Axis of Weasel

[Bapopik at AOL.COM]

   "Axis of Weasel" has been applied very often to France and Germany in the past few weeks.  Its pun on "Axis of Evil" has just about expired.
   William Safire did a column about "weasel words"--supposedly a Teddy Roosevelt phrase, but I'll have to re-check.
   I thought that these things spring from the general consciousness, like "Dude, yer gettin' a cell!" that I saw simultaneously in four newspapers.
   Google Groups shows 1,120 hits for "Axis of Weasel," with the first being this one, from the Cecil Adams group posted less than a year ago:


From: Bob Moissonnier (bobmois at earthlink.net)
Subject: Re: MC Hamster, hamstering, and where are they now? (Re: Hamster test)
View: Complete Thread (60 articles)
Original Format
Newsgroups: alt.fan.cecil-adams
Date: 2002-03-10 19:09:47 PST

mutighollander1 at aol.comseven (The AFCA Kid) wrote in message news:<20020307231956.17937.00000168 at mb-fb.aol.com>...

> >Presumably they adjusted their attitudes
> >to match the local culture when they connected to each of the two
> >quite different groups.  Deborah largely DEFINED the local culture on
> >this side.
>
>  Smug cluelessness I can see, but whence came the dyspeptic
> conservative-liberturdian axis?

The "Axis of Weasel"!