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English has an uncountable thousands of words it doesn’t need.  If you don’t believe me, check out “A Word a Day,” and learn the meanings of words that are completely useless.  The last two days brought us:

  • April 14: Flocculent (adjective: having a fluffy, woolly texture).
  • April 13: Impetrate (verb: to obtain by request or entreaty).

Maybe this impressed people a century ago, but if I wrote that a sheep was flocculent, I think you’d be rolling your eyes.

While some English speakers 400 years ago were discovering gravity, developing calculus, using newly minted telescopes to explore our solar system, and refining our understanding of logic as originally put forth by Aristotle, others were inventing words for groups of animals.

Sure, it’s useful to have words like “pack” (for dogs), “herd” (for cows and horses), “flock” (for birds), and perhaps a few others.  But what about a group of owls (a parliament), flamingos (a flamboyance), or ferrets (a business)?  And that’s just the beginning.

By contrast, Spanish has too few words, IMO.  For those interested, here are the 15+ possible meanings in English of the verb “llevar.” As someone who made an honest attempt to learn the language, I’d go into panic mode when someone would say something with any conjugation of that verb.  S***! Is he talking about wearing something, Giving someone a ride? Bringing something? Getting along well with someone?  Stealing something?

Is It Odd that Many Words in English are Supernumerary? Or Is that Superfluous? Extraneous? Unnecessary?

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Renewable Energy

Is There a Pattern in Republicans’ Behavior?

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I’m not sure it’s as simple as this, insofar as Bush 41 and 43 weren’t criminal sociopaths.

I happened to be driving through Manhattan on the very day that Colin Powell was addressing the United Nations just a few miles away and claimed, and I think honestly, that Saddam Hussein had “weapons of mass destruction,” and must be stopped by a U.S. military invasion.

Contrast that against what we’re doing in Iran.  Fifteen years ago, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), included Iran, the P5+1 nations (the United States, China, Russia, France, the United Kingdom, and Germany), alongside the European Union made an agreement in which most of the developed world agreed that Iran must not have a nuclear weapon.

That stood firmly in place until Trump’s latest war crime, which is costing lives and choking the world economy, solely to defend our president’s neuroses.

Is There a Pattern in Republicans’ Behavior?

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Renewable Energy

Illegal Immigrants Are Voting Huge?

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The Brennan Center at NYU’s seminal report on this issue, The Truth About Voter Fraud, found that most reported incidents of voter fraud are actually traceable to other sources, such as clerical errors or bad data matching practices. The report reviewed elections that had been meticulously studied for voter fraud and found incident rates between 0.0003 percent and 0.0025 percent.

Does that stop liars like Mike Lee from spreading disinformation of the subject?  Of course not.

There is no judgement day.  There is no Saint Peter standing in front of the Pearly Gates discerning good from evil and acting according.

That’s a lucky break for Mike Lee.

Illegal Immigrants Are Voting Huge?

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Renewable Energy

There Were Prior Threats to the Nation Stemming from the White House

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For most of our lives, many of us boomers have believed that the biggest threat to the United States was our president, starting with Tricky Dick Nixon, the inventor of the “trickle-down economics,” liar Ronald Reagan, and GW (the moron) Bush.

But yes, none of us was prepared for the cold, calculating criminal who is Donald Trump.

There Were Prior Threats to the Nation Stemming from the White House

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