Pronunciation of bin Laden's org in the media

[Peter Richardson]

On Tue, 4 Mar 2003, Peter A. McGraw wrote:

> Bush, Sr., used to say ['saed at m].  I assumed it was just the usual American
> ignorance of foreign pronunciations until I heard, from a non-authoritative
> source, that it was used deliberately to be insulting.  Supposedly there
> was an insulting Arabic word with similar sounds.

...which reminds us that Pres. Carter used to address the imperious, if
diminutive, Helmut Schmidt as "Helmet." Nothing to do with the haircut,
either.

PR