Endangered specie (coinages)

[Ben Zimmer]

On Sat, Mar 10, 2012 at 4:04 PM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
> On 3/10/2012 2:46 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
> > ...He was invited to share the story about how, after his friend Bill
> > Safire introduced him to DARE, he used it to clear up some confusion
> > about the word "commode" in a congressional investigation of
> > government expenditures. (It turned out the $1,200 that Stanford
> > president Donald Kennedy spend on an "Italian fruitwood commode" was
> > for a chest of drawers, not a toilet.)...
>
> IIRC, the "congressional investigation" may well have been a
> criminal/ethics investigation that put Duke Cunningham behind bars. I
> recall Josh Marshall being puzzled over at TPM over Duke's possession of
> a pricey commode, but, eventually, realizing his mistake. The word, of
> course, exists in other European languages, but AFAIK it does not mean
> "toilet" in any of them--seems to be an English euphemism only. I could
> be wrong, of course...

No, the hearing involving Donald Kennedy was much earlier -- back in 1991.

Dave Wilton wrote about more recent cases of "commode" confusion
involving both Duke Cunningham and John Thain:

http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/site/comments/commode/

--bgz


--
Ben Zimmer
http://benzimmer.com/

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