cat

[Wilson Gray]

Hah! Didn't know that old Joyge was hip, did you? It's all right.
Surprised *me*, too.

Good catch!

-Wilson

On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 9:48 PM, Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      cat
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> GQ has a longish excerpt from a book by one of Bush's speech writers.
> New York Magazine (nymag.com) summarized the piece as "10 things we
> learned about George Bush". Among the 10 things, there is this one:
>
> 5. Bush Refers to People As "Cat": "We got to make this understandable
> for the average cat," he said of one speech. Another time, talking about
> candidate Barack Obama, Bush said, "This is a dangerous world, and this
> cat isn’t remotely qualified to handle it."
>
>
> Last time I heard "cat" used like that was in Fritz the Cat cartoons by
> Ralph Bakshi--since he does not refer to anyone as a Crow, it's probably
> safe to say he did not learn it from there. OK, so maybe there were some
> TV ads that referred to "cool cats" (I have an image of a cheetah with
> sunglasses in my head, for some reason). Or maybe some NYC BE in Kojak
> (as little of it as there was in the show--probably associated with
> musicians). Either way, the language is bizarre for an upper middle-age
> white guy who grew up in suburban Connecticut and "matured" (if this
> word applies) in Texas.
>
> Am I missing something here?
>
> VS-)
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
-Wilson
–––
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
–Mark Twain

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