`Surge' makes the banned-words list

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`Surge' makes the banned-words list

By JEFF KAROUB, Associated Press WriterMon Dec 31, 2:56 PM ET

Resist the urge to say you will "wordsmith" your list of New Year's
resolutions rather than write one. And don't utter, "It is what it is"
when you fail to meet your first goal.

Those are two of the 19 words or phrases that appear in Lake
Superior State University's annual List of Words Banished from the
Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness. The
school in Michigan's Upper Peninsula released its 33rd list Monday,
selecting from about 2,000 nominations.

Among this year's picks are "surge," the term for the troop buildup
in Iraq. "Give me the old days, when it referenced storms and
electrical power," Michael Raczko of Swanton, Ohio, said in nominating
the word.

The list also included "waterboarding," "perfect storm," "under the
bus" and "organic." Also: "It is what it is," which Jeffrey Skrenes of
St. Paul, Minn., said "accomplishes the dual feat of adding nothing to
the conversation while also being phonetically and thematically
redundant."

Sadly for grammar's guardians, the lighthearted list isn't binding,
as evidenced by the continued use of past banned words and phrases such
as "erectile dysfunction," "i-anything" and "awesome."

Still, university spokesman Tom Pink, part of a committee that
evaluates submissions, takes his syntactic success where he can find it.

His office once received a letter from an Arizona Supreme Court
justice who said he posted that year's list on a bulletin board and
prohibited all attorneys from using those words.

___

On the Net:

Lake Superior State University's banished words: http://www.lssu.edu/banished

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