"Benign" player raiding

[Joel S. Berson]

Here is the explanation of "benign", direct from the horse's
mouth.  An ADS-L correspondent with good, and perhaps new,
connections!  BTW, I usually find soccer players more articulate than
Alexei in this example, more than most others in other sports.

Joel

At 6/13/2007 09:39 AM, David Daniel wrote [off-list; quoted with permission]:
>Hi,
>
>For whatever reason I am still not able to post to the list, so am replying
>to you re the "benign" thing. FWIW, I asked Alexi Lalas what he meant by
>that and he said "When I referred to the comments as being "benign" I simply
>meant to convey that they would ultimately have no significant effect..."
>
>So your interpretation of ineffectual, etc. was right.
>
>David Daniel
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of
>Joel S. Berson
>Sent: Monday, June 11, 2007 2:25 PM
>To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>Subject: "Benign" player raiding
>
>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
>Subject:      "Benign" player raiding
>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>---
>
>"Real Madrid's president ... was quoted as saying that he would try
>to persuade [David] Beckham to stay [with Madrid} and would use an
>escape clause in Beckham's Galaxy contract to withdraw from the deal.
>...
>"Alexei Lalas, the Galaxy's president and general manager, said ...
>'On the surface of it, it's a benign comment.'"
>
>Did Las mean kindly, gracious, meek, humble,
>propitious?  Hardly.  Rather, vacuous, idle, ineffectual.
>
>(It would be an interesting "escape" clause that let Real Madrid void
>Beckham's contract with the Galaxy.  More like an imprisonment clause
>for Beckham.)
>
>NYTimes, June 11.
>
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