Ed Huntress wrote:
"Gunner" wrote in message
...

Ah..Ed...I suspect that your "dead set in the middle" was defined by
a Marxist.

Jeez, I keep telling you, Gunner: It's polls and elections. There's no
denying the evidence, unless you intentionally ignore it.


AP via CNN - Jan 7, 2006
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/01/07/wor...ion=cnn_latest

'Truthiness' is word of the year

ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (AP) -- A panel of linguists has decided the word
that best reflects 2005 is "truthiness," defined as the quality of stating
concepts one wishes or believes to be true, rather than the facts.

The American Dialect Society chose the word Friday after a runoff with terms
related to Hurricane Katrina, such as "Katrinagate," the scandal erupting
from the lack of planning for the monster hurricane.

Michael Adams, a professor at North Carolina State University who
specializes in lexicology, said "truthiness" means "truthy, not facty."

"The national argument right now is, one, who's got the truth and, two,
who's got the facts," he said. "Until we can manage to get the two of them
back together again, we're not going make much progress."

The group of linguists, editors and academics agreed the most useful word
was "podcast" -- a digital feed containing audio or video files for
downloading to an MP3 player.

In a runoff for the most creative word, "whale tail," the appearance of a
thong above the waistband, beat out "muffin top," the bulge of flesh hanging
over the top of low-riding jeans.

Tom Cruise became the first public figure in the contest's 16 years to be
noted for his influence on public discourse. The group coined the term
"Cruiselex" to describe such terms as "jump the couch" and "Cruisazy."

"Jump the couch," meaning to exhibit strange or frenetic behavior, won the
best Tom Cruise-related word or phrase. It stems from the actor's antics in
May on Oprah Winfrey's couch as he talked about his love for fiancee Katie
Holmes. "Cruisazy" means to exhibit crazy behavior.

"I don't know any other public figure who has inspired so many words in a
single year," said Erin McKean, editor of the New Oxford American
Dictionary.

Other winners included "sudoku," a Japanese number puzzle voted the word
most likely to succeed, and "pope squatting," the practice of registering an
online domain that is the name of the new pope in order to profit from it,
as least likely to succeed.

Last year's overall winner was "red, blue and purple states." In the 2004
general election, voters in red states favored Republicans, those in blue
states favored Democrats and residents of purple states were undecided.

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press.


--
John R. Carroll
Machining Solution Software, Inc.
Los Angeles San Francisco
www.machiningsolution.com