It Can't Happen Here---Can It?

Here's a description of a noted politician:

 “[He] was vulgar, almost illiterate, a public liar easily detected, and in his “ideas” almost idiotic… [He] advocated…plenty of graft for loyal machine politicians, with jobs for their brothers-in-law, nephews, law partners and creditors….He would whirl arms, bang tables, glare from mad eyes, vomit Biblical wrath from a gaping mouth…and almost contemptuously jab his crowds with figures and facts—figures and facts that were inescapable, even when, as often happened, they were entirely incorrect. He could…make you see him veritably defending the Capitol against barbarian hordes, while he innocently presented as his own warm-hearted inventions every anti-libertarian, anti-Semitic madness…He regarded all foreigners, possibly excepting the British, as degenerate.  But he was the Common Man twenty-times-magnified by his oratory, so that while the other Commoners could understand his purpose, which was exactly the same as their own, they saw him towering among them, and they raised their hands to him in worship.”

 

Sound like anyone you know of? Well, it’s Sinclair Lewis’ description of Buzz Windrip, the successful Presidential candidate in It Can’t Happen Here, published some 85 years ago.

 

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou pondered the implications of Lewis's prescient political parable, and it left him almost speechless. Almost, but not quite.

 

                    There is a  problem with democracy:

                    Sometimes it leads to demagoguery,

                    And then, surrounded by hypocrisy,

                    And lies, and threats, and pettifoggery, 

                    Before you know it, you've got oligarchy--

                    And that's malarkey!

Impeachy-Keen

A good many people recently have been using the word impeach as if it meant to oust someone (guess who) because of misconduct. The Merriam-Webster College Dictionary (eleventh edition) even allows this meaning (“remove from office”)--as a third alternate to the primary definition (“bring an accusation against”). This ambiguity of meaning can be confusing these days when people talk (some gleefully and some indignantly) about impeaching the President.

Impeach stems from the Anglo-French empecher, meaning “hinder, stop, impede, or capture,” which derives from the Latin impedicare (“fetter, entangle”). The basic Latin roots are pes (“foot”) and impedīre (ensnaring the foot in a trap”). By late 14^th century, “impeach” was used to mean “accuse,” especially to accuse the King in the House of Commons of treason or other high crimes. The shift in meaning was no doubt due to confusion of impedicare with the Latin impetere, which means “attack or accuse.”

Now for a little civics lesson (pay attention, so you may appear erudite at your next cocktail party or barroom brawl): As used in the United States Constitution, impeach means to make an accusation that an offense has been committed.  The nature of the offense is, perhaps purposely, left vague. The Constitution merely says, “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.“ (Article II, Section 4)

Elsewhere the Constitution specifies that the House of Represenatives has the “sole powert of Impeachment” and that the Senate has the “sole Power to try all Impeachments, with conviction requiring the “Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present.”

The punishment for conviction is limited to “removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States,” although the possibility of subsequent criminal indictment and trial for the same offense is suggested.

Impeachment, then, can be regarded as equivalent to indictment in criminal law, followed by a trial that will determine whether the accused is guilty or not guilty.

Two previous United States Presidents have been impeached, and neither was found guilty. (Here comes the history lesson.)

In 1868 Andrew Johnson, a Democrat, was impeached on eleven charges (“articles of impeachment”), all having to do with his firing Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, a violation of the Tenure of Office Act, which required Senate approval of any firing of an official for whom Senate approval was required for the appointment.

On strict party lines, the House voted 126-47 for impeachment, with 17 abstentions. The Senate vote on the first four articles failed by one vote to reach the two-thirds majority, and other seven articles were never voted on. There were 35 votes, all Republicans, for conviction, and 19 against, comprising 10 Republicans and 9 Democrats. Democrats, of course, were underrepresented in Congress since the delegates from the seceded Confederate states had not yet been readmitted.

In 1998, Bill Clinton was impeached on two counts, lying under oath and obstructing justice about sexual relations with two women, one of whom was a White House intern. The House vote to impeach was largely on party lines: 223 Republicans and 5 Democrats for impeachment on the first charge, with 201 Democrats and 5 Republicans against; and 216 Republicans and 5 Democrats for impeachment on the second charge, with 200 Democrats and 12 Republicans against.

The Senate vote fell far short of the two-thirds requirement, with 45 Republicans voting for conviction on the first charge, and 45 Democrats plus 10 Republicans voting against. The second charge was closer, with 50 Republicans for and 45 Democrats and 5 Republicans opposed to conviction.

The Bard of Buffalo, who, surprisingly, has never been impeached, has been in hibernation for a good long while, fortified by several cases of Chardonnay. Now he seems to have run low on supplies, since he is back, versifying for his vino, with this deplorable result:

                        There’s a big debate on impeachment,

                        With many a partisan preachment,

                        And much purple prose

                        About quid pro quos

                        And what the President’s speech meant.

                       

                        On the one hand we have Jerry Nadler,

                        On this issue he’s nobody’s straddler,

                        Then there’s Collins and Gaetz,

                        Jordan, Gohmert, and mates--

                        Which of them is the chief fiddle-faddler?

                        Nadler said, “Listen, you chumps,

                        Let’s not sit around on our rumps,

                        We can settle this claim

                        With a speedy bridge game,

                        And the winning bid is no trumps.”                        

                       

                       

23 Skidoo!

People of a certain age (now mostly dead) will recall the slang phrase 23 Skidoo! It means “to leave quickly,” usually in order to avoid some unpleasant consequence.

First seen in print around 1906, it became a popular catch-phrase in the 1920s. Its etymological origin is murky. Evidently it's a combination of two earlier phrases, twenty-three and skidoo, each of which independently meant to “leave quickly” or possibly to “be kicked out of” an establishment. 

One supposed explanation tries to associate 23 Skidoo with New York’s Flatiron Building, which is on West 23^rd Street beween 5^th Avenue and Broadway. Because of the building’s odd shape, high winds swept vigorously around it.  Lecherous men (are there any other kind?) liked to gather there in the early 1900s and watch women’s skirts being blown up, revealing lots of leg. Cops would shoo the men away from 23^rd Street, giving them  a “23 Skidoo.”

Nice story, but probably not accurate.

The term twenty-three by itself, meaning “scram,” appeared in print in 1899, but it can possibly be traced all the way to Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, published in 1859.  At the end of the novel Sidney Carton is No. 23 of a group of some 50 to be guillotined. In the theatrical version, an old woman sits at the foot of the guillotine, counting the heads as they roll. When Carton meets his fate, she dispassionately says “twenty-three,” and the phrase became popular among theatre folk, meaning “It’s time to exit.”

Another theory traces the term twenty-three to nineteenth-century English race tracks, where that was the maximum number of horses allowed in a race, so that when No. 23 was in the post, it was time for all the horses to leave and start the race.

Skidoo, which appeared by itself around 1901, is generally regarded as a variant of skedaddle. Skedaddle comes from the British dialectic scaddle, meaning to “run off  in fright,” which in turn is derived from Old Norse skathi (“harm”).

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou, who has had a long rest, has been at his wit’s end (not a great distance) to come up with an appropriate verse. This tortured colloquy is the sad result of his efforts.

            Into a bar there came two dozen squid.

            Just one does not remember what she did,

            No, she does not recall what she did do—

            But you know that twenty-three squid do!

What's the Word?

There must be a word—although I do not know what it is—to define a metaphorical term whose meaning has supplanted the literal meaning of the original.  There are plenty of these words in English.  A few examples are:

Mortarboard—Chances are the first thing you think of when you hear this word is a flat academic hat—not a mason’s tool for holding a gooey building material.  Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, published in 2007,  even lists the academic hat as the primary meaning.  Webster’s New International of 1949, however, says a flat board with a handle for holding mortar should go first, with the hat in second place. I conclude that this shift in primary meaning has taken place over a half-century.

Warhorse—Most people think first of a veteran public official or an overdone artistic work before settling on the original meaning, a horse used in battle.

Beanpole—A tall thin person comes to mind before a wooden stick for a bean vine to grow on.

Blockbuster—Originally this was a bomb so powerful it could blow up a city block, but now it’s primarily a production of some sort that is extravagant and spectacular.

Melting Pot—This term has been used so often to describe the diverse society of the United States that hardly anyone would now think it meant a crucible in which to dissolve substances over high heat.

Barn Burner—Very few barns actually go up in flames when this term is used; instead it refers to something that arouses a great deal of excitement.

Spare Tire—Okay, which do you think of first—that Goodyear radial in the trunk or that extra layer of fat around the tummy?

Nest Egg—Which is it—an egg left in a nest to induce a hen to lay more (original meaning) or a sum of money saved for a rainy day?  I’ll bet you think first of the latter.

I’m sure there must be many more such terms that have virtually lost their original definition and now primarily denote their metaphorical meaning.  Now all I have to do is find out what to call them.

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou (who has been uncharacterstically dormant for a blessed while) has bestirred himself (having thought he heard the tinkle of ice cubes) to regurgitate a few lines of gibberish. 

            A Broadway composer, who thought anything goes,  

            At a college commencement soon started to doze,

            For alas, one address by a man in a mortarboard,

            I have to confess, left poor old Cole Porter bored.

                 

Would I Lie?

Yes, I know the “Lie-Lay” Train has left the station without me on it, but two recent misuses of these verbs were so egregious that I cannot forbear making a last-ditch effort. The cases in point:

1. The Houston Chronicle, the backbone of the Hearst newspaper empire, reported that the “body of Mrs. Bush will lay in state at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church.”

2. A few days later, a CNN on-line item related that the passengers on a Southwest Airlines plane, trying to rescue a woman sucked through a window when an engine blew out, “grabbed her and lay her on the floor.”

Those two usages, mirror opposites of each other in their wrongness, sound so painfully offensive to the ear that it’s difficult to imagine anyone, let alone a professional writer of the English language, thinking they were right. O, copy editors, where art thou?

One more time, allow me to point out:

In the present (or future) tense, lie means to “repose or recline, to be prone or supine.” (There’s a little mnemonic rhyme.) It also means simply to “be situated.” Mrs. Bush’s body will lie in state.

The past tense of lie is lay. Mrs. Bush’s body lay in state last week.

The past participle of lie is lain. Many important people have lain in state before they were buried.

OK, now then: lay in the present (or future) tense is an entirely different word. It means to “put or to place something.” The key here is “something.” Lay in the present (or future) tense requires an object. The rescuers are going to lay the woman on the floor.

The past tense of lay is laid. The passengers laid the woman on the floor.

The past participle of lay is also laid. The rescuers have laid the woman on the floor and are now back in their seats.

Of course, everyone knows—I pray I am correct—that lie, meaning to “tell an untruth,” comes from an entirely different root and has nothing to do with the words we are discussing. (This lie's past and past participle is lied.)

‘Nough said?

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou thinks he never says enough, and so he relentlessly offers this verse, which will be of no help whatsoever in remembering whether to use lie, lay, or laid.

            I was laid up, so I lay down           

            To lie low while I was sick.

            My boss rang up to lay me off,

            And I laid it on quite thick.

           

            But still my boss laid into me--

            That made me worse, no doubt.

            Now on my tomb, engraved, you’ll see:

            “Laid up, laid low, laid off, laid out.”

Dibs on Nibs

Not many readers, I expect, will recall the pop-jazz singer of the 1940s and 1950s who was invariably introduced as “Her Nibs, Miss Georgia Gibbs.” It was a nickname conferred on her by the radio host Garry Moore, playing on the common phrase “His Nibs,” a satirical title of honor for a person of self-importance.

No longer much in use, “His Nibs” first appeared in 1821 and its origin, according to all the etymological experts, is obscure.  Clearly, it is not related to nib in the singular, which is a variant of neb, and means either a “beak” or a “pen point.” It derives from the Old Norse nef (“beak”). 

More likely, “His Nibs” had its origin in nabob, a word that came from the Hindi navāb and Urdu nawāb, which are words for a provincial governor of the Mogul Empire in India and, hence, a “person of great wealth and power.”

Nabob also gave us nob, which appeared in 1703, a slang term for a person of the upper class. San Francisco’s Nob Hill, was named for four such persons, the railroad tycoons Leland Stanford, Mark Hopkins, Charles Crocker, and Collis Huntington, who built mansions there.

Another variant also probably descended from nabob is nabs, dating from 1790, and used with a possessive as a jocular designation of an important person, i.e. “His Nabs.”

Georgia Gibbs was born Frieda Lipschitz in 1919 in Worcester, Massachusetts, and became known, first as Fredda Gibson and then as Georgia Gibbs, as a singer whose hits included “If I Knew You Were Coming I’d Have Baked a Cake,“ “Kiss of Fire,” and “Dance With Me, Henry.”  She died in 2006 at the age of 87.

His Nibs, The Bard of Buffalo Bayou, would like to hobnob with nabobs, but most of them prefer to avoid him.

                  I once had a pal who was known as His Nibs,

                  And he could not abide anyone who told fibs.

                                    If someone strayed from the truth

                                    He would say, “That’s uncouth!”

                  And poke the offender quite hard in the ribs.

                  If His Nibs were around in 2018,

                  And tuned to Fox News on the big TV screen,

                                    When he heard all the inanity

                                    Of Carlson, Ingraham, and Hannity,

                  There’d more aching ribs than you’ve ever seen. 

Bar Talk

Normally, I don’t like to steal material from other writers to use in this blog.  Well, that’s not entirely true; I steal a lot, but I usually try to disguise the theft. In this case, however, I’m reprinting verbatim a very clever Facebook post, whose author is anonymous, but nonetheless deserves to stand up and take a bow.

Herewith, a few variations on the “man walks into a bar” jokes:

            A dangling participle walks into a bar. Enjoying a cocktail and chatting with the bartender, the evening passes pleasantly.

            A bar was walked into by the passive voice.

            An oxymoron walked into a bar, and the silence was deafening.

            Two quotation marks walk into a “bar.”

            A malapropism walks into a bar, looking for all intensive purposes like a wolf in cheap clothing, muttering epitaphs and casting dispersions on his magnificent other, who takes him for granite.

            Hyperbole totally rips into this insane bar and absolutely destroys everything.

            A non sequitur walks into a bar. In a strong wind, even turkeys can fly.

            A mixed metaphor walks into a bar, seeing the handwriting on the wall but hoping to nip it in the bud.

            A comma splice walks into a bar, it has a drink and then leaves.

            Three intransitive verbs walk into a bar. They sit. They converse. They depart.

            A synonym strolls into a tavern.

            At the end of the day, a cliché walks into a bar -- fresh as a daisy, cute as a button, and sharp as a tack.

            A run-on sentence walks into a bar it starts flirting. With a cute little sentence fragment.

            The conditional and the subjunctive would walk into a bar, if it were possible.

            A misplaced modifier walks into a bar owned a man with a glass eye named Ralph.

            The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense.

            An Oxford comma walks into a bar, where it spends the evening watching the television getting drunk and smoking cigars.

            A simile walks into a bar, as parched as a desert.

            A gerund and an infinitive walk into a bar, drinking to forget.

The Bard of Buffalo bayou walks into a bar every chance he gets.  When he comes out, he’s usually staggering and clutching a sheaf of dubious verses, such as:

             A florist walked into a bar,

            And said, “I’ll have two Buds.”

            A laundress who was with him said,

            “Just pour me up some suds.”

            “On second thought,” the laundress said,

            “Make that a cup of Cheer.”

            And then an undertaker said,

            “I think I’ll have a bier.”           

            An optician walked into the bar

            And said, “I’d like two glasses.”

            A fisherman then said, “I want

            Some ale—make that two Basses.”

            A milkman walked into the bar,

            And said, “I’ll take a quart.”

            A sailor right behind him said,

            “I’m really into port.”

            A cotton farmer in the bar

            Remarked, “I need a gin.”

            A census-taker then came in

            And asked for Mickey Finn.

            A contortionist squeezed in

            And called out, “Bottom’s up!”

            Omar Khayyam came in then

            And wrote, “Come fill the cup.”

            A gunman walked into the bar

            And said, “I’ll take a shot.”

            A realtor scanned the drink list and

            Declared, “I’ll have the lot.”