American Conservatism And The Meaning Of "Combobulate"

Fred Owens

This is a game called Discouraging Words. We see a list of Discouraging words that begin with D followed by a list of Encouraging words that begin with G.

So far the D list is longer and the pessimists are winning. Please submit your contributions in the comment boxes

Death, disease, destruction, depression, disaster, despair, disappointment, desolate and deserted, distress, damaged and derelict..... Also dummy, dodo, dimwit, doofus and dork.... Dark, denial, decadent, downcast, distended, disinclined, disinherited, dubious, dysphoria, dismissal...... Dictator, dumbass, deplorable, dengue, drudgery

Good, gardens and grandchildren, gratitude and grace, gift, generosity, geniality, glad, gumption,green, glory, grow, gay, gravy
....Gracious, grits (for the gravy), gentle, genuine, gallant, glamorous, genius, genuine....... Guacamole, giraffe, grapes, grass.

4 Comments

Comments

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  Fred Owens Dis words are disallowed. Dis is a prefix and there are hundreds of words that begin with dis, like disagree, discombobulate, etc.

  1

Alan: I was preparing to argue that "discombulate" does not fall under your "prefix rule" since there is no "combobulate" to make the "dis" a mere appendage.

Then I discovered: "Combobulate. (Verb) To put together in a somewhat mysterious manner. To bring something out of a state of confusion or disarray. To manufacture by some unusual or novel means."

Tangent...

Our mutual friend Jim Sanfilipo knows a fellow who has been close to Trump for 30 years. (This wo/man -- who sadly must remain anonymous -- is a medical practitioner whose hands have been inside Trump's body more than once.)

Jim's informant says "Trump doesn't know anything - and he doesn't want to know anything." http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2018/01/fast-food-and-trumps-concept-of-truth.html

Such hermetically-sealed ignore-ance makes me wonder if garden variety Trumpistas would ever be tempted to look up "combobulate" or probe any other lexical-semantic issue.

I fear John Stuart Mill was right: "Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid, it is true that most stupid people are conservative."

Lockstep with their commander-in-chief, these addled "conservatives" posit nonsense-as-knowledge and have no interest -- zero, zilch, nihil, niente, nada -- in venturing beyond the iron-clad confines of middle school talking points.

As we say the The South: "God bless their hearts!"

Mark Twain, Carl Sagan And Isaac Asimov: It Is Damn Difficult To Admit We've Been Fooled

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2017/03/mark-twain-and-carl-sagan-it-is-damn.html