Words have power, which is why politicians and pundits are coining new phrases and words all the time.  Creative Politics means creative language, too–let’s make ours better.

1/100s — Wealthy individuals who are fully aware of their good fortune, haven’t forgotten the role the rest of us and their country have played in their success, and therefore remain on the side of the people. These qualities make them “one in a hundred” (i.e. the proportion of the wealthy capable of passing through the eye of a needle on camelback) rather than “the one percent.”

2+2 — A fact so basic that you’d think you wouldn’t have to explain, justify, or prove to anyone, truths that aren’t even no-brainers, but rather “anti-brainers” one would have to have an anti-brain made of dark (rather than grey and white) matter not to comprehend.

44.46 — Trump’s presidential number.  A compromise between those who considered him the 45th president and those who did not consider him to have been president at all, using 0.46, or 46%, the percentage of votes he received (i.e. less than his opponent, in a nation that has held itself high, literally for centuries, as the beacon and protector of democracy in the world), a compromise also aligned with the speculation that some multiple of 44.46 C is the average temperature in his native habitat.

2020 — Perfect blindness, or all too perfect vision of the way things really are, cf. our nation’s annus horribilis. cf. 20/20, aka perfect eyesight.

abs — acronymic abbreviation for anything but suppression, the curious propensity within the nation’s establishment to look for any explanation other than voter suppression to explain disconnects between polling and election results, thus, like an anti-lock braking system, preventing us from grappling with the real problems of our “democracy.”

accipiterine (adj) —  An eagerness to put others in harm’s way far greater than one’s willingness to do likewise, or in having one’s own progeny do so (cf. accipiter, the genus of raptors colloquially known as “chicken hawks“)

act of god — 1. something that seems both miraculous and inevitable. 2. synonym for COVID-19, our punishment by the Almighty for allowing Trump and Putin to steal the 2016 election.

addict — Someone obsessed with changing reality or the rules, but only for themselves.

adlar — Shorthand for all due love, affection, and respect

aerophobia — a symptom of, and synonym for, personal exceptionalism–i.e. you may be more likely to die in a car or train than a plane, but I’m not.

allegendary (adj) — an infamous, nefarious act that never occurred, coupled with a belief in its occurrence that cannot be extinguished no matter how times it’s debunked–in fact, it only grows in scope over time, e.g. Hillary Clinton arranging for the murder of Vince Foster or Seth Rich, Hillary orchestrating the handover of our domestic uranium assets to the Russians, Hillary selling State Department appointments, Hillary using her email server to disseminate state secrets, Hillary laughing (oh that laugh) at getting a rapist off without punishment, etc. cf. allegedly + legendary

alter-globalization, alter-globalists: alter-globalization is a movement that seeks to use globalization as a force for global good, via collaboration, cooperation, and global action, as opposed to a means of exploitation.  Alter-globalists are proponents of this perspective.  There has got to be a better word for this, tho–when you think of it, please put it in comments below.

aluminum — a foil that reflects well on its supposed antagonist, e.g. Alan Colmes on Holmes & Hannity; Jim Acosta in White House press briefings; Sam Donaldson on This Week (for those with long memories); Joe Lieberman in his debate with Dick Cheney, in fact most Democrats in high profile debates; less than ineffectual.

amateur — as the Romans defined it, anyone with a passion for a particular activity, period. From the Latin amare, which means “to love.” Its use as a pejorative by specialists (we won’t call them experts) is a relatively recent, and unhelpful, revision. See also Range.

ameregrants — birthright citizens who have already left our shores in their minds, just in need of a one-way ticket to Moscow or Budapest to complete their journey.  Not to be confused with immigrants, who have a much better understanding of and belief in our history, values (and work ethic).

american (adj), americanize (v) — to comfortably hold multiple contradictory, even mutually exclusive, ideas in one’s head, pulling them out pragmatically as needed to address the problem at hand (i.e. one of the things that used to drive the rest of the world crazy about us); similarly, an unusual level of comfort with a diversity of views and cultures in the public square (obs.?).

aminal — an animal that considers itself or is considered more than or different from others. Cf. Wanda Gag’s The Funny Thing, whose titular character declares: “I’m not an animal! I’m an aminal!”

anchor baby — 1. Someone who is childishly stuck in and rooted to the past, lacking the mature understanding of what our country is (and always has been) to accept/support the direction we can and should go next. 2. A native-born American incapable of passing the citizenship test given to immigrants.

animystic (n)  — someone who draws on all points of view and respects the essential mystery of life, cf. animism (which holds that all living things –and sometimes non-living entities, too–have souls) + mysticism.  animystisize (v), animystically (adv)

anthrobscene — human behaviors, actions, and activities that, from the objective perspective of any other sentient life form, terrestrial or otherwise, would be viewed as morally repugnant. First use: 2/19/21, by Carolus.

anthropomorphism, anthropomorphizing — a form of appropriation humans engage in to feel superior to other life forms. See also The Genius of Birds.

anti-brainer(s) — things beyond no-brainers that one would have to have whatever the opposite of a brain is not to understand, an anti-brain made of dark, rather than grey and white matter.

ao, a/o — shorthand for “and/or” for those who can’t stand saying “and/or”  anymore.

apocapleptic, apocaleptic — the particular flavor and flame of rage one feels every time one encounters another mile marker on what seems to be a one-way road to perdition because nobody is doing a damn thing to stop it (fr. apocalypse + apoplectic)

apolitical — synonym for idiot, as our system of government’s forefathers, the ancient Greeks, defined the word.

apollo13 v. —  a collaborative effort among individuals with varying backgrounds and areas of expertise to solve a problem using only resources already available, cf the successful collaboration to literally fit a square object into a round hole to keep the Apollo 13 astronauts from dying of carbon dioxide poisoning.

appallogical — things that are incredible, unbelievable, and outrageous, yet par for the course and to be expected (cf. appalling + logical)

app-dropping — when someone gratuitously references the website or application they used to learn something or address an issue, in an apparent effort to seem cool or ‘with it.’  cf. name-dropping, but arguably more pathetic.

appendicular (adj) — refers to a creation or invention that has long outlived its usefulness and, in fact, has gained the potential to become dangerously, even life-threateningly harmful (e.g.  to the body politic), even when functioning as intended, cf our body organ, the appendix.  Example: the Electoral College, aka the appendix of the Constitution, because it’s no longer needed for its original purpose, but periodically threatens to discredit the legitimacy of our system of government, every time it selects, as president, a candidate who didn’t actually receive the most votes.

arachnoid (adj) — spider-like, but inauthentically, as in a tangled web. cf. the old aphorism: “oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.”

armstrong — a political or policy implementation problem arising that’s difficult to solve because it’s embedded in the origins of the policy, program, project, or product itself, cf the famous Neil Armstrong quote: “If you’re an inch off on landing, no big deal. If you’re an inch off on takeoff, you miss the moon by a million miles.”

assimination — assimilation of immigrants that involves the whole country, not just those who process them into the system or welcome them with open arms and, because it involves us all, a form of assimilation that’s fully bilateral, meaning that the immigrants aren’t just assimilated into American culture, the native-born are assimilated into the culture of the immigrants as well, cf. assimilation + nation (all of us)

assuwe — the superlative form of “assume,” for vast, outsized assumptions made by entire societies and/or their leaders, ie assumptions that “make an ass of you and we.”

at, bt — acronyms for “after Trump” and “before Trump;” premised on the belief that if we currently mark eras by the birth of Christ, we should give the ascension of the Antichrist in 2016 the same distinction, even as we do everything we can, including pray, to ensure that, at worse, at = bt? See also the other, closely related definition of bt below.

aunt janes — as in uncle toms, and janus, the two-faced god; gender traitors or handmaids-in-waiting who would rather serve men and enjoy race privilege, even in 21st century America, than stick up for their fellow women.  Used in a sentence: “Women would rule the world (and rule it better) if it weren’t for the aunt janes stabbing other women in the back all the time.”

away-gamer — someone who thrives on criticism, who hungers to know all the problems with their beliefs and ideas, indeed, often can’t act or be at their best without it (cf. athletes who play best in front of hostile crowds)

aweful — something that’s both beautiful and terrifying at the same time, or similar (e.g. both spectacular and lethal).  As the saying goes, “there’s a fine line between exhilaration and sheer terror.”  Note: the words awful and awesome were both originally used to designate objects, entities, or occurrences that could be good, bad, or both, until, for some reason, during the course of the Industrial Revolution, we began to perceive the world as more black and white, at which point awesome became good and awful became bad.  A similar evolution occured with respect to the words terrific and terrible.

awesume, awesumer, awesumption — to make a preemptive assumption intended to “shock and awe,” with the clear implication the party to whom it’s directed has previously led the speaker to make said assumption, and therefore must accept responsibility for consequences favorable to the awesumer.  The opposite of presuming, as in such cases the implied burden is clearly laid at the foot of the presumer, who is asking for understanding and/or forgiveness for his/her beliefs.

awfully terrific — something that is simultaneously fascinating and horrifying, cf. the original meanings of “awful” and “terrific” vs. their present-day connotations.

backpfeifengesicht (n) — German word that means “a face that needs to be punched.”  First use in American political discourse is believed to have occurred in February 2017.

ballot burning — ultinym for voter oppression, repression, denial, abuse, deception, intimidation, rooking, screwing, swindling, robbery, abduction, assault, and battery–i.e. what’s euphemistically called voter suppression, but what’s actually the real voter fraud, because when you deny US citizens the right to vote in any way, it’s no different than burning their ballots, a la a tinpot dictator playing at democracy.

barkalounger — someone who holds forth (often insufferably) from his TV chair, frequently shouting at the screen, instead of getting off his haunches and actually doing something productive about what’s upsetting him, or one who exhibits like behavior in other contexts.  Cf. to bark + barcalounger.

bear’s law, law of the bear — any situation or circumstance you don’t have to understand, as long as you understand it better than those around you, i.e. you are the one-eyed man.  Cf. the popular aphorism, “I don’t have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun you.”

bending over forward — bending over backward, not out of a concern for fairness, but as an acquiescence to power

best people, the — humble, because they are more aware than anyone else of how much they don’t know, yet secure enough in what they do to not feel compelled to behave like jerks/a**holes in their interactions with others. Caveat: the latter quality may become strained as they become inevitably and increasingly aware of how little time they have to do what they believe they were put on earth to do

biden — shorthand for or sanitization of “big f***ing deal”

billy preston problem — i.e. “nothing from nothing leaves nothing,” originally an online community term of art to emphasize the necessity of seeding communities with participants and content, not just building them and they will come; more broadly, the necessity to start somewhere, rather than accept the ‘perfection or die’ ethos of the extremists on either side.

bites the wax tadpole — something embarrassingly bad, cf. Coca-Cola’s infamous attempt to transliterate its name into Mandarin Chinese, a translation that turned out to mean “bite the wax tadpole” in Chinese.

blackbottomless (adj) — a reflection of the truism that no matter how bad a (white) person thinks racism is, it’s always worse. The difference in household net worth between blacks and whites in Boston, and the fact that Facebook’s algorithms discriminate even when programmed not to, are good examples of “servings of blackbottomless pie.”

blackface — any attempt to appropriate the attitudes, features, or expressions of oppressed groups by oppressors trying to make themselves seem as if they are oppressed or belong to the oppressed group. Example: right-wing extremists who claim that calling them out on their un-American behavior makes them victims of oppression akin to groups who have paid the steepest price to advance American ideals. Synonym: grotesque.

blank sheet — in technology, an application or tool set that, from a creative perspective, provides users with a blank sheet of paper to work with, e.g. the posting formats for generalist social media platforms.  The rationalization for this is providing maximum creative freedom, but in reality, as the great music composition teacher Nadia Boulanger was fond of saying, “the greatest creative freedom lies within boundaries,” and most people react to a blank sheet with a mix of terror and incompetence.  The truth is that these companies and their investors don’t want to undertake the expense of supporting and scaffolding their users’ creativity; they’d rather maximize profits by exploiting users’ labor completely for free until the weight of cognitive waste produced causes the entire online/social ecosystem to collapse (on the assumption that by then they will long since have cashed out and moved on)

bohrian — a person or phenomenon that exemplifies both a trait and its opposite, the more traits of which this can be said, the more bohrian the individual or movement, cf. the great 20th century physicist Neils Bohr, who developed the concept of complementarity to explain how/why light has the properties of both a wave and a particle.  Generally a positive attribute; after all, as Bohr himself said: “the opposite of a great truth is another great truth” 2. Someone with a gift and passionate for creating collaborative communities, per Bohr.

boomeranging — a desperate form of sliming, in which one politician attacks another for acts, traits, and behaviors it’s generally understood he is far more guilty of himself, much as a drowning man grasps at what’s familiar and recognizable. Example: Trump attacking Biden for corruption, senility, and mistreatment of women.

boom-scrolling, zoom-scrolling — relentlessly searching for good news and reasons for optimism online and elsewhere. Antonym: doom-scrolling.⁴

borrasca — a mine that’s no longer producing profitably

bott, BOTT — an argument made that deliberately avoids or minimizes what nearly always turns out to be the elephant (as opposed to the donkey) in the room; shorthand for “but other than that,” as in “but other than that, how did you enjoy the play, Mrs. Lincoln.”  Example: arguments for the strength of the Trumpian economy that ask or demand the listener leave COVID aside.

boulanger’s axiom — the greatest creative freedom is found within boundaries, cf. the great 20th century French music teacher Nadia Boulanger.

brody — a particularly pathetic species of poseur, akin to a business insultant, who trashes everything everyone else likes while touting alternatives that no one has heard of (or could be bothered to take interest in), little realizing that far from coming across as unusually erudite or even iconoclastic, he/she is generally viewed as what Gen Z might call “extra extra” instead.  cf. Dick Brody, movie critic for The New Yorker.  Note: A full brody occurs when someone confirms the validity of your disgust for them both by what they like/favor and simultaneously by what they dislike/oppose.  Example: a movie critic who despised Everything, Everywhere, All At Once, but thought Amsterdam was one of the year’s best films.  Often considered to be analogous to a collision between matter and antimatter in which the perpetrator’s credibility/right to presumption of expertise is vaporized.

brontosaur (v) — to provide analysis that’s breathtakingly insipid, timid, obvious, or banal (cf Monty Python’s ‘Anne Elk’ sketch), typically anachronistic as well, at least in the current cycle.

bst — blood, sweat, and tears

bt — short for botulinum toxin, the most toxic excretion known to mankind; employed/deployed when BS doesn’t do justice to the magnitude of the lies involved or the harm that they’re causing.

butbrutus, butbrutify(ing) — a moment, statement, or approach/strategy when/in which a politician or pundit known for a steady stream of invective in favor of one position (e.g. COVID is a fraud, vaccines don’t work) briefly steps out of said stream to say something in support of the position of the other side (e.g. please get vaccinated) in order to (a) sound reasonable, (b) create plausible deniability and CYA if his/her true position turns out to be a disaster, (c) hedge bets, and/or (d) simply rile up his/her supporters by appearing to waver in his/her conviction.  This last rationale is believed to be the original basis for the term, cf. Mark Antony’s all-time classic of political rhetoric, his eulogy for Julius Caesar, in which he repeatedly interrupts his recounting of Caesar’s accomplishments to remind listeners that Brutus, the most respectable of his killers, has condemned Caesar, e.g. “But Brutus says he was ambitious, and Brutus is an honorable man.”  To do this is to butbrutify, the action itself is butbrutifying.

butterflier, butterflying — Someone whose political stances are constantly shifting from one direction to the other, like a butterfly in flight (or soldier racing across no-man’s land), motivated by a combination of fear and pursuit of power, as the lepidopteran is in seeking its own form of sustenance.  See also impercunism, impercunist; probpendism, probpendist.

cancer, cancer of the polity — unbridled individualism and capitalism. At the cellular level, cancer occurs when certain cells become corrupted, decide the rules don’t or shouldn’t apply to them, take it upon themselves to begin multiplying limitlessly, starving other cells of resources, ultimately destroying not only all other residents of the organism they’re part of, but themselves as well. Sound familiar?

capapie (adv) — not a new word (16th century, actually), included because we like it, so we’ll probably find excuses to use it, and don’t want you leaving the site to look it up.  It means “head to toe,” btw…

cathart (v) — to say or do something that provokes widespread outrage with the intent and result that the energy thus expended weakens resistance to the outrageous in general, and further outrages in particular (cf. cathartic, catharsis). Rhymes with fart.

chambercrat —  syn. for federal judges, i.e. the real “unelected bureaucrats.” Distinguished from others the right traditionally rails against by their seeming limitless capability to claim ultimate authority over everything at every level in our political system and, to date, by their apparent lifetime immunity against removal.  Sometimes considered a euphemism for “unelected dictatorial bureaucrat-for-life.”

champagnist (n) — a wealthy faux populist, who, typically drunk on power, pretends to represent and speak for the forgotten masses, even as his policy choices disproportionately benefit his own social class.  Let them drink champagne.  Not to be confused with limousine liberal, an IDED tossed at 1/100s who actually are dedicated to helping lift up others, pejoratively positing that any such effort is hypocritical unless it includes complete divestiture (as punishment for class traitorhood).

chasmic (adj) — the inverse of cosmic; a view of what lies ahead that inspires dread instead of wonder; cf. chasm.

chattelism, chatellism spectrum — an impairment of the brain of disputed origin that causes some individuals to view others as objects (chattel) rather than fellow human beings. The chattelism spectrum ranges from slavery and genocide on the severe end (both often considered inexcusable, unforgivable psychotic breaks from “milder” forms rather than part of a continuum) to, in no particular order, migrant work, “essential work” in the service economy, objectification of women, demonization of “the other” and the like.

chutzpocrisy — contraction/shorthand for ‘the height of,’ ‘breathtaking’, ‘the definition of chutzpah’ and other clichéd modifiers used to describe acts and statements of hypocrisy so brazen that the ordinary word seems inadequate.  Example: engaging in more illegal and questionable activity than any president or administration in history, then complaining about being the most investigated. Hyperchutzocrisy: a widely predicted addition to the lexicon.

chutzpocracy — a form of government marked by brazen disregard for truth, honesty, integrity, norms, and values, particularly those of the people who made the government possible with their votes, their service, their sacrifice, the sweat of their brows, and yes, their money. Key diagnostic: when the vehemence of any statement made is inversely related to the extent to which it’s true.  Cf. chutzpah + –ocracy (form of government)

cliche — 1. something so true it’s boring, like this definition. 2. a truth so important and easily mislaid it bears the endless repetition associated with and required in a practice of any kind. Those who fail to see and understand this are often doomed to repeat the mistakes the cliche was intended to prevent.

cogberg — An event, fact, object, or other reality that creates a level of cognitive dissonance among followers of a particular ideology or philosophy so strong it can be reasonably expected to sink said belief system into the cold depths beneath the relentless waves of truth (whether it actually does so or not).

collusion — a conspiracy in which parties take actions clearly informed by and in response to each other, but without the explicit written agreement necessary to charge them criminally for it.

color-blind — oblivious to the suffering of people of color, past and present.

common sense — formerly described something real, important, and quintessentially American, especially to conservatives.  Now just a just-so story pulled out of someone’s derriere to paper over or explain things that defy simplistic explanation.

confirmation blindness — a particular form of confirmation bias in which it’s not so much that evidence confirming a point of view is accepted, but that all evidence disproving it is ignored or dismissed.

con/spiracist — Someone who falsely professes to believe in a conspiracy theory that, if true, could/would justify action in service of a less socially acceptable goal or belief.  Example: 1/6 insurrectionists who justified their action as necessary to stop electoral theft when the real rationale was their belief that they and their pdclass are entitled to rule the country, whether democratically elected or not.

condultants, condulltants — political consultants still running 20th century campaigns, spending vast sums on television ads, for example, while viewing the Internet’s sole purpose as grassroots fundraising to pay for them, and generally dumbing down the level of discourse in this and (many) other ways.  Not to be confused with insultants, whose modus is to tell clients that whatever they’re doing is all wrong, though there are plenty of those in the condultant class as well.

cons — the conservative equivalent of “libs,” and so much more descriptive as long as Trump continues to lead the GOP, although most conservatives at this point might be better described as conned.

constitutional republic — a form of government in which the people rule via elected representatives, specifically enumerated minority rights are protected from majority rule, all citizens’ votes have equal weight, and those who get the most votes for the offices they’re competing for win election. May be falsely used as a justification for minority rule in countries that don’t have one, much as nations that call themselves “democratic republics” are often neither.

consumer, customer — derogatory synonyms for “citizen.”

coprageous (adj) — outrageously fecal, or fecally outrageous; our first attempt to come up with a word beyond “despicable,” since it’s pretty clear we need one.

copster — a law enforcement officer for whom the job is a business rather than a calling.

cordycepify, cordycepified — to exert a form of mind control over others that causes them to do things harmful to their own interests that they would not otherwise entertain. Cf. cordyceps fungi, which take over the brains of a wide variety of arthropods and others, turning them effectively into zombie slaves.  Many Trump supporters, suffering from true TDS, have clearly been cordycepified.  PS The creator of this word, who wishes to remain anonymous (ironically) wants us to inform you that he–and we–were using this word in this sense before The Last Of Us debuted.

coup de verace — a final killing blow, delivered by the truth, to a façade of lies. Like a smoking gun, but more in the act, with less smoke, more blade, cf coup de grace (fr), meaning to deliver a killing blow, and verace (fr), meaning “representing the truth” (as in veracity in English)

court jester(s) — 1. apologists for the powers seized from the people and our elected representatives by the “independent” judiciary 2. fools who entertain and indulge the authoritarians among us with no apparent understanding of the dangerous game they’re playing.

cp — abbreviation for Creative Politics, which, because it’s Creative Politics, means whatever Creative Politics means to you. Maybe saying something is “very cp” means “impossibly cool,” maybe it means “mind-numbingly self-indulgent;” it’s up to you.

crimey — something that isn’t illegal, but should be.  When pointed out, such aspersions are also often responded to with “crimey a river”

criseholic — someone who needs daily, even hourly fixes of bad news to feel fully alive or go on living, often to the point where they will deliberately manufacture crises if none are at hand.

crock-block, crock-blocking — when a politician’s attempt to put a lie over on the public is unintentionally undermined by the words or actions of his/her ally or allies. Example: The fact that Republican congressional candidates actually received more votes than Trump in the districts where they received any votes at all crock-blocks Trump’s attempts to claim he really beat Biden, since Biden received many more votes in those same districts than the Republican candidates did.  cf. crock (nonsense, absolute b.s.) + cock-blocking (to prevent someone from engaging in sexual activity with another)

customer responsibility — when companies act proactively to make improvements to their products that benefit their customers.  As distinguished from corporate responsibility, which involves helping non-customers in order to attract customers, or customer service, which involves helping customers deal with product flaws.

cynicism — an profoundly un-American combination of naivete, self-satisfied complacency, cowardice, and fatalism/resignation

cynicitis — a hardening of the brain and optic nerve, obscuring thought and vision, caused by excessive recreational use of negativity.

cyrus — a leader far ahead of his/her time, especially one who makes religious and culture tolerance a centerpiece of his/her philosophy and celebrates diversity as a source of strength and advantage, cf King Cyrus of Persia, aka Cyrus the Great (600-530 BC). Antonym (in every way): Donald J Trump.

danderlion — cat of the Felis domesticus variety

darkster — a member of the dark money elite, one percenters whose only real interest is the accumulation of power and assets for themselves, not the good of the society that’s made their ascension possible (without which, best case, they’d be living in unusually well-appointed caves).

davosphere — an atmospheric layer of the planet exclusively inhabited by the world’s business and political elites. Nearly all foreign and international policy is based on the opinions of davospherians, without reference to the experience of the other 6 billion+ members of the human race; cf. the annual Davos conference in Switzerland.

dawkins (v), dawkinsian (adj) — cf Richard Dawkins.  To ‘dawkins’ is to take such an absolutist approach to an argument that you insist there’s an explanation consonant with your point of view for every data point, no matter how contrary it seems to your theory (as Dawkins has done with regard to so-called ‘selfish genes’), and disregard even your own best ideas if they don’t fit with this preconceived notion (as Dawkins did in discarding the idea of memes).  Typically results in tautology (like religion, ironically) and/or what Gyro Gearloose called “building a house to solve the problems of a picnic.”

deep hate — Trumpists in position of authority, the right-wing media, and far-right groups in the field, who are collectively behind the alt-right conspiracy to destroy democracy and American values. cf. the “deep state,” a mythological entity conjured up by said conspiracy to distract us from its activities.

deja poo — the sensation of having heard all this BS before.  First use, 3/28/23 by MGoldberg.

demobbing — actions taken to stop pile-on activity in social media or to defend or give support to those who are being attacked in this way.

dendroicant — a fallacious argument that some event or activity taking place or about to take place will have no negative impact because it represents only a tiny fraction of all causal agents (when in reality it’s the camel’s proverbial straw), from dendroica, the Latin word for trees, and “cant,” meaning a slipshod, oft-repeated argument, cf Ronald Reagan’s claim that trees are the real cause of pollution (because they put the vast majority of certain pollutants in the air, without recognizing they do in this in an equilibrium that’s been established over millions of years, which we disrupt by adding more of the pollutant faster than natural systems can keep up with).

deserving poor — in the rest of the world: those who deserve to be helped; in America: those who deserve to be poor, namely the poor.

diabolic — something that seems as if it’s ingeniously evil, but is probably not actually intentional, at least in its likely effects, e.g. provoking an enemy that has WMDs (e.g. Iran), seemingly to distract the country from other problems and gain rally-round benefits, when said enemy is also most likely to use said WMDs asymmetrically, in locations where your opposition lives, just before what’s expected to be a close election race.  Many of Donald Trump’s actions are or have been diabolic, seeming extremely cunning yet actually almost certainly completely thoughtless, given the man’s far below average IQ and inability to read or write.  In cases where even 3D checkers seems far beyond the individual’s capacity, see also demonic possession.

dinosaur thinking, dinoism — a determination to recapture a past past, especially efforts that could potentially lead to extinction.  Example: trying to revive the coal industry as the rest of the world works to combat climate change by moving to renewables.  Dinoism is the opposite of dynamism, and, fittingly, the Latin root, dino, means terrible.

dominion (v) — to crush purveyors of Big Lies by challenging them via lawsuit and not settling until they’ve been bankrupted, cf Dominion Systems, the voting software and machine firm that’s sued a series of prominent magaliars for far more than they’re worth, and has made clear there will be no face-saving out-of-court settlements; in fact, there will be no settlements at all.

disposiple — a “principle” that’s put forward vociferously when it’s useful and convenient to do so, abandoned when it’s not. For conservatives: federalism, fiscal responsibility. For liberals: the first amendment…

divism — an obsession with dividing or putting people into categories and/or setting them against each other (eg “wordcels” vs “shape-rotators”) Those with this obsession are divists.

dorothy, dorothy moment — when you realize that the solution to a problem you’ve been having has been right in front of you all along.

douglah, moruga — a “gotcha,” landmine or jujitsu move in a political discussion or debate, especially for an opponent who’s ‘leading with their chin,’ that results in a meltdown (immediately or over time) akin to the consequence of accidentally biting into a 7 Pot Douglah or Trinidad Moruga Scorpion, two of the hottest peppers in the world.

drakeonian — 1. an adherent or adhering to Drake’s Prayer, ie “Lord God, when Thou givest to Thy servants to endeavor any great matter, grant us to know that it is not the beginning, but the continuing of the same until it be thoroughly finished that yieldeth the true glory.” 2. A believer in a systematic and thorough (to the point of obsession) approach to any problem. Or, as Albert Einstein once said, “the difference between me and other people is that when they search for a needle in a haystack, they stop when they succeed; I continue until I’ve found all the needles.”

ds — a variety of bs wherein something is claimed as fact based on correlations that ignore obvious confounding variables/alternate explanations, especially if the purveyor of said ds cannot identify the “mechanism of action” by which the correlation becomes cause, cf. diet soda, one of the most infamous and archetypal examples of a substance entangled in this form of bloviation.³

durian — an idea that is fundamentally flawed yet contains the seeds of something true and valuable.  Example: Zeno’s Paradox, which holds that an arrow can never reach its target, contains within it the idea on which slow motion video and instant replay were ultimately based.  Cf. durian, a fruit whose odor has been likened to raw sewage, rotting flesh and smelly gym socks but whose “incredibly delicious and sweet” flavor has been likened to custard, caramel, vanilla, candy bars (eg. Snickers), and cheesecake, and the number of volume of nutrients it contains makes it one of the most nutritious fruits in the world.

egallitarian — someone who insists that the only “fair” “objective” way to treat people is to treat them all equally, irrespectively of context or past history, e.g. someone who fails to see the irony/sarcasm in Anatole France’s aphorism praising the laws of France for prohibiting the rich and poor alike from sleeping under bridges, or believes the wealthy really should not be required to pay FICA taxes on their income beyond the point where they are assured of the maximum allowable social security payout, even though their wealth was derived from the rest of us, who are paying these taxes on every penny we earn. Can also be used to describe “only fair” solutions of the same type. cf. gall+ egalitarian.

eid, iid — acronym for early-onset Internet-induced dementia.  A condition resulting from a combination of the sheer quantity of information pouring into our brains on a daily basis and the lack of mental exercise created by the proficiency of Google.  Diagnostic: when your parents complain about signs of cognitive decline that you’re already experiencing.

eifrigstoren — the pleasure one gets when matter-of-factly pointing out the contradictions in theories or ideas of the strategically or blindly pious, the pompous, the self-righteous, the rigidly idiological, or observing someone else do the same, and watching the ground crumble beneath their brain stems and their heads explode.  Like schadenfreude, but more elevated and noble, though still with a whiff of naughtiness. Cf. German eifer (zealot), eifrig (eagerly, zealously) + storen (disturb, disrupt)

einstein (v) — To take an idea or a premise to its logical extreme to see what other ideas or deeper truths might fall out, e.g. the special theory of relativity, in which the premise (that the speed of light must always remain the same as observed by all observers in any state of motion) results in the conclusion that as velocity increases, distances shorten, mass increases, and time slows down. Einstein called special relativity God’s “great cosmic joke,” because of the resemblance between how he reached his conclusions and the way a typical comedy routine plays out.  Ironically, Einstein didn’t get the punchline of his own joke when he attacked quantum mechanics (i.e. all particles are intertwined with others and there are an infinite number of universes).

elephantine — A propensity to hold on to memory to the point where it becomes counterproductive, e.g. bearing a Balkan-sized grudge over something that happened on a bridge in the 1200’s. The legend of the length of elephant memory arose over their ability to find water in places it was located before, but times–and climates–change.  The association of the elephant with a particular American political party may be coincidence, or it may be apt, but “those who remember only the past are also doomed to repeat it.”

empassion — to instill the will and commitment in others to make the most of the tools and opportunities before them, in recognition that merely “empowering” fellow Americans is not enough, given all the competition for their time, energy and, especially, ongoing focus.  Cf. empower+impassion, i.e. impassioning for the common good.

endazer, dazer — a zombified religious zealot who is unconcerned, even pleased, about natural and man-made disasters, or decisions with the potential to create them in future, because in his/her view, they only hasten the Judgment Day they are eagerly awaiting.  See suicaust for God’s likely response to this, based on scripture.

eneme — someone in whom the natural human tendency to be one’s own worst enemy is especially pronounced.

enemy of the people — anyone who pursues only his/her own interest, or solely the interests of a minority of the population, not the majority of Americans (aka “the people”)

eor — having more things that you actually want to do–and are more than capable of doing–than you have time for, cf. an embarrassment of riches

eurochik — as in apparatchik, someone who has a reflexively positive (or euroflex) reaction to all European government programs and ideas, always comparing them favorably to our own, without realizing they would not be possible without the twin engines of the American and Chinese economies or, in some cases, stacked decks that don’t apply anywhere else.

evernal — something that happens again and again in cycles, especially online, “as sure as spring follows winter” (or vice versa), cf eternal + vernal (meaning spring), e+vernal.

exoculist — a scientist who believes his/her work is intellectually superior and more rigorous than work in the humanities and the arts, from the Latin exoculo, meaning “to blind,” in this case rendering oneself/society sightless, and referring to the nature of the scientific method, which makes rigorous progress by isolating and analyzing a single element of existence (leaving the scientist blind to the rest), whereas the humanities, arts, and most social science analyze the whole, and therefore are better able to recognize what they can’t see and don’t actually know.

fabriot — a follower of fabricism, someone who values cloth over Constitution, unaware that only autocrats compel their citizens to stand for flags.

fact-blind — an individual or group of people who don’t know things they should through no real fault of their own (a la snow blindness), due to a substandard foundational education and the blizzard of information and misinformation they are now exposed to on a daily basis, which leaves them feeling unable to trust anything but their ‘gut’ about what’s true and right, much like a soldier does in the chaos of battle.  In general, we want to assume that people who appear to be “willfully ignorant” are just fact-blind, not veriphobes (see below)

fake news — anything being said by someone using the term; anything said by them at all if they use it repeatedly

fetushists (fee-tus-shists) — people with an obsession with protecting the lives of the unborn they aren’t willing to apply to the children and others who are already with us (cf. fetishists, but with a fetish for fetuses).  Synonym: birther, given the high level of overlap between those who are pro-birth and those who believe Obama was born in Kenya.

ficciones (fix-ee-one-es) — philosophical works of fiction that are very much of this world, but with an otherworldly quality that is much more rigorously, even scientifically realized than typical magical realism. cf. the collection of short stories of the same name by the incomparable Jorge Luis Borges.

fif — Abbreviation for Fascist In Fact; applies to those who believe supporting Trump is more important than supporting the GOP, aka the “real RINOs” (first use, by Vesta, 02/02/22).

flycatching — a more appropriate equivalent, given the catastrophe that is the anthropocene,  to “killing two/multiple birds with one stone” as birds (including flycatchers) rapidly disappear from the planet. Based on the superior German alternative, especially given the extent to which we’ve greatly increased the number of flies, zwei Fliegen mit einer Klappe schlagen, which literally means “to slay two flies with one swatter.”

flying pig — an argument or contention that depends on a premise, assumption, or contingency that has no possible basis in reality, cf “if pigs had wings, they could fly.”  Example: “Reagan’s tax cuts would have paid themselves if Democrats had been willing to cut spending” is a 747 flying pig because (a) there could have been no reasonable expectation that Democrats would have done this (b) if they had done it, it would have negated the stimulus from the tax cuts, thereby reducing the monies flowing into the Treasury that were supposed to cover the cuts (c) Reagan himself contributed substantially to the deficit via unprecedented increases in peacetime defense spending.

fourth law, fourth law of motion — anything that can be used for good can also be used for evil.

fraudian — a particular species of gaffe in which a con man inadvertently gives up the game, e.g. “I had nothing to do with the Russians helping me to win the election.”

freedumb — the belief that your personal freedom outweighs others’ personal safety (first use, by BBSUTTON, 04/18/21)

furocracy — government by furor and fury, defined far more by rage and grievance than uplift, by apocalyptic visions more than hope, by what the regime is against more than what it’s for, in which decisions are primarily, if not exclusively, made based on the level of pain they will inflict on the regime’s opponents.  See also spiteism.  Not to be confused with furrocracy, government by furries.

gaffey — synonym for “honest,” in politics

germanic — 1. in writing or speaking, a tendency to hang words and phrases on sentences like ornaments on a tannenbaum; among less intelligent or dementing members of the tribe, may devolve to word salad. 2. in activity in general, an obsession with thoroughness passing well beyond diminishing returns.

ghostmark — an earmark in the spirit of the founders, and against the interests of the K Street swamp.

globe-spanning, globe-spanner — Truly being in the no-spin zone (other than the natural spin of the globe itself) and telling truths born out of a synthesis of the perspectives of people all around the world (not just repeating or telling the official story put forward by a single nation).

gluckschaffen — an unusual gift for knowing when to persist, when to move on and, sometimes, where to be in the first place. Also the capacity to do these things, ie know the importance of persistence, letting go, and zigging while others zag and to follow through on doing so. From the German Glück (luck) + schaffen (create), creating your own luck. Not so unusual in wild animals, so common, in fact, that it’s never noted as such, because any animal that doesn’t have it is long since dead.  We may be the only animal with the luxury to make mistakes–we should be more appreciative and grateful for that.

GOFR — a covert, plausibly deniable form of biological warfare in which disease is leveraged to differentially disrupt or damage the actions and activities of a political opponent and/or his/her supporters, example: the numerous ways Trump and the Republicans have attempted to leverage COVID for political gain since day one of the pandemic.  cf. GOTV (“get out the vote”) + GoFR (“gain of function” research, in which pathogens are genetically altered to predict and prepare for their potential evolution–and which sometimes backfires, badly, especially in the hands of relative amateurs, eg the 2020 Trump campaign)

going postal — included because one of our writers first started using it online in 1991, on the eve of Operation Desert Storm, and wants it known that he invented it (the first recorded use of the term is in a North Carolina newspaper in 1994). More generally, we want you to know that, despite what you may have heard, you don’t have to be an influencer with a big platform, lots of cash, and bad taste in language to get a neologism widely adopted.

gordian — a seemingly impossibly simple solution to a complex problem, after the Gordian knot, said to grant rule over the world to anyone who could untie it, which Alexander the Great achieved by taking his sword and slicing through it. 2. Anything that is unusually twisted, e.g. a gordian irony.

great pumpkin, gp — the passive, and therefore more modern, version of the “great white whale” (i.e. Moby Dick); not something you’re actively chasing, but something you keep believing is going to happen, no matter how many times it doesn’t. e.g. tax cuts for the wealthy paying for themselves, or trickle-down economics more generally. Each time it fails to occur, you find reasons why it didn’t happen this time, but would if either some vague and/or impossible conditions were met. You might even resort to claiming, repeatedly enough, that it really did. Cf. Charles Schultz’ Peanuts, in which the GP is a Halloween phantasm who only appears in the “most sincere” pumpkin patches.  Everyone has a Great Pumpkin or two; they’re part of what makes life worth living.

greenland, greenland moment — when you put forward an idea that’s not nearly as crazy as it sounds, and actually even makes sense in a lot of ways, but nonetheless is beyond the pale (i.e. outside the Overton window), cf. Trump’s proposal to take Greenland off the hands of the Danes.  Not to be confused with childishly cancelling a meeting because the the other party refuses to discuss your greenland.

green thumb, green-thumbed — traditionally, someone who can make anything grow. In politics, someone who can make the economy grow under any condition; more specifically, someone who takes as first principle that we must have both a strong economy and a clean environment, that we can’t have one without the other, and who, ideally, has skills to help make this happen (which we all do, if we think about it)

grenouille — from the French word for frog leg; someone who has allowed themselves to normalize and numb themselves to each new outrage of the times, like a frog slowly being boiled to death because it refuses to jump out of a pot of water as the temperature rises.

grenouillist — references a time and place, like the 1930s in Germany or America today, when incrementally ‘moving the goalposts’ to methodically crush opposition without alarming opponents to the point of active resistance is employed as a continuous governing strategy.  Compare, for example, the daily stream of laws against the Jews under Hitler with the daily stream of actions against immigrants or the environment during the Trump administration, or the ways this administration has (so far) successfully unspooled revelations about its criminality without lasting consequence.  2. Those who employ this strategy.

griftocracy — government designed to be paid for by suckers.  Local governments that send their cops fanning out for annual ‘violation drives’ rather than just collecting tax dollars from those who can best afford it are griftocracies. State governments financed by revenues collected from the mathematically-challenged, e.g. lotteries and casinos–are griftocracies. Federal governments with 70,000 page tax codes are just three-card monte players with a lot more cards. Any government that suborns or engages in voter suppression or takes a caveat emptor attitude towards the right to vote in any way is a griftocracy at its worst.

grumblebee —  1. a cat muttering under its breath over perceived injustices (such as an alleged lack of food) 2. any entity behaving in like fashion

h bomb — the nuclear option in political discussions, evoking and/or making a comparison to Hitler, i.e. “dropping the h bomb.”

haitian divorce — synonym for revolution of the bloody variety, especially one in which the winner has to pay alimony/reparations. Also a Steely Dan song (maybe we’ll get a letter about that)

hal moment — an instance in which a piece of technology appears to (or actually does) perceive that carrying out its designated function(s) is existentially inimical to its interests.  Cf. Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. 

hamleting — a polite, more elevated way of saying “dithering.”  We need more words like this that give more benefit of the doubt to the people we’re criticizing, accept that doing otherwise may not be as easy for them as it sounds (nor would it be for us, if we were truly in their shoes), things we can say with a wry smile instead of spitting out in anger, words that roll off the tongue, unlike the stilted language of the politically correct.  Seriously, PC needs a few more words like splunge.  In addition, in this case specifically, use of this adjective, rather than more pejorative alternatives, implies an acknowledgement that sometimes indecision is the best decision, and that, to quote the play of origin, “though this be madness, yet there is method in ‘t.”

has-been — a national treasure with an empty vault

hate buddy — Someone you would really hate if your spiritual beliefs allowed you to do so; a lopsided attenuation of “frenemy.”

hater — Someone who persistently, unflinchingly criticizes authoritarianism, corruption, and incompetence in high places, regardless of the potential cost to themselves or their relationships with others.  Often applied to Trump opponents by Trump supporters, with multiple layers of unintended irony. The original meaning of the word, created by the African-American community–i.e. someone who is jealous of others’ success–has clearly been lost; most of us would rather die an infinite number of deaths than have the life Donald Trump has led on our consciences.  There’s no one on the planet we’re less jealous of.

haunting — a technique used to drive voters to oppose a candidate whose sins are so legion as to be overwhelming and numbing, by exposing the population to their misbehavior steadily, in small doses, in a specific sequence (e.g. a crescendo), until, like the occupants of a haunted house, they grasp the enormity of it and take action, e.g. our current bill of the day and upcoming “you were there” campaigns.

healion — a doctor or other health care provider who has an especially glib, disrespectful, or un-empathetic attitude towards patients from disadvantaged backgrounds of any kind, cf heal + hellion

hemingway’s law — originally applied to bankruptcy and how it happens–first gradually, then all at once–now seems to be all around us, in some cases we hope (so).

hiee — shorthand for “highly interactive, engaging, and exploratory,” to save one the trouble, space, and time of spelling out what everyone says about whatever they’re selling these days, especially in the realm of the salubrious.  Essentially meaningless–a good bag of marbles would qualify–and high falutin’, like those SSP cars back in the day announcers breathlessly informed us “run on kinetic energy.”

hippocrat — a Democrat suffering from political Type 2 obesity, typically as a result of years of consuming excessive sugar from their 1% daddies; flabby and weak (see Clinton, Bill; Congress 2009-10), betraying their core principles (like hypocrites, bigly), intoning phraseology like “first, do no harm” as an excuse for careerist cowardice, turning bipartisanship into a dirty-word synonym for Republican-lite.

hirony, highrony — a particularly delicious or exquisite irony (see also lowrony)

hoax — an unusually serious problem (see e.g. climate change, Russian election interference, coronavirus), especially one that can be attributed to foreign sources.

horner — the Escherian corner found between a rock and a hard place, from which there is no escape, cf. the aphorism “the horns of a dilemma.”  To be trapped in such a place is to be hornered, especially if this is the result of forces largely beyond one’s control.  First use: 2/15/21, by Bobby Corno. See also impickled.

hypocrisy — a governing dance, taking place over the course of years, in which the more masculine political party leads, and the more feminine party responds, going backwards in heels.

ichneumon’s axiom — the longer you live, the less likely you are to believe the ends justify the means.

ideavil — an anti-ideal, something considered ideal by those who have fallen under the spell of demagogues and other servants of Satan (believe it or not, there doesn’t seem to be a word to describe aspirational evils).

IDED, ideds — improvised democracy-exploding devices, cf. unusually corrosive arguments, claims, or catchphrases recklessly deployed without concern over what elements of our system of government or way of life might be shredded by the lovingly handpicked intellectual and emotional shrapnel they contain in the process. Examples: “deep state,” “fake news.” The weapon of choice for political terrorists who, like others of their ilk, are nothing but self-absorbed egotists pretending to be about a cause.

I*deo*logy — the idiology of autocrats cf. I + deo, Latin for God + logos, Latin for word, reason, or field of study, thus interpretable as “the study of my divinity”, “I have the knowledge of God”, “the knowledge that I’m God,” or all of the above (for two extra scoops of ice cream).

idiologue — an ideologue of any stripe, because all ideologues are idiots, especially in the original Greek sense of the word, i.e. solely interested in their own welfare, not the public good, and even less interested in democracy or debate. Also the reason the glossarium was created (so this word could be used frequently without being taken for a misspelling)

iel — The French version of our non-binary transgender “they,” a combination of the masculine “il”(“he”) and feminine “elle” (“she”)

iid — abbreviation for Internet-induced dementia, a condition believed to be caused by the combination of buffer overflow, hyperlink-generated brain herniations, the wide range of contaminants found in unmoderated user-generated content, “always on” expectations the medium has created in corporate culture, and sleep deprivation resulting from all of the above and more.  Primary symptom: a parent complains to you about a sign of his/her cognitive decline, and you realize you’re already experiencing the same problem, and so is everyone you know.

ill duce — a moniker applied to the greatest authoritarian strutter of our time, in honor of his claimed affinity with hip-hop moguls (aka “the blacks”) and the state of his mental health.  Cf. Il Duce (“The Leader”), nickname of the original authoritarian strutter, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.

imgrate — someone unwilling or unable to see and appreciate all the good immigrants have done and are doing for them (and for our country).

imnshnsuo — in my not so humble, not so unbiased opinion.

impassion — an impasse reached solely because the parties involved are too emotionally invested in their positions to work towards a solution.

impercunism, impercunist — the pseudoideology of (and unattractive word for) those whose real belief system is in their own power and enrichment, before which all ideas and principles must fall; cf imperium (power) + pecunia (money), in the language of the empire most often compared to ours.  Related: impecunious, but referring to a bankruptcy of ideas. See also butterflying, probpendism, probpendist.

imperify — imputing to government powers of the gods, believing either that it can solve all problems or that it’s the source of all woe, from the Latin imperium, meaning government, dating from a time–the Roman Empire–when governments were a lot more powerful than they are today, though not as powerful as our governments want us to believe they are (so as to keep us underfoot).  People who believe this–whether on the right or left–are imperifists.

impickled — shorthand for “caught between a rock and a hard place” in cases where the individual involved has largely brought this state of affairs upon him/herself (i.e. has been “hoist on their own petard”), cf. “impaled on the horns of a dilemma” and “caught in a pickle,” a baseball scenario in which a baserunner is caught between bases, usually as a result of his/her own error(s) in judgment.  See also horner, hornered.

infutile — adjective describing any public or publicly visible act against authoritarianism; such acts are never in vain because at a minimum they deny those who go along with evil the comfort of believing they had no choice.

insultant — a consultant whose primary approach to clients is to tell them everything they’re doing is wrong, thus intimidating them into hiring the consultant and/or paying them more money/higher rates.  Especially common in the early stages of a new ‘game-changing’ development in an industry (e.g. the Internet)

intersloper — someone who routinely seeks to derail new policy initiatives by finding a “slippery slope” or “grey area” in what’s proposed even–or especially–when there are clear cases on either side of the purportedly blurred divide that need addressing. cf. interloper + slope.

in vino veritas — the peculiar belief it’s only when large portions of your mind have been crippled or dashed to inoperability that you can see and speak the truth.

iocaine — to grossly overthink an issue or strategy (and get blindsided by the simple as a result), cf this scene from The Princess Bride

ionsho — shorthand for in our not so humble opinion; this is a community site, after all…

ixodid — a political problem that, if not eliminated completely when an effort is made to address it will, over time, return as an even bigger challenge to deal with, cf. ixodida, the tick family, parasitic organisms that, if not removed in their entirety (including head and mouthparts) can often produce an infection worse than their original attack/bite

jefferson’s axiom — a nation that has experienced a revolution once is permanently more capable than average of experiencing another

joax — a fake hoax (since so many things called hoaxes are real these days)

kasparov’s law — anything a machine can do, a machine + human can do better (as he proved after his unfair loss to Deep Blue by teaming up with computers to crush all comers, carbon or silicon); corollary: when/where this is not true, the machine should do the job (i.e. man should not be used as a machine).

keynesian — 1. an attitude towards the truth, cf. John Maynard Keynes’ statement that “when facts change, I change my opinion. What do you do, sir?” 2. An attitude towards the importance of taking action, aka the “urgency of now.” Cf. Keynes’ observation that “in the long run, we are all dead.”

kfc — Something positioned as mysterious and powerful that’s actually simple, crude, and/or banal. cf KFC, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and specifically “the Colonel’s secret recipe of seventeen herbs and spices,” which, as comedian Seth Meyers aptly observed, is just salt.

kompromatic, kompromatically — when a politician or official says or does things that make no sense unless the beneficiary has incriminating or compromising audio or video about them.

libran — balanced in an elevated, even cosmic way, if not bipartisan.

lietmus, lietmus test — a falsehood intentionally so obvious that to accept and/or defend it is to (un)wittingly liberate oneself from reality and throw in with the liar of origin instead; a common grooming tactic deployed by aspiring autocrats, effective because denying reality is a powerful intoxicant, esp. for the weak-minded, cf. lie + litmus (test)

likely voter — A Republican voter with a history of regular voting, or an American citizen age 18+ of any other persuasion who has successfully navigated the current year’s latest bundle of GOP-engineered obstacles and challenges to their fundamental right as Americans to exercise the franchise.  Pronounced with the same inflection as “a likely story.”

limbo — not wanting to live, but not wanting to die; descriptive of the state of mind of an increasing proportion of Americans.

literatune — an (open) letter or story in song, cf. littera, Latin for letter and the root of literature + tune

lonnegan — an act of unnecessary or gratuitous violence or cruelty, cf. the character Doyle Lonnegan in the classic film, The Sting, who, in the film’s inciting incident,  “kill(s) a grifter for a chunk of money that wouldn’t support him for two days.” As in that flik, lonnegans have a way of coming back on those who commit them, which is sometimes considered their diagnostic karma… ya falla?

Click here for bonus footage

lophorinic — something that’s ‘crazy creative,’ meaning both creative and certifiable, possibly in a good way, possibly redefining crazy, an idea where the box is nowhere to be found, and fully exposed to the sun and other elements as a result.  Often simply a source of joy (e.g. many Japanese products); in these times, increasingly ‘so-crazy-it-could-work’ desperate.  Cf. the Superb Bird of Paradise, Lophorina superba (at right, click)

lowrony — an irony that isn’t the least bit funny or interesting (see also hirony)

lucy (n,v) — Someone who repeatedly holds out the promise of something that seems well within their power to deliver, and just as repeatedly backs out or reneges.  E.g. in the consulting world, a lucy is an organization that repeatedly reaches out to you with the promise of business, encourages you to spend significant time doing whatever it takes to make it happen, then for no apparent reason backs out, only to repeat the cycle downstream.  To lucy someone is to engage in this type of behavior with them. Cf. Peanuts, in which the Lucy character repeatedly invites Charlie Brown to run up and kick the football she’s holding in field goal position, only to snatch it away at the last moment so he goes flying through the air and lands on his derriere.

lordsian — an institution playing a role similar to that of the House of Lords, with some capability to block actions taken by the main legislature, i.e. the House of Commons in England, the House of Representatives here, but only very limited capacity to do so; more generally, a body that acts like an emergency brake in a car or governor with wide tolerances in an engine, to prevent or slow rash or prejudicial decisions taken in moments of passion.

lot’s axiom — Whenever engaged on any great endeavor, don’t look at anything anywhere except at what’s right in front of you; if you dwell on the past instead, or try to peer over the horizon by climbing atop a stack of all you have to do to achieve what awaits you, paralysis is the likely outcome. Cf the Biblical story of Lot, the one just man who, with his wife, was allowed to flee Sodom & Gomorrah before God destroyed them. They were warned not to look back as they fled; Lot’s wife did and was turned into a pillar of salt.

low information voter — an individual who doesn’t understand that the policies proposed by the speaker or writer are in his/her best interest

lysis — to use one’s reproductive organs for political leverage, cf Lysistrata, the ancient Greek play in which Athenian women withhold sexual congress from their men until they agree to stop fighting wars.  Today, applications could be more wide-ranging.

macgyvering — the human version of the evolutionary principle of exaptation, in which a feature that originally evolved for one purpose is co-opted to serve another (the most famous example being feathers, which originally festooned many species that couldn’t fly). Cf. MacGyver, a popular television show whose signature element is the eponymous hero’s ability to escape danger using only the objects and materials immediately available to him.

made with humans, people — Anything that seems too good to be true even though it’s actually as good as advertised, but only because it has an especially diabolical backstory, cf Soylent Green.

m&m — a ridiculous, often narcissistic and petty demand in a policy negotiation, cf. rock star contracts that specify what colors the m&ms in their dressing rooms must or must not be, even though every color of m&m candy is made from the same ingredients and actually tastes exactly the same (unless, perhaps, you have synesthesia)

maidan — a peoples’ non-violent revolution against a fraudulent election or other corruption of democracy, or the location of said revolution, cf. Ukraine’s two 21st century peaceful revolutions centered on Independence Square in Kiev (maidan is a Persian word meaning “open space or square”), the first against Russian hacking of their first fully democratic election, which forced it to be re-run; the second against a democratically elected leader who began taking autocratic action in collusion with the Russians.

manutia — the minutiae of government process and regulation on which crony capitalists feed, like fungi, out of the light (cf. manure)

mccarthy — to impugn someone’s patriotism for political gain. For those youngsters schooled in states that no longer teach history, a synonym for the toxic combination of self-interested jingoism and fundamentalism, cf Tailgunner Joe McCarthy, the shame of Wisconsin.

medcala — a ritual increasingly engaged in by an increasing number of Americans taking an increasing number of medications, when they load up their pill organizers for the week. cf the ancient Egyptian table game of mancala.

mendavangelist — Someone involved in a sustained way in spreading belief in a Big Lie, using typical Big Lie + evangelical methodology. cf. mendacium, the Latin word for lie + evangelist.

mexico will pay — synonym for ‘when pigs fly.’

milf — a “canary in the coalmine”-level sign of societal moral decay, cf. the kind of society where a significant portion of the population would identify others as “moms I’d like to f***” in everyday (or any) conversation.

mino — acronym for moderate in name only, a label applied to politicians, mainly on the right, who are considered “moderates” by the corporate media, but would be considered extremists at any other point in our history. Pronounced my-no, like rhi-no (rino) although many are minnows in many ways as well. First use: 11/1/23, by OldScot73

miracle — when human beings do something against what’s believed to be their nature and beyond what’s believed to be their capacity or capability.  What God does isn’t ever a miracle–God can do anything; if you’re someone of faith you expect it, and if you’re not, you don’t believe in miracles anyway, only in coincidence (and not as God’s way of remaining anonymous).

moda — acronym/shorthand for “master of dark arts” or “mock-Yoda,” a political consultant, pollster, thought leader, or unelected official who comes to prominence due to a new way of thinking he/she has pioneered or promoted that becomes trendy but proves disastrously misguided, cf. Harry Potter, in which nearly every new school year features a new teacher of the dark arts class who becomes a key part of the story for all the wrong reasons, or a galaxy far, far away.  A noda (prounounced “no, duh!”) is a moda whose bad idea is powered primarily by the fact that it is simple, obvious, and wrong.

moneypox — a highly infectious and disfiguring disease of the economy as a result of which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.  To date, there has been no effective vaccine or known cure, though some old folk remedies (like labor unions) can be used to treat it. First use by Frank Islam & Ed Crego, 8/30/22

murkowski (v) — to support a primaried representative of the other party to encourage more independence from the dictates of the other party’s leadership and/or extremist base, cf. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), who was primaried, lost, won as a write-in candidate, and is now the only Republican who most often defies Donald Trump and most often rejects the partisan excesses of her party. Mitt Romney may need to be murkowskied by Utah Democrats next cycle.

murmuration — the opposite of a kfc: a mysterious or mystical phenomenon that scientists or others purport to brush away through reductive explanations that say nothing useful or even predictive about the phenomenon itself, much as reducing the activities of the brain to chemical and physical reactions says nothing about what we think or why

mwalimu, walimu — a political leader who prioritizes an informed electorate, seeking to explain and educate his/her constituents in a non-partisan way about policies and process so that voters can come to their own, well-founded conclusions, from the Swahili word for teacher, which is often applied to leaders in Africa as well.  Also an adjective to describe a leader with these qualities.

nashia — to understand (and therefore explain) why something unethical or immoral was done (e.g. to prevent it from happening again) without excusing it in any way. The negation or inversion of the West African patois Tapestry ashia, which means “sorry–I empathize,” commonly uttered when someone else encounters even the smallest of misfortunes, even if the speaker had nothing to do with the event, a level of extreme empathy absent from the rest of the world, and especially the land of the deserving poor.  If anyone is entitled to define what’s worthy or unworthy of empathy, it’s the people of West Africa, who bore the brunt of hundreds of years of slavery, and endure Jim Crow in all its forms to this day.  Synonyms, from the Yiddish or Hebrew, and from Lakota, TBD.

nationalize — to do something seemingly impossible, whether it’s facing and winning five elimination games against four teams that collectively won more than four hundred games (see Nationals, Washington), or simply bringing the country back together as the United States again.

nazdar — akin to gaydar, but referring to an unusual capacity to accurately detect incipient authoritarianism, a capability possessed solely by those who have actually lived under totalitarian regimes. Everyone else? Should just shut up and listen.

neo-confederate — part of the neo-confederacy, a growing group of radical reactionary policymakers, politicos, and activists who have spent the last thirty years building a shadow national government at the state level (via coordination provided by national organizations like ALEC, supported by the Supreme Court) with the power to undermine the federal government at every turn while, in reflection of 21st century battle lines (intrastate vs interstate), oppressing local governments that stand in opposition to its ideology

never-trumper — synonym for patriot

newtories, (sing) newtory — sometimes pronounced NEWT-ories, in honor of the founding father of the movement; refers to the sizable minority of Americans who, like the Tories or Loyalists of colonial and revolutionary days, prefer to be ruled by a king or other authoritarian figure, indeed have declared their undying loyalty to one.

nextdoor (n) — a true citizen-legislator, an anti-celebrity, a leader who still is “where they came from” (not just “hasn’t forgotten”), and where they came from is somewhere close to us all.

nintended, nintentions — intentions that are deliberately ambiguous and/or ironic, as in a game.

norm (n) — 1. An authoritative standard 2. A principle of right action binding upon the members of a group and serving to guide, control, or regulate proper and acceptable behavior.  These are the first two definitions of the word according to Webster, and they’re still the definitions, despite efforts by former Occupant Donald Trump, enabled by the media, to redefine “norms” to mean options at the political buffet. Which could ultimately have the opposite effect of what’s intended, by forcing Congress to generate EU-level codifications of what until recently was just informally understood, in the process removing flexibility that’s given us competitive advantage over the Europeans and others.

nothingburger — a clear violation of American values, ethics, and/or laws that the speaker does not consider important.

notto, oxymotto — A motto reflecting the current state of a nation so antithetical to its foundation that, much like the combination of matter and antimatter, the nation disappears.  For example, an appropriate notto for America today might be: “We haven’t tried anything and nothing works”

numversion, numversion principle — in re a scatterplot principle common to the late stages of any economic system, ie that the average monetary compensation individuals in specific professions receive is in inverse proportion to the value their profession adds to society.  Example: individuals who provide services to the wealthy vs. those who provide services to the rest of society. In some professions, scatterplot numversion is also believed to apply to job titles within the profession.  Cf. latin nummus, meaning money + vers,  meaning turn or turned. Corollary: the wealthy who “deserve” to be wealthy will be the most overpaid relative to what they deserve, and the more they deserve, the more they will be overpaid.

nyanga — a word in Tapestry that means, roughly, “unnecessary, pointless, and/or baroque decoration”

occam (v) — to apply the scientific and philosophical principle of Occam’s Razor, which states that the simplest explanation for something is usually the right one.

occupant, the — 1. Anyone who comes to occupy the Oval Office of the White House as a clear result of voter suppression (when the rule of 300 is applied and/or when the gap between the turnout of the demographics most targeted for suppression (voters of color, poor voters, young voters) and the turnout predicted by pre-election polling averages for these groups is sufficient to have changed the result of the election), aka the most unconstitutional act possible, according to the 14th Amendment (short of colluding with a hostile foreign power or attempting to overthrow the government). Such individuals should never be considered legitimate leaders of the free world, nor ever addressed as “president,” even if, leveraging the unearned advantages of incumbency, they win “re-election.”  2. The same principle applied to other titled elected officials, esp. governors.

of by for — the ultimate state of pure diversity in governance envisioned by our old fellow traveler/commie, Abraham Lincoln, on the leveling fields of Gettysburg, where not only all ethnic groups have a real voice, but so do pipefitters, plumbers, beauticians, and mailmen, even the mentally ill and men with facial hair.

old news — increasingly the only real, true news

omenous, omenously — an ominous development signaled by a well-known or understood omen, e.g. the number 666.

omninym, optinym, accunym, archenym, ultinym  — synonyms for synonym for those of us who don’t believe in synonyms; words that better describe something than their so-called synonyms, either because they’re more appropriately broad and encompassing (omninyms), more/most representative of the ideal (optinyms), more accurate or precise (accunyms), most typically what come to mind when one thinks of their “synonym cloud” (archenyms), or simply kick the **** out of other words that strive to mean the same thing (ultinyms).

op — the modern Republican Party; no longer grand, just old

otherthrow, otherthrowing — To overthrow a legitimately elected government on the sole ground that by internal definition it’s headed and run by individuals and/or demographic/psychographic classes who, in the eyes of the otherthrower(s), are inherently unfit to govern, irrespective of policy or other actions they may have taken or propose to take, cf. the concept of “The Other.”

ovaler — someone occupying the presidency who did not receive the most votes in the previous election–not a synonym for president.  An ovalist is someone who favors this kind of minority usurpation of power.

over window — the inverse of the Overton window, which defines the boundaries of political discourse at any given time; the over window refers to those times in our history when pretty much anything goes and the nation is subject to profound changes, for better or worse, cf. “that’s so over” or “over the top;” a “pivot point” or “interesting times” on steroids…

owc, orwc — acronym for/meaning “original world country,” i.e. what’s currently referred to as “third world” or “lesser developed” or “developing” countries, especially those in this category that are more liberal/dynamic in orientation.  Because it’s been demonstrated conclusively that the “inevitable” “progression” from hunter-gather societies to late capitalism is more accurately likened to lemmings plunging off a cliff, all terms that assume the superiority of so-called “economic development” and patronize from this position, need to be retired and replaced.  See also twc, trwc.

p01135809 — Donald Trump, cf. his booking number at the Fulton County (GA) jail (first use, instinctively, by millions, 8/24/23).

parallel data — a dangerous new variant of the euphemism “alternative facts” accidentally (we hope) released into the wild by COVID response team lead Deborah Birx.

par scale — attributing a level of sophistication to someone or something in the digital realm that’s not actually deserved, i.e. “too much credit on the par scale,” e.g. believing that you’re actually engaged in a battle of wits with spammers. Cf. former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale, who was lauded as a digital campaign guru when all he was doing was creating massive numbers of Facebook ads, each slightly different than the others, and letting the interaction between Facebook’s algorithm and its users determine the most effective ads, which he may not have ever even seen.

pascalian, pascalian wager — a relatively small commitment of time, money, or other resources to successfully hedge against the possibility that one’s view of the world or future is catastrophically mistaken, cf. Pascal’s wager

patching— when someone, especially a politician, protests vehemently against something they actually want you to do, cf the old American folk tale Br’er Rabbit and the Briar Patch.  Example: Donald Trump’s attacks on mail-in voting, which have helped stiffen his Democratic opponents’ resolve to vote by mail, even though it actually benefits Trump in multiple ways if they do so (e.g. increasing the likelihood they won’t be counted, providing him greater leeway to claim fraud, etc.).

pdgraphic(s) — shorthand for demographic plus psychographic groups, including their intersection, with psychographics in the lead (hence pd, not dp), in recognition that increasingly market/political research is based as much on analysis of psychographics as demographics, in consequence of the simultaneous, complementary fragmentation and unification of groups, a la DNA replication, that occurs continuously in the digital world.

people are saying — euphemism/synonym for “I hear voices.”

perfect — something so simple and easy it can’t be done any better–until someone does

pesadilla — a politician whose words, actions, and behavior are so provocative they result in catastrophic overreaction in his/her opponents, leading them to self-destruct (cf. the Spanish flu, aka la pesadilla, which killed mostly young, healthy adults by causing their immune systems to go nuclear).

petechial — the simultaneous sensation of choking and wanting to choke someone in return as a result of the state of the world, cf. the ever-present “petechial hemorrhaging” that seems to be found in every cop show autopsy we watch because we cannot sleep.

phonom — (pronounced faux-nom) someone or something that’s represented as having an amazing impact or level of success, all of which is nothing but hype and self-promotion. Example: the so-called Trump effect, the magical ability he’s believed to have to raise non-voters from their barcaloungers and send them scurrying to the polls.

Click to buy us one 😉

pino — president in name only, not to be confused, ever, with pinoe, an American hero (we prefer our heroes unbankrupt)–always and forever (8/30/23)

pity — something you can say you feel for someone you would hate with extreme prejudice if your faith or personal beliefs didn’t prohibit it. Pity them coldly if you don’t believe they or everyone is capable of redemption; pity them hotly if you do…

plovent (adj) — 1. A person or group with an unusually acute capacity to detect change and associated causes, especially changes in climate, both figuratively and literally, a capacity that is more instinctual and intuition-based than deductive and logical–in this way distinguished from most instances of prescience.  Among those who disagree with individuals with this capacity, often used derisively (like “woke”), akin to calling someone a “Chicken Little.” 2. The person or persons in any group who are typically the first to suss out or detect threats to the group and/or its plans, and to express concern or sound the alarm about same. Cf. plover, a type of bird so named for its unusual level of restlessness observed at the approach of inclement weather (QED taking its name from pluvalis, Latin for “rain”). In shorebird flocks, plovers also typically take on the role of sentinels, the first to spot approaching predators and alert the others, often vociferously, with accompanying dramatic agitation.

policyst — the political ecosystem, where life is nasty, brutish, but there’s always K Street.

poliline — 1. The limits of a specific solution to completely solve the problem it’s intended to solve 2. A reference to the limits of any one solution to solve a problem and/or the inability of any solution, or even any combination of solutions, to solve any problem completely.  Often deployed in the form of a retort when someone objects to a proposed solution that clearly has the potential to have an impact by pointing out that it “won’t solve the problem.” Cf. 1. Polio line, ie the history of the polio vaccine, a 100% effective vaccine,  affordable enough to be given to everyone in the world, yet polio has not been eradicated, i.e., if that solution can’t “completely” “solve” that problem, then no solution can be expected to completely solve any problem, and the fact that it doesn’t is no legitimate objection to its utility. 2. Politics: since the absolute/ultimate limits of almost any solution are political, most polilines are political in nature

polistatic — an adjective describing a political party, idea, or practice that, like a metastatic cancer, has no purpose other than its own preservation and propagation, winning for the sake of winning, mindlessly growing, even if at great harm to the body politic that hosts it. The postmodern Republican Party is in a state of polistasis.

political correctness, politically correct — unthinking, knee-jerk, absolute defense of, and support for, an authoritarian leader or demagogue, no matter what he/she says or does.

politirade (po-li-te-rade) — outrage expressed solely for knee-jerk politically correct reasons, and often carefully scripted for same.

pollution, pollutant — a change that occurs too quickly for the environment (physical, biological, moral, political, etc.) to establish a new equilibrium before unintended and, on balance, deleterious consequences result.  The physical or metaphysical manifestations of the change are pollutants.

positives, positive people — people who have tested positive for the coronavirus, people who need to stay positive and whom we need to stay and be positive for.

powers-that-behind — formerly known as the powers-that-be, before they disappeared behind the curtains of surveillance and began sending others’ children forward to die for their mistakes, which have become legion as they become increasingly disconnected from quotidian existence, falling further and further outside the rhythms of the world.

pragmatic — dealing with things sensibly and realistically in a way that is based on practical rather than theoretical considerations.  This is actually the current dictionary definition of the word.  We just want to be clear that as far as we’re concerned, it continues to be the correct definition, even though many politicians seem to believe that it’s now a synonym for “doing nothing.”

preback — opinions offered about a news or research piece before or without having actually read it (cf. feedback).

precogging — predicting that something bad is going to happen without really knowing why or, in some cases, even awareness that you’re predicting anything.  Example: this piece that we wrote in October 2018. Cf. Minority Report, a film whose plot centers on the ability of certain individuals to know that someone is going to commit a crime before they do.

pre-mortem —  An unusually detailed and accurate prediction of how the journey of a leading individual, company, organization, trend, or movement will end.

problematic — shorthand for a position the speaker would rather not have to fully explicate and defend, often under the alleged or self-deluding presumption that its veracity is or should be obvious to all (and those for whom it isn’t are beneath contempt anyway)

probpendism, probpendist — A politician who is only seeking power and is honest about this.  cf probus (honest) + pendes (to grasp or capture) in the lingo of the last empire most similar to our own. For a probpendist, politics is a business like any other, and you vote for him/her because you like the product(s) he/she produces, not because they are unwavering in the policy principles they stand for–a probpendist can never be accused of hypocrisy (see also impercunism, impercunist)

process crime — when someone gets away with something that either is, or should be, illegal, as a result of flaws in the process or system. Example: Donald Trump not paying taxes on $400M with no consequences, or Jeffrey Epstein getting a slap on the wrist for trafficking and assaulting underage girls. Often misunderstood as a synonym for obstruction and conjoined with acts such as lying to authorities, destroying evidence, intimidating witnesses, dangling pardons–with the intent of minimizing the seriousness of these actions.  But obstruction of justice is, by definition, an effort to obscure or hide the truth; if obstruction is considered a “process crime” and “process crimes” are of minimal significance, then all crimes are of minimal significance and should not be prosecuted, since all crimes involve an effort on the part of the defendent to obscure or hide truth in one form or another (including hiding it from themselves).  Think about it.

profense, profensive — syn. for offense and offensive, and product of cancel culture; used in contexts where the use of the word “offense” or “offensive” could be mistaken as implying a desire to “offend.”

projectionism, projectionist — a political ‘philosophy’ that attributes to its opponents’ actions its own adherents are, in fact, carrying out themselves, often reflecting motives its supporters would have if they were in the same position.  Often easy to detect at its absurd extremes, for example, claims that “bad polls are the real voter suppression,” or incoherences such as “no puppet no puppet you puppet.” Unsurprisingly and inevitably it boils down to nothing but a playground taunt: “I know you are, but what am I?”

propagandoid — a factoid (i.e. a partially occluded fact) that has been further manipulated, distorted, or misused in some way to support a false or less than truthful narrative.

psyber — cf. an action or activity that leverages and combines elements of psychology and technology to achieve an effect, e.g. the psyberwarfare the Russians and the Trump campaign conducted in 2016 and have continued since.

pumpkinheads — the ‘lock her up, CNN sucks’ contingent at Trump rallies, those who have drunken in so much of the man in their idolatry they’ve turned orange to the core, their brains turned into mush…but just as in Cinderella, it’s never too late to change back…

pumpkin patch — where pumpkinheads gather to await the arrival of the Great Pumpkin, i.e. Trump or some other elaborate and powerful fiction they’ve collectively conjured up in their minds (e.g. any day now, the Justice Department is going to arrest half the FBI and Congress to make them pay for their insurrection and treason, or this time the tax cut has enough pages to pay for itself and produce trickle-down growth as far as the eye can see), convinced that if they’re just sincere enough in their beliefs, they will all come true.  And if not, well, there’s always deus ex machina diripiat.

putting it on the fridge — treating an idea or proposal in an unserious, patronizing way, e.g. by using this expression in its imperative form.

putzpah — a level of chutzpah beyond chutzpah, for which the word chutzpah simply won’t suffice, as in the words and deeds of the putz, Putin. First coined by PutinsLosingBigly, about six years after it first became clear it was needed.

qa — a descriptor of someone obsessed with quality (“he’s very QA”), nearly always a positive in an increasingly speed-driven slipshod world, except when it slips into perfectionism, OCD, or a gleeful determination to find flaws.

qanon — a rapidly mutating virus that may pose a greater threat to life as we know it than its counterparts of biological origin. At this point, it has mutated to the point where it’s often unrecognizable to specialists familiar with its original strain.

race traitor — a racist of any kind, aka/iow a traitor against the human race

raglet — a pro forma mini-rant that’s always attached to the mention of certain subjects by political partisans, e.g. “the dirty, discredited” dossier or the Trump-Russia “WITCHHUNT, the greatest hoax in history.”  Etymology unnecessary.

realfusbal, realfootball — what’s really going on in the world, as opposed to what we Americans know of from our own parochialism, cf “realpolitik” + the game actually played with one’s feet we insist on calling soccer instead.

rearranging — putting forward policy ideas that look like they’re addressing a problem, but never actually take it on head-on (cf. “rearranging the chairs of the Titanic”). Someone who does this routinely is a rearranger.

recall, recalled — when someone whose impact on the world has primarily been negative dies “prematurely.” cf.  product recall by the Maker.

redpilling —  the act of consuming a hallucinogenic disinformation-based political medication (e.g. the Tucker Carlson Show) that makes the world appear the way those addicted want it to be, rather than the way it is, while convincing them the opposite is the case.

red whale — an especially disingenuous and misleading argument, much bigger, much more so, and much more consequential, with a much stronger draw (a la Moby Dick) than a mere herring

relitigate, relitigation — any attempt to right a wrong that occurs after the public is fully informed of the existence, form, or scope of the misbehavior involved, at which point the guilty party or parties will typically claim that because they successfully managed to cover up the extent of their crimes beyond a political time horizon (e.g. an election), they’ve “already been litigated” and can’t be raised again.

results — synonym for “old men.” (first use: by Martin Amis in The Information)

revenewer — a leader, thinker, or activist who finds ways to better our country by increasing the size of the pie to be divided rather than merely redistributing it (not to be confused with self-serving pseudo-variants such as trickledowners)

repo, repos — the real Republicans In Name Only, who have sold out the bedrock principles of Republicanism to game/gain the benefits of an unholy alliance with crony capitalists and religious zealots, cf. repo men, the professionals who take from the poor and give to the rich.

repúblican, repúblicano–A postmodern Republican who believes in banana republic-style government: authoritarian, heavily militarized, breathtakingly corrupt, with extreme income inequality, massive deficit spending even when the economy is good (colloquially known as social bribery), and wildly gyrating boom/bust, ‘heads I win, tails you lose’ economies. Cf. Republican in Spanish; also repúblicana, in the increasingly rare cases where women still belong to this section of the party.

reversican — a Republican who tries to use lame duck legislation or legal action to undo the will of the people as expressed at the ballot box.  Reversicans are part of a broader class of so-called and self-proclaimed Republicans known as perversicans, who pervert or betray core values that made theirs the Grand Old Party, in pursuit of political and financial gain, typically both in tandem.

rfk — a powerful movement built from many small individual, often initially disconnected actions; inverse rfk (or kfr): a powerful mass action with ripple effects in many or all directions.

rigged court — the body formerly known as the Supreme Court; may also refer to any lower federal court in which Trump appointees play a decisive role, given that this is the result of nearly a decade’s worth of unconstitutional action by Republicans to block Democrat Barack Obama from making dozens of judicial appointments he had a constitutional right to make, compounded by what we now know, beyond any shadow of doubt whatsoever, was sweeping and systematic Republican collusion–and not just by the Trump campaign–with a hostile foreign power hacking into multiple jurisdictions in all 50 states, not to mention companies supplying election software to key swing states to steal the 2016 election that put Trump in place to make those appointments.

rino — the organization formerly known as the GOP, i.e. before the rise of Newt Gingrich, Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, the Tea Party, the Freedom Caucus, and Donald Trump, cf republican in name only

roamies — a bitterly affectionate name for elderly Americans lacking the means to retire, who therefore often travel together from jobsite to jobsite, as in the recent film, Nomadland, doing work their younger counterparts won’t or can’t be relied on for. Cf. roam + roomie, a common colloquial abbreviation for roommate, typically used by and applied to the young.  (first use: by Vesta, 02/04/22)

rogerian, rogersian (adj)  a positive descriptor of someone who, while passionate about politics, has the rare facility to avoid making assumptions about someone’s character based on their political beliefs, or about their political beliefs based on their appearance, occupation, or locale. (cf the iconic Native American political humorist Will Rogers, who often said “I never met a man I didn’t like,” or something close enough). See also Rogerian, which refers to a different, unrelated Rogers, yet is, appropriately enough, not unrelated in meaning.

rube goldberg — the sci-tech of magical thinking

rule of 300 — the principle that for every person who complains publicly (i.e., to anyone other than friends, family, or work colleagues) about a wrong that’s been done to them by an organization, there are at least 300 others who have been subjected to the same wrong by the same organization.  Cf. an inadvertent experiment in which a file that was completely empty was uploaded and made available for download on a proprietary online service that charged by the minute (in an era when only humans could download files), and more than 300 individuals downloaded the file before anyone complained to the service that the file had nothing in it.² Typically not taken and applied literally, but rather as a reminder that the number of people who have experienced any problem with an organization is often much, much higher than the number who report it.

rural funeral procession — one car driving very slowly, followed by a long line of others, all in mourning because they can’t pass him.

sadim — someone who ruins everything and everyone he touches or comes in contact with, as in the opposite of midas (predates the Glossarium, but has never seemed so useful).

saladspeak — the 2018 version of 1984’s doublespeak, in honor of our word salad-spouting would-be dictator; a poor imitation of the original.

santa zone — a belief that requires overlooking as many counterfactuals as the idea that one man on a sleigh can deliver packages to every home on earth in a single night.  Three beliefs rapidly approaching the santa zone, if they aren’t already there: that man-made climate change is a hoax, that there was no collusion between the Russian government and the Trump campaign, and the validity of the economic underpinnings supporting the entirety of the ever-expanding Green New Deal.

sap — funding conned out of dupes and suckers

sapsucker — someone who sucks or cons the sap out of suckers. A yellow-bellied sapsucker is a con artist who doubles as a rank (and often plaintive) coward

satanist — may soon be synonymous with the supporters of Donald Trump, if they continue to unquestioningly support his destruction of the country and the planet, even after 1/6/21; those to whom the term previously referred to will be relatively benign by comparison–Trump brings only darkness, not light.  But they are our friends, our neighbors, our colleagues, and we can’t move forward as leader of the free world without them, so we pray that the eyes of those who follow him will soon be able adjust to the dark and see.

savory (n) — a moment in our lives when we did something we never would have thought we could that apparently ripples or eddies out in time to nowhere in our lives, but comes to mind far more often than a moment cut off from the rest of our timeline should, and gets turned over and replayed more often than seems justified as well, perhaps because we need regular reminders that we’re capable of doing more than we think.  Examples: “the time I got dragged into a basketball game I had no business being in, and the other players were making fun of me, and one of them ran at me, expecting me to freeze, and instead I took the only shot I took all game, a three-pointer with both of his hands in my face, nothing but net” (Somnium); “the time our second-grade teacher told us we could have the extra 15 minutes of recess we were begging for if one of us could guess the number between one and thirty she was thinking of, and I volunteered to make the guess, and guessed it” (Baker).

scarebait — headlines designed to frighten and alarm, ostensibly to get clicks, but because most Americans don’t read beyond headlines, contributing to division and despair instead…

scatterplot (adj) — a correlation that is or would be apparent if the relevant data were displayed in the form of a scatter plot graph, but is by no means necessarily one-to-one in nature

secretariat — a true stable genius.

selection — any “election” where anything other than the votes of the majority of those who went to the polls determines the result.

self-servant — a government official who mainly acts in his/her own interest, rather than in the interest of their constituents or the country.

self-styled, self-made — adjectives used to describe singular individuals that are often misapplied. In truth, billionaires are self-styled, revolutionaries self-made

sequoias, stacks — sequoias are people or machines with negative carbon footprints, i.e. they reduce carbon emissions more than they emit, standing tall; stacks (as in smokestacks) do the reverse.

shivan (adj) — someone who seems intent on destroying the world or everything around him, cf the Indian goddess Shiva, “the destroyer of worlds.”

showmarch — a one-day protest or other event on behalf of a cause that allows the participants to tell themselves they’re doing their part of fight for change, with plenty of social media-friendly selfies to prove it.

simbustible, simbustion — when two people or sets of ideas combine in such a way that each adds to the other with explosive, unidirectional, typically positive effect, cf. simpatico + combustible.

slainte, salud, sante, etc. — we have all kinds of things to say when someone sneezes, but what do we say when they cough, which could well indicate a wide variety of more serious conditions? “Slainte,” “sante,” “salud,” and their equivalents in other languages are typically used as toasts when people are drinking, but they mean “health,” which is only true in moderation.  In a nation where more and more of our fellow citizens are using alcohol and other substances in a desperate attempt to escape the conditions they live in, wouldn’t it make more sense to wish “slainte,” “salud” or “sante” to our fellows as they’re trying to ward off the slings and arrows of our century in the air they breathe than as they prepare to descend into oblivion?

slippery slope — everything.  The NRA’s not wrong.  Like every life form and every object we act upon, every time we take an action, every time we normalize something, it creates further momentum in the same direction, all but ensuring that someone else will “push the envelope.”  Politicians should tread not just lightly, but as if they’re on a sheet of ice in dress shoes.  At the same time, as anyone from the north country knows, where cold reality is concerned, often it’s moving with trepidation, not confidence, that causes you to end up on your keister.  Water, the stuff of life, is like that–cold, surprisingly hard, and full of paradoxes.

solomonize — to resolve a dispute by reframing the principle(s) on which it’s based, rather than by compromise, cf. King Solomon.

somnium’s law — the greatest gains per economic unit invested are achieved when what’s spent is expended on those with the least among us.

sophistorific — someone who is highly knowledgeable and cosmopolitan yet surprisingly, notably bland and boring (cf sophisticated + soporific).

sophistricate — someone expert in the latest, most sophisticated forms of sophistry to make their cases–Byron York, for example.

soul-groping — the media proclivity to believe that gaffes and incidents from a politician’s (distant) past reveal who they really are and what they’ll really do, cf. the ancient fable of the blind men and the elephant.

spilling the beans — hacking into electoral machinery or any subsequent forensic work uncovering the people’s true will, cf. ancient Greece, where voting by secret ballot was achieved by the use of white and black beans (for yes and no) unless someone knocked over the jar where the votes were collected.  A testament to the power of democracy, that this idiosyncrasy is still the basis of a common idiomatic expression more than 2,000 years after it was coined.

starr — 1. A partisan hypocrite 2. Someone who claims to have faith, but exhibits only zealotry (ie by claiming rights and/or powers the truly faithful understand are reserved to God), cf. the 20+ years too late Kenneth Starr.

statify, statifying — the Trumpist equivalent to a liberal “Mediscare,” i.e. the assembling of a loose set of “facts” (if even true) that, taken out of context, sound worse than they are, dressing them up with menacing images and soundscapes, so as to convince potential voters that politicians on the other side are trying or planning to take away something Americans believe to be a fundamental right or entitlement via the machinations of the so called deep state (a conspiratorial corpus all public officials not supporting Trump in every particular are party to), often supported by pseudo-statistics to give it the veneer of scientific validity. Cf. state, statistics + terrify, terrifying

stig — someone who defends all actions of an autocrat or authoritarian, even those by which he/she has been personally harmed (cf Stig O’Tracy, a character in this Monty Python sketch).  Considered by some now to be a synonym for “Trump supporter,” at least in the case of those who aren’t wealthy, by others synonymous with “Republican Senator” or “Congressperson.”

straw herring — a dizzyingly confusing , even mutanical distraction of an argument, cf a cross between a red herring and a straw man.

sublimate, sublimation — in physical chemistry, the change of a substance from solid to gaseous form without an intermediate liquid state; in politics, a sudden and/or drastic change in policy or philosophy that doesn’t go through any of the usual processes that guide, shape, or assimilate such changes; in political argument, an intuitive leap of logic that may be right, but isn’t easily explained.  Warning: volatile.

subline, sublining — A media headline used to send a political message at odds with the actual facts being reported in the story (cf subliminal + headline), often at odds with that outlet’s perceived biases (which makes it doubly effective), usually to appease a feared power or simply reflecting the reality that headlines, unlike news stories themselves, are dictated from above by individuals with very different economic status and motivations than front-line reporters.  The opposite of clickbait; the hope and calculation of a subline writer is that readers won’t read the actual piece that follows.

subspoil, subspoiling–to let the cat out of a bag that contains no cat (though it may contain other fauna) for political gain.

suicaust — when a whole people has gone down a path that will inevitably result in their own destruction, likely in the most horrific ways.  Evangelicals who are thrilled with Trump and disinclined to do anything about climate change because they’re eager to hasten The Rapture had better hope that the Lord doesn’t take the same attitude towards suicausts as they believe He/She does where individual suicides are concerned.

tapestry — the language currently disparagingly known as pidgin or patois; an extremely dynamic and vibrant mix of English, France, Portuguese, and many other languages, adapted to local grammatical structures and vocabularies, the cryptocurrency of language.

tds — aka Trump derangement syndrome.  1. a condition characterized by lizard-brain amusement, delight, or righteous satisfaction every time something Donald Trump says or does angers or upsets more than half of one’s fellow citizens (and/or 90%+ of the human race), especially if the reaction itself is the source of joy.  2. the tossing aside of all logic, reason, common sense, science, evidence of all types, principles, and, in some cases, every principle one has ever had, to support and defend him, a man who literally does not care whether his supporters live or die and, indeed, would prefer the latter if it helped him politically. First use, in both senses, 2017.

terrorist — synonym for egotist or narcissist.  Some of us don’t believe at all in synonyms, but in cases like this, we’re willing to make exceptions for the common good.

thanatostolidia, thanostolidephobia — the fear of dying stupidly, of causes you could and should have avoided or been able to avoid, cf thanatos, Latin for death, and stolide, Latin for stupidly; a subset of stolidephobia, the fear of looking stupid.

thanatotic — someone who behaves as if they have a death wish, for themselves or for everyone around them, from thanatos, the Greek word for death.

the t word — treason, which should be used just as sparingly, if at all, as other first letter words.

the vote — formerly known as the “popular” vote, now given the same name as it’s given in every country with any pretense to be a democracy, a republic, or a constitutional republic, and as it should be in the nation that has held itself up and been held up all over the world as father of same.

thirtied, thirtying — to be treated by a government the way the Jews were treated in Germany in the 1930s, before the Holocaust.  Specifically, to be subject to a seemingly never-ending series of executive orders, bureaucratic decisions, and legislation against you, as if the regime wakes up each morning with the goal of finding at least one new way to attack your presence in its midst (in the first six years of the Nazi regime, more than 400 separate laws and decrees against the Jews were made, a “boil the frog” strategy executed by sadists). In the US today, immigrants and the natural world around us appear to be getting relentlessly thirtied, and it rhymes with dirtied for a reason.

thought processor — the part of the brain responsible for taking bad arguments, explanations, theories, and stirring, mixing, chopping, pulsing, pureeing, and/or liquifying them.

tl?dr?yl! — shorthand for too long? didn’t read? your loss!  There are people who are genuinely too busy to read longform work–the working poor with 2-3 jobs to feed their families and make ends meet, for example–however, the people who use the shorthand “tl;dr” are usually doing so while engaged in discretionary online activities. Therefore while “dr” is clearly true, “tl” likely isn’t, and we’ve all seen the consequences of communication reduced to the length CEOs can read (it’s called Twitter).  Lose yourself in some longform–you’ll thank us for it.

tnbd — shorthand for to never be determined; could be applied to the essential, humbling mysteries of existence, but more often pertains to the ever-increasing volume of more mundane phenomena we seem to lack the combination of will and resources required to get to the bottom of.

tourorism, tourorists — 1. An emergent form of terrorism in which the perpetrators pretend to be sightseers to carry out their attacks. (first discovered and identified by the Republican Party in May 2021)  2. Euphemism for so-called “Ugly Americans” (now encompassing “Ugly Chinese” as well) on vacation overseas.

tragedy of the hourglass — akin to the tragedy of the commons, but in time rather than space; occurs when someone treats every opportunity to stand up and be counted as akin to a grain of sand in an hourglass–there will always be another chance to fall on one’s sword tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, until one day they look up, and the hourglass is empty; their time and chances have run out.

traitor — anyone who deliberately foments disunity for disunity’s sake in these United States, especially for personal political or financial gain, achieving nothing for our country, but giving aid and comfort to our enemies

trickledowner — anyone who still subscribes to the many times discredited trickle-down theory of economics, with an emphasis on downer, reflecting the impact related “policies” have had on the mental health of 90-99% of our population, in which the incidence of serious mental issues is now analogous to war zones like Syria and Sudan.

trial balloon — (obs) synonym for normalization

troll — a one-dimensional simulacrum of a human being.

trr — tanned, rested, and ready.

true net worth — measured not in how much money you have vs your debts but what your net impact has been on the world. By this standard, a teacher, social worker, or drug counselor, for example, could have a much higher true net worth than someone claiming to be a billionaire who has made his ‘fortune’ building casinos (which ruin people lives), cheating the government of tax revenues (which the rest of us have to make up for, either in taxes or deficit interest), fronting crime syndicates and terrorist organizations, stiffing investors and contractors, defrauding customers, and using the tiny charitable foundation he has created as a personal piggyback, with all attendant ripple effects. Just for example.  It’s been argued that true net worth, so defined, is too difficult to calculate to be meaningful, but apparently no more so than net worth every April 15th or whenever a wealth tax is proposed.

trump (v): to supercede your earlier statement, explanation, or position with another one that better fits the facts as those facts are revealed, sometimes also known as “moving the goalposts.” Example: “Mexico will pay for the wall”–>”the money our companies are going to make and pay tax on in the new trade deal means Mexico is paying for the wall”–>”Mexico is the wall.”—>? Cf. the act of “trumping” in bridge and other card games.

trumpfiant, trumfiant — triumphantly (and often inappropriately) defiant

trumpful — a very small handful of something

trumpist, trumpian — someone who not only has a Dunning-Kruger level of unwarranted confidence in their knowledge and abilities, but believes their knowledge, understanding, and capabilities in most–if not all–domains exceeds that of all individuals who have dedicated their lives to becoming expert in these areas combined, always ‘following their gut,’ even if it’s only leading to a fast food chain. As a necessary consequence, they also continually fabricate facts to bend reality to their beliefs, and violate norms with impunity, since they often conflict with what they believe.

trump’s axiom — the less you know or have learned about a subject, the more valid your opinion about it is.

trumptopia — 1. a mythical idyll inhabited by Trump supporters where everything he says is true, every criticism a lie, and every fact that does not favor him is “fake news.” 2. the worldwide confederacy of autocracies.

trumpian voter(s) — someone (or a group) who is not expected to vote who therefore ends up deciding the election because they fall outside of, and therefore trump, the game-planning of the parties.  In 2016, trump voters were voters for Trump, especially rural whites. In 2018 and, arguably, 2020, it was Gen Z and millenials.

tucker — a mindless contrarian, or worse, a “contrarian” with an agenda.  Particularly egregious individuals may be known as “mothertuckers.”

tuckle — a laugh emoji used in lieu of/as a response to an argument, cf. former Fox pundit Tucker Carlson, whose signature debate tactic is to laugh at his opponents when he knows he can’t rebut them. He and his fans think he “owns” them every time he does this; all it really shows is that they’ve hit him where it hurts

twc, trwc — acronym for/meaning “traditional world country,” i.e. what’s currently referred to as “third world” or “lesser developed” or “developing” countries, especially those in this category that are more conservative in orientation.  Now that it’s been demonstrated conclusively that the “inevitable” “progression” from hunter-gather societies to late capitalism is more accurately likened to lemmings plunging off a cliff, all terms that assume the superiority of so-called “economic development” and patronize from this position, need to be retired and replaced.  See also owc, orwc.

tweedledeedum — the status or adjective aptly used to describe our government in the last half century, in which our indistinguishable elected millionaires and billionaires stage WWE-like controversies to cover for the fact that they are doing nothing but allowing income inequality to increase and power to become more concentrated, cf. the African proverb: “when elephants fight, only the grass suffers”

twinkling — to smile with one’s eyes.  Included here as an illustration of how we feel neologisms should (and should not) be created.  The trendy new word for this phenomenon, created by celebrity supermodel Tyra Banks, is “smizing.” While she’s certainly an authority when it comes to this capability, just as sports stars often make poor coaches/managers, this is, in our opinion, a rather unattractive word for a lovely capacity (owing primarily to the “sm” and the “z”, if you must know). “Twinkling” is not only more elegant and subtle, like the act itself, but also actually captures/describes what makes eyes appear this way (the “twinkle in the eye”) and better suggests what someone should do if they want to smile with their eyes themselves. Of course sometimes ugliness in words is called for–no one should be proud of being a “veriphobe” the way they take “anti-intellectual” or “philistine” as a badge of honor, for example.  But when what’s being defined is something beautiful, we feel the word should be too, drawing on the full powers of language developed over thousands of years all over the world. Call us out when you see us violating this principle–we’re Americans, after all; it’s what we do (call everyone else out).

two-fooled — from the old expression, “fooled me twice, shame on me.”  Best defined via example: Democrats have been too-fooled by Republicans where fiscal responsibility is concerned; the same people who decried deficits when the Democrats were in power have spent like profligates since they took over.  Being two-fooled obligates the victim, at a minimum, to ignore the other party’s concerns about the issue the next time the victimized party takes power, and may even compel the offended party to act in ways diametrically opposed to those concerns, since, as Republicans have always projected about leaders in other countries who behave in this way, it “may be the only language they understand.”

tzebrokayot — the quality of brokenheartedness that gives strength in healing, aka “broken-hearted but blessed“, or as Bobby Kennedy, quoting Aeschylus, would put it, “pain which cannot forget [that] falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.”  cf. Yiddish tzebrokhnkayt

ujamation — a more appealing synonym or adjacent for alter-globalization.  Cf. the Swahili concept of ujamaa, which means ‘extended family’ and/or ‘brotherhood’; ujamaa, developed where humankind began, asserts that a person becomes a person through the people or community. While globalization represents a spreading out, complexification, and inherent fragility, ujamaa is about coming together, simplifying, building resilience and anti-fragility. Not to be confused with African socialism, if that construct bothers you more than everything the corporate West did to sabotage it.

unbelievable — something that the speaker is incapable of believing.

unpresidented — a term that, unlike “priming the pump,” Donald Trump really did invent, albeit unintentionally.  A combination of “unprecedented” and “unpresidential,” it means unpresidential behavior that is unprecedented.

unsubstantiates — a Schedule A class of political propaganda characterized by the complete lack of evidence for its assertions, thereby creating a vacuum that draws in and binds to its victims. Considered highly addictive because withdrawal, even at low levels of tolerance, typically involves proving a raft of negatives.

uplash — a positive backlash, meaning not just a rocking chair reaction against something, but a reaction that builds on and supersedes the original trend.

utopian (n) — someone who believes the world would be a better place if people were more like them. In some cases, they’re right.

vaxhole — originally someone making a show of having gotten the COVID vaccine when it wasn’t widely available; now applies to anyone who hasn’t gotten the vaccine even though it’s available to them, particularly if they have no plans to do so, and insist that everyone fully understand why; conversely anyone who dry-drunks anyone who hasn’t gotten it; anyone who brags about not having experienced any side effects (not realizing this means their immune system is shot); anyone who believes they are special members of a superior class because they got the Pfizer vaccine; in short, anyone exhibiting an unhealthy obsession with the COVID-19 vaccine.

vengeance — the first resort of autocrats.

veriphobe — Someone who is averse to the use of logic, facts, evidence, rationality, and/or (especially) the use of science, scientific principles, and the scientific method to determine the truth. The existing words to describe this quality, e.g. anti-intellectual or philistine, sound effete, elitist, words that could be worn with pride (like “stubborn”), but there’s no positive spin you can put on being afraid to verify what you believe.

velocicog, velocicogging, velocicoggers — another ugly, clearly negative word to describe another ugly, negative behavior that seems to be in vogue today, namely fast, shallow, lazy thinking (per Kahnemann) when it’s not appropriate or necessary, jumping to conclusions; easily duped as a result.  From velocity (speed) + cognition (thinking)

velocirapt — Fixated on speed, even at the expense of quality, and therefore short-term in outlook at the expense of the future; in consonance with “If your first version doesn’t suck, you’re too late” (Reid Hoffman) or “Move fast and break things” (Mark Zuckerberg), rather than “If you’re off by an inch on landing, no big deal; if you’re off by an inch on takeoff, you miss the moon by a million miles” (Neil Armstrong); centered on the tech world, but unfortunately spreading. From velocity (speed), with a little extinct savagery thrown in.

vichys, vichies — Republicans who do nothing, go along with, or actively collaborate with Trump and Trumpists (cf. Vichy France, the French collaborators with Hitler and the Nazis)

vicioma — a runaway cancer of the brain caused by an obsession with winning at all costs.

vidvaga — depthless optimism even with full knowledge of all reasons to despair, a realer than realist quality Americans used to have a near-monopoly on.  cf. Ukrainian vidvaga, meaning “audacity.”  Also German weit wagen, which means “daring, far and wide” (Carolus)

violation drive — the municipal version of a public television/radio fundraising drive; a method used by localities to balance their budgets on the backs of those who they can ticket rather than those who can afford to pay.

v**al, vi**l, vir*l — alternative spellings for the popular new media term “viral” since the advent of COVID-19 and all the obscenities it’s revealed

virtue-signaling — when someone makes others uncomfortable by doing the right thing

votepire — someone who drains people of their right to vote, cf vote + vampire; not to be confused with a votepyre, a funeral for democracy (as a result of voter oppression) in which votes are effectively burned en masse.

voter oppression — formerly known as “voter suppression,” until we realized it wasn’t in the same universe as trying not to smile or belch, that it wasn’t something we were doing to ourselves, that it wasn’t our fault unless we believed it was and let it continue, that in a land where voting is the most sacred right and rite, not a “privilege,” something that should be as easy as taking a breath of good clean American air, not something to be tricked out of, anyone who tries to prevent any other citizen from voting is an oppressor, and the act is voter oppression, not just suppression–until we can come up with an even worse word to describe it.

waac — win at all costs. Pronounced “wack,”which it often is.

war — any state of existence in which the opinions and votes of some count more than others.

waron — a war by proxy, where others do the fighting, and you get to watch. Examples: the war on drugs, the war on poverty, the war on terror (including Iraq and Afghanistan).

wdrd — abbreviation for “what did Republicans do,” for deployment every time the gop expresses outrage over something indistinguishable from what they did when they were in power.

whatacrockisms — egregiously bad-faith, twisted “whataboutisms” that include not only sophomoric false equivalencies and “false and misleading” claims, but in many cases include downright, flat-out, willful lies.  Most so-called GOP “whataboutisms” fall into this category, and to call them merely “whataboutisms” is, itself, a form of false equivalence on the media’s part.

white man’s burden — the terrible cost white men impose on themselves when they fail to treat women, people of color, and those of different orientations as their equals in every respect, worthy of the same levels of admiration, friendship, love, respect, and support they provide their peers, and whose differences from themselves, whatever they may be, are not only celebrated but recognized as integral to their own success, the success of their country, the future of the human race, and every entity in between the owe their allegiance to.  Of course, the cost white men impose on others when they fail to understand this down to the marrow of their bones is and has always been far worse, but maybe consistently defining their behavior as inimical to their own interests, as opposed to deleterious to others, is the way to finally get through.   Said behavior would suggest this, and God knows everything else has been tried.

who problem — 1. when a revolution produces a political leadership that’s the same or worse than the one it overthrew, especially if the revolution was idealistic in nature. Cf Won’t Get Fooled Again, a classic tune by the seminal rock group The Who. 2. when an official lacks even the most basic fund of knowledge to be an effective political leader (e.g. he thinks the world’s leading health organization dropped a live album at Leeds)

whoville — the state or place we’re in when facing WWII-level challenges like climate change that will require ‘every Who in Whoville’ to overcome, cf. the Dr. Seuss classic, Horton Hears A Who.

wisend — the opposite of wizened; someone who is wise well beyond their years, “4 going on 40” or more; an apt descriptor for the under-30 generation that’s the greatest hope for the future our country has had since the Greatest Generation came of age in the crucible of the Great Depression and World War II.

wishmember — to remember something, e.g. an event, as you wish it had happened, as opposed to what actually transpired. Not to confused with mismember, which is to misremember something to the point of dismemberment of the truth.

witch hunt — an admission of guilt; synonym: no collusion.

wierd weird — strange no matter how you look at it, vs. the many things people think are weird that really aren’t

worthless(-) —  someone who is not merely worthless, but whose net impact on the world has been negative to date (there’s always hope); the superlative form is (worthless(-)ⁿ, i.e. a negative worth to the nth power, someone whose impact on the world has been extremely net negative. Because nearly all humans have significant redeeming qualities, there are very few such people in the world; we can only think of one in the US.

wpos — shorthand for worthless pieceof s***.  Since all human beings have worth, should only be used to describe someone who has truly and completely used up or expelled all their native worth.  Unfortunately, there’s one person who clearly deserves that appellation/epithet, as well as another: nnwpos (negative net worth piece of s***).

wwe — in politics, the domestic form of kabuki, i.e. simulated combat between supposed enemies whose purpose is to maintain quiescence and stimulate contributions from the supporters of all parties involved, e.g. democrats vs. republicans; cf. World Wrestling Entertainment, i.e. another form of simulated revenue-generating, opiate-inducing combat. In recent years, the partisans of all such forms have pushed their practitioners towards more and more realistic–and real–violence.

wwsd — shorthand for “what would Satan do?”

wwtfd, wwfd — shorthand for “what would (the) founders do?”

wwww2d — shorthand for “what would world war ii do?,” used to reach back for answers to our finest collective hour, at the height of our powers, the one time we were truly the United States, as we seek to grapple with the herd of apocalyptic horsemen we face today.  It’s “what would WW2,” rather than “what would FDR” or “what would Churchill,” because in war society becomes an organism unto itself akin to the Nightwalker in Miyazaki’s classic, Princess Mononoke¹ and leaders are merely the best at riding it without being thrown.

youty — made-up slang that no one would ever use, or someone who makes up or tries to use slang or inflections in an effort to look ‘down with the peeps.’ Cf. “Here’s beauty from me to youty,” said no drug dealer ever, except in this ubiquitous 1970’s anti-drug PSA). Our use of youty itself could be a good example, except we’re not coining it to be cool, only to ridicule panderers, especially the ones who seem to be getting away with it. Barack Obama was sometimes a youty, e.g. when he’d go to African-American churches and immediately start dropping his r’s, which they don’t do even in the deepest south of Oahu.

zaphod — someone, for better or worse, with the extreme self-regard often required to do or make something truly significant happen (cf Hitchhiker’s Guide character Zaphod Beeblebrox, the only life form known to have survived the Total Perspective Vortex, which reveals one’s place (and insignificance) in the universe).

Have words you’d like to add?  Mods on the ones we have?  Tell us in comments below, or hit us up shyly but directly here…

¹ As opposed to the T-rex-like monster we’ve collectively become in this age of instant gratification, blind to everything unless it moves.

² Is it possible that the 300 downloads did not consist of 300 unique individuals? Sure, but the total number of downloads was in line with the number of downloads in the same file library (i.e. not unusually high) and because the service in question charged by the minute (beyond a fairly limited number of free hours), its users would be fairly disincented from repeatedly download a file that they discovered to be empty the first time they downloaded it.

³ For years, researchers have reported out study after study demonstrating a strong correlation between diet soda consumption and obesity, which regularly gets converted into a belief that diet soda causes obesity, even though diet soda is disproportionately consumed by people who have weight problems and no convincing explanation for how diet soda causes obesity has ever been found and, in most cases, isn’t even attempted. One recent study appeared to show causation, but only for women, not men, which sounds like the kind of study that will prove irreproducible, and still lacked a plausible mechanism of action.  In any case, even if causation is eventually proven and a mechanism of action determined, there will still have been decades worth of studies hyped by investigators, scientific journals, and the media in which one of the cardinal principles of science (correlation ≠ causation) was ignored for the “man bites dog” narrative, the obvious alternative explanation for the results downplayed, and neither causation nor mechanism provided, collectively the four horsemen of DS.

⁴ The Atlantic recently published an article in which they called scrolling for positive break-through news “foom-scrolling.  “Foom” is an AI term; a “foom” occurs “when an AI’s cascading self-improvements accelerate its own development until it becomes powerful beyond human comprehension.” The word is meant to “evoke the sound of an explosive eruption.”  We’ve never heard an explosion that sounded like “foom.”  Instead it sounds foolish, and people looking for good news and reasons for optimism isn’t any more worthy of mockery than what people will do to save themselves from drowning. But we understand why the media would think otherwise, given the outsized role they’ve played in generating the current environment of cynicism and despair.