"drone" (v. trans.)

[Ben Zimmer]

"drone" (v. trans.) 'target or kill (someone) in a drone strike'

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http://burnpit.us/comment/9732#comment-9732
Michael Shouse, Burn Pit (comment), Oct. 21, 2011
Who is to say who is a terrorist? That is a very dangerous label, and
will be used against us, even as we drone people into martyrdom.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEycDKgUwbw
RussiaToday, YouTube, Feb. 7, 2013
'Don't drone me, bro!' Protesters disrupt Brennan CIA chief approval hearing.
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http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/03/rand-paul-won-now-what/62878/
Elspeth Reeve, Atlantic Wire, Mar. 7, 2013
We are droning people who aren't shooting at us at the moment we drone them.
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http://www.politico.com/story/2013/03/bill-maher-credits-rand-paul-on-drones-88652.html
Kevin Cirilli, Politico, Mar. 9, 2013
“Let’s encourage Republicans when they do something close to good,”
[Bill] Maher said Friday on his HBO program “Real Time.” “He [Rand
Paul] got us talking about it... Why are we doing this? Why are we
droning everybody?”
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Possible WOTY candidate? Might be difficult to explain the
significance of a new transitive verb, as was the case with "surge" in
2006:

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/003975.html


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Ben Zimmer
http://benzimmer.com/

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org