Friday, June 14, 2013

Key Words.

Boy, old words, new meanings this week, huh? Like new wine being poured into old skins. Sigh. I love metaphors.

-"prism."
-"tangible things." From the NSA Verizon court order.
-"event horizon." Not new but vague, innocuous-sounding "tangible things" reminded me of it. That's the term astrophysicists use to refer to the lip of a Black Hole.
-"leaker." I don't think I've ever heard that word applied to...What would the word be for an Edward Snowden-like person. You can see editors having that discussion. "Whistleblower," I guess in their minds would mean Snowden exposed government wrongdoing and with Congress having passed legislation and the courts having approved the action, editors weren't willing to say that. "Spy," "traitor:" too far the other way.  "Leaker" though? Snowden isn't incontinent. How about "revealer" or "exposer?" Too suggestive, like "flasher?" I don't know. "Leaker" just sounds like pee stains.
 -"secret."
-"treason."
-"pink police state." New words, not old words, still key words this week.
-"stiletto heels."  I can never look at those things the same way after this week (But I'll still look.)
-"lie."
-"No sir." (NSA Director James Clapper)
-"least untruthful." (Ditto)
-"Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" (Senator Ron Wyden to James Clappet)
-"You can misunderstand the question." (Senator Dianne Feinstein)