Tyrannosaurus lex

Vocabulary for a New American Century

AMNEIZURE. A paroxysm brought on by the unexpected recurrence of suppressed memories. Example: “On being questioned about parallels with Vietnam, General Richard Myers experienced a sudden amneizure.

CLAMDUNK. Jailing and/or fining reporters who refuse to divulge their sources.

DEBRIEFING. A slight sartorial adjustment made by most foreign nationals within a few minutes after leaving the Green Zone in Baghdad.

DISEMBEDOUINS. Nomadic journalists, often Arabs or disguised as Arabs, whose insufficient allegiance to any state makes them both feared and hated.

FALLUGE. Rapid descent of a slippery slope from military occupation to outright barbarism.

GREENHOUSE AFFECTATION. Pretending to care about global warming.

HYPOCRACY. A system of governance in which the rule of law only applies to suckers.

IMPURGENTS. CIA agents who refuse (or whose husbands refuse) to parrot the Bushite line, inviting a purge.

INSECURED AREAS. Sections of conquered cities that are “secured,” but remain full of resistance fighters.

MIDDLE CLASSIFICATION. A uniquely American way to eliminate poverty and social strife in two, easy steps: 1) Expand the definition of “middle class” to include all income groups below plutocrats, and 2) Give out “middle class tax cuts.”

PABULIATIVE. Pabulum designed to serve as a palliative. Accent is properly placed upon the third syllable.

PSYOPSY. Intense “cross-examination” of selected members of a body politic to try and determine the cause of their seemingly inexplicable unrest.

SELF-FULFILLING PROFLIGACY. A deliberate plan to run up huge deficits in order to bankrupt the U.S. Treasury, forcing massive cuts in every conceivable non-military program, with the ultimate purpose of disabusing Americans once and for all of the absurd and irresponsible notion that government spending can ever solve anything.

SINERGY. The tendency of two or more evils in apparent competition to form feedback loops, resulting in an evil far greater than the sum of its parts. Example: Al Qaeda and the Bush regime.

TERRIF. Steep costs extracted, usually in maimed and slaughtered civilians, for importing small numbers of foreign resistance fighters (“terrorists”).

YELLOW-DOG REPUBLICANS. Republicans who would vote for an administration full of chicken hawks over a Democrat. Interestingly, a great many of them appear to be the children or grandchildren of the equally loyal, faithful, obedient and wet-nosed Yellow-Dog Democrats of yore.

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