Saturday, May 26, 2007

Spelling: A new low on language in politics?

Well, of course not, but it's sort of tragically stupid. As John McCain's campaign continues its crash and burn, there's this. Obama just criticized McCain's assessment of the war as unrealistic:
Senator McCain required a flack jacket, ten armored Humvees, two Apache attack helicopters, and 100 soldiers with rifles by his side to stroll through a market in Baghdad just a few weeks ago.
McCain's comeback? He concludes:
By the way, Senator Obama, it's a 'flak' jacket, not a 'flack' jacket.
The reports on liberal blogs (like this) make the key points: flack is acknowledged as an accepted spelling (New Oxford American and Merriam-Webster's both give it) some young underling typed this up, not Sen. Obama himself.

So, it's not a new low for language and politics, but it's got to be a sign of a dead campaign walking.

5 comments:

GAC said...

Such a rediculous thing to say. I agree with you on this one.

BTW, might want to fix that link. You seem to have a nasty habit of leaving the initial "h" of "http" off your URLs.

Mr. Verb said...

Oh, thanks ... the 'h' is there now.

The Ridger, FCD said...

Clearly McCain has run out of things to say. Unless his point is that he's old enough to remember when the word came into the language and Obama is just a young pup.

Mr. Verb said...

Yeah, but it's sad to see him do this stuff on a national stage. He's played a positive role in the Senate sometimes (McCain-Feingold, for example, as a first step on campaign finance), but it seems like he's falling apart.

The Ridger, FCD said...

You're right - it is very sad. I wish there was someone close to McCain who could stop this.