I feel that we haven't done enough to document the made-up words and phrases coming out of the run-up to the 2008 U.S. presidential election. I did note the flurry of shag-derivations over at Talking Points Memo, and there have probably been a few others that slip my mind at the moment, but many seasonal blends and other acts of politico-linguistic creativity have passed us by. So before the chance is gone, I'll note that yesterday Ross Douthat offered this gloss for Huckenfreude (n):
Pleasure derived from the outrage of prominent conservative pundits over the rising poll numbers of Mike Huckabee.
One of his commenters cited a list of other huckavocabulary items, includng Huckaboom, Huckabomb, Huckabinge. And another suggested
Huckaventionism: misguided, well-meaning government intervention in private life meant to enforce some sort of virtue such as smoking cessation, weight loss, outlawing foie gras, etc.
Past seasonal coinages range from the obvious (Obamania) to the obscure (Ron Paul Effect).
If you've seen some especially interesting specimens, please send links and I'll add your observations to the end of this post.
[Richard Bell sent in a link to Huckacide at The Stump. Looking around a bit at The Stump also turned up Hill-a-copter and Barackabee.]
[Victor Steinbok contributes Huckaplomacy, along with some others that I don't have time to add just now.]
Posted by Mark Liberman at December 15, 2007 09:58 AM