me:

The Word of the Day for August 24, 2009 is:
proffer • \PRAH-fer\ • verb

: to present for acceptance : tender, offer

Felix’s Example Sentence:

Every version of a public option in healthcare proffered by the administration or its progressive allies in Congress has been attacked and in many cases deliberately misrepresented by opponents of reform.

Did you know?

You may notice a striking similarity between “proffer” and “offer.” Are the two words connected by etymology? Yes, indeed. “Proffer” comes from Anglo-French “profrer,” which itself is an alteration of the earlier “porofrir.” That word in turn combines “por-” (which means “forth” and is related to our “pro-”) and “offrir” (which means “to offer” and is an ancestor of our word “offer”). “Proffer” entered English in the 14th century. A more literary word than plain “offer,” it adds or puts stress on the idea of voluntariness, spontaneity, or courtesy on the part of the one doing the tendering.

The Birthday(s) of These United States

A bit behind on observing Independence Day, I will simply re-post a slightly edited entry from last year:

Now that the fireworks are mostly over, it is time to remember the occasion for all the hoopla. On July 2, 1776, the Second Continental Congress voted to declare independence from England, with New York abstaining. Over the next two days, the Congress considered the draft Declaration of Independence, finally on July 4th approving a version with minor changes from Jefferson’s draft. The process of producing formal copies for signatures  was authorized. These copies bore the date of July 4, 1776, even though all the signatures were not completed until later, well into August. There was a long, hard road ahead to make the Declaration effective in actions as well as in words. I believe the Revolutionary War was the longest the United States has ever fought. Perhaps Viet Nam lasted longer, depending on when you designate the beginning and end of both conflicts.

Caring for the Country

After almost nine months of economic decay, collapse of large financial institutions, continuing job losses, foreclosures, bankruptcies and oh, yes, war in Afghanistan threatening Pakistan, a nuclear power, the key issues for Republicans and Democrats to debate are torture and the closing of the Guantanamo mini-Gulag.

Although President Obama and former Vice-President Cheney were not on the same platform, their television addresses last night covered those issues as though they were point-counterpoint.

The Myopia of Power

The past week has been  dominated in the news media nationally by the question of “What did Nancy Pelosi know, and when did she know it?” regarding the briefings or non-briefings in 2002 on water boarding and other torture methods in use by CIA and military operatives in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay. Speaker Pelosi’s denials, qualifications of denials, and re-explanations of her explanations have undermined her own credibility and distracted from the large domestic and foreign issues facing the country.