Engineering amazing

[Jonathan Lighter]

Re adj. > n.

Michael Moore explained today that the banks are filthy rich.

"But filthy rich isn't good enough."

All of these forms may be characterized as simple (though novel)
"being"-deletion.

(Apologies if someone has already suggested that.)

JL

On Tue, Sep 27, 2011 at 11:31 AM, Ben Zimmer
<bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Engineering amazing
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Tue, Sep 27, 2011 at 11:23 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >
> > The commercial I mentioned is for Grant Thornton, management consultants.
> >
> > As the words materialize on the screen, a voice tells you,
> >
> > "Big doesn't win....
> >
> > "Original wins.
> >
> > "Fresh wins.
> >
> > "Smart wins."
>
> And speaking of the opposition between "smart" and "big", there's a
> commercial currently running for the Smart Car with a tagline
> seemingly designed to appeal to Larry Horn: "Unbig. Uncar."
>
> http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/ad-day-smart-car-134981
>
> --bgz
>
> --
> Ben Zimmer
> http://benzimmer.com/
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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