"War is messy."

[Jonathan Lighter]

"Messy," of course, is used in a faux-childlike  (thus, to the recent mind,
rhetorically powerful) sense of "impossible to put into good order;
inconsistent and unpredictable; offensive to everyday standards."

Not quite in OED, though def. 2 goes in the right direction. Tweak needed?

JL


On Wed, Jun 11, 2014 at 11:36 AM, 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:      "War is messy."
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Not the first adjective that might come to mind, but one used by SecDef
> Hagel before Congress just now.
>
> I've encountered this expression so many times as to regard it as a
> cliche'.
>
> Earliest:
>
> 1968 _U.S. News & World Report_ [GB, not confirmed]: This from Dr. Wilbur
> Schramm, Director of the Institute for Communication Research at Stanford
> University: "War is messy. If people don't know it, they should. Television
> is showing war as outmoded as a means of national policy."
>
> The appearance in one little snippet of "hawk," "credibility gap," "domino
> theory," and "good grief!" tells me the date is likely correct.
>
> JL
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>



--
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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