more chad chaff

[Dennis R. Preston]

Normally, I am a fan of Gerald's as regards etymological stuff, but the
claim that we are in the new (data processing) age and should not look to
Middle English for sources leaves me a little worried about words like
"airplane," "helicopter," and the like.

dInIs (who admittedly likes old wine in old bottles but will look elsewhere)

>>(6) So my tentatively advanced, speculative etymology of "chad" is
>>(drumroll, please):
>>an acronym of CHip of Automatic Data.
>
>>-----Gerald Cohen
>
>
>How about:
>Cut Hole And Discard.
>
>I, too, like the notion of an acronym and see that it could lead to ENDLESS
>discussion of candidates, just as the election itself seems to be doing.
>A. Murie


Dennis R. Preston
Department of Linguistics and Languages
Michigan State University
East Lansing MI 48824-1027 USA
preston at pilot.msu.edu
Office: (517)353-0740
Fax: (517)432-2736