adultism n.— «One specific “ism” that GLSEN takes great pains to address is “adultism,” which the guide defines as “behaviors and attitudes that adults are better than young people, and entitled to act upon them without their agreement.”...
lawyertician n.— «A couple I know, working people, were having coffee a while back, and they were reading the paper, and every other story was about some pol stealing or getting himself a fatter pension, and they coined a word to describe what’s...
“A fish stinks from the head down.” When an Indianapolis woman is quoted saying that, she’s accused of calling someone a stinky fish. She says she wasn’t speaking literally, insisting that this is a turn of phrase that means “corruption in an...
Tomnibus n.— «A product of Democratic frustration with the tactics of Senator Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican and physician who has become the Dr. No of the Senate, the Tomnibus is a $10 billion collection of Coburn-blocked measures assembled by...
chicken coop n.— «Interestingly, the two Republican senators who voted to override Mr. Pawlenty’s veto not only were not punished, the GOP Senate leadership didn’t even criticize them. I wonder if that’s why some senators sometimes derisively refer...
day soldier n.— «But they will continue to provide insurgents, I’m sure. What has to happen here is to drive a wedge between the extremist leadership and what I call the “day soldiers,” [insurgents] those who sign up not because they are ideologues...