exasperating the situation

[Laurence Horn]

At 4:05 PM -0400 9/19/10, Neal Whitman wrote:
>Instead of a malapropism (as noted in one followup message), maybe
>it's just metathesis with progressive voicing assimilation of the
>[b]: [srb]->[spr].
>
>Neal Whitman

Maybe it's because of O'Donnell's celebrated issues with masturbation
(cf e.g.
http://www.borowitzreport.com/2010/09/17/delaware-masturbators-march-against-odonnell/)
--or is that "masperation"?

LH

>On Sep 19, 2010, at 1:51 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>
>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>-----------------------
>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>>  Subject:      exasperating the situation
>>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>  Christine O'Donnell said this week in an interview that something or other
>>  "only exasperates the situation."
>>
>>  I've heard the substitution of "exasperate" for "exacerbate"  enough times
>>  to convince me that it isn't just a slip of the tongue.
>>
>>  Over 6,000 raw Googlits on "to exasperate the situation."
>>
>  > JL

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