Phrase

An alcoholic once said to a friend: "You should share your drink with me, because the Bible says 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you.'" What's missing here? The situational context. An abstract ethical principle requires thoughtful application if it is to be a legitimate basis for action. Our rhetorically-skilled president needs to explain how he sees Jesus' words apply to the historically unprecedented situation of redefining marriage to include same-sex unions.

Paul Dickson, a Garrett Park resident, loves the origins of words and is a compiler of word books and dictionaries. So imagine my delight and pleasure when my friend, Mary Garson, who is also fascinated with etymology, gave me a copy of Dickson's recently published book, "Words from the White House," a dictionary of presidential utterances that have become a part of the American vernacular. The next time you use "iffy," you might be surprised to learn that the word goes back to the New Deal.

SOME OF us still remember law and order, which was a catch phrase intended to justify veiled racism, and an excuse to minimize abusive police practices while claiming benign protection of the community. Which community? What worries some of us now is the modern phrase -- zero tolerance -- whose details sound a little too close to yesterday's law and order.Thomas Frazier is gone, and the presumptive mayor-elect, Martin O'Malley, searches for his replacement as police commissioner of Baltimore.

Dr. Ben Carson doesn't need me, or anyone else for that matter, to defend him ("Dr. Ben Carson steps down as speaker at Hopkins graduation," April 11). His decision to withdraw as the commencement speaker at Johns Hopkins University was just another manifestation of his integrity. The same, unfortunately, cannot be said for those, including Medical School Dean Dr. Paul Rothman and the graduating students, who feel Dr. Carson went beyond the pale in his recent remarks about marriage. How dare he express his unequivocal, unvarnished, un-sanitized view that "marriage is between a man and a woman," and that no group " gets to change the definition.

With its dark legacy of witch hunts and enemies lists, the Republican Party is once again collecting names. In a project coordinated by the office of House Majority Leader Dick Armey of Texas, conservatives are working hard to identify political advocacy organizations that get federal money. And they're obviously not gunning for their ideological brethren."Defunding the Left" is the catch-phrase for the campaign to stop the flow of federal funds to not-for-profit groups that are associated with liberal causes, and it has gained powerful new impetus through the GOP's takeover of the House.

Today's politicians and other public figures need arms so long that their hands drag on the pavement.They need these long limbs in order to "reach out." You've probably noticed that "reaching out" is what most politicians do these days. Hardly a moment passes without one of them reaching out or saying that someone else should reach out.I had a computer search for the "reach out" phrase in three newspapers -- the Chicago Tribune, the New York Times and the Washington Post -- to see how many times it was used this year.

MONTEREY, Calif. -- A week ago, only nine people in the U.S armed services could say "hello" -- or anything else -- in Somali.Today, thanks to the military's language center in Monterey, thousands of U.S. soldiers carry hip-sized survival guides to such key phrases as "Don't shoot [me]," and "Where are the minefields?"It's all the result of an extraordinary effort from the Defense Language Institute, the military's premier language school. Its directors have been working day and night since the first hint of U.S. involvement in Somalia to get language materials to soldiers on the ground.

It would be downright un-American if any phrase or image that freshly explodes into public awareness were not swiftly snared for profit. A shocking failure of entrepreneurial DNA! An awesome neglect of exploitative opportunity! The phrase "shock and awe" was coined -- but not trademarked -- by military strategist Harlan Ullman in a 1996 publication. He used it to describe a tactic of pressuring the enemy to give up without much of a fight. But the phrase leaped into universal recognition soon after the first heavy aerial bombardment of Iraq began on March 21. So it's only natural that, by last week, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office had received 26 applications for the use of "shock and awe" for everything from hot sauces to bath toys.

Close the book on "The City That Reads." Welcome to "The Greatest City in America." A year after being elected, Mayor Martin O'Malley has changed Baltimore's official slogan. The new tag replaces the phrase established 13 years ago by O'Malley's Rhodes Scholar predecessor, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke, to replace William Donald Schaefer's "Baltimore Is Best." O'Malley has been quietly testing his new mantra, placing it on the city Web site and hanging a sign outside his office. But the mayor made the phrase - which he used to close his campaign speeches and inauguration address - official when workers stenciled it on a bus stop bench at St. Paul and Saratoga streets this week.

Unless you've been living in a spider hole, it will neither shock nor awe you to learn that military slang has become increasingly, uh, embedded in American popular culture. While hardly a new phenomenon - the military has been a source of American slang since the Revolutionary War - it does seem to be having a growth spurt. Ever since the World Trade Center was designated "ground zero," it has been (damn the torpedoes) full speed ahead for military jargon. Not all of it reaches catch- phrase status.

The world of academia - the world of ivory towers, learned scholars, and ivy-covered walls - is a fraud. And I am a living fraud. As an academic, I cannot escape the fact that I work in the fake world. What else can I conclude when people use the term "the real world" to refer to life outside academia? University faculty and support staff hear this phrase so often that we barely pause over it. Worse still, we have thoroughly imbibed it and utter it regularly. Sure (I tell myself)

An Internet search is inconclusive as to where the phrase "no skin in the game" originated. Some ascribe it to the late columnist William Safire, others to investor Warren Buffett. Politicians often use the phrase to justify policies to their liking. It can also be applied to the latest in a long list of their outrageous behaviors, as well as to those of President Barack Obama. Like an increasing number of politicians, the president has never served in the military, nor has he ever run a business.

An alcoholic once said to a friend: "You should share your drink with me, because the Bible says 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you.'" What's missing here? The situational context. An abstract ethical principle requires thoughtful application if it is to be a legitimate basis for action. Our rhetorically-skilled president needs to explain how he sees Jesus' words apply to the historically unprecedented situation of redefining marriage to include same-sex unions.

What a headline: "Aide's gaffe dogs Romney" (March 22). Do the headline writers read the articles first or do they just skim them until they find a "gotcha" phrase? I watched two different Baltimore TV channels' coverage of Mr. Romney's visit and nothing was mentioned about the so-called "gaffe. " Yet The Sun had to create something negative and eye-catching, and it chose to run with this on page 1. Marie Mullen, Joppa

There's a new game in town.  Or, actually, there's not. But judging from the enthusiasm with which Gov.Martin O'Malley has embraced his latest catchphrase, you could see why someone might think so. The governor doesn't want to play kick the can. Anyone even casually following his Twitter account (@GovernorOMalley) knows it, what with his dropping the hashtap #Can'tKickCan into dozens of Tweets -- sometimes nearly a dozen in one day. Stop kicking the can down the road is the theme for his proposal for a statewide gas sales tax. As in, we can't keep putting things off, kicking the can down the road, we need money from a gas tax right now. (Or as in this, one of his actual Tweets: "Everything has a cost.

Four trucks laden with 100 slot machines arrived early Wednesday morning at the nearly completed casino at Arundel Mills mall. For the next two hours, workers wheeled banks of the gleaming new machines, one by one, inside on hand trucks. Installation of the first set of slots moved Maryland Live! Casino, the state's largest, another step closer to its scheduled opening in three months. That's progress for Maryland's lackluster gambling program, which has yet to be fully implemented more than three years after voters approved five slots locations statewide.

I hadn't been on a basketball court in a while, at least not with anyone old enough to shave. My knees barked to remind me the absence had been at least a few years, but it seemed even longer than that after one of the 30-something crowd with whom I was playing dribbled the ball off his foot and out of bounds."

A few months ago, Rent-A-Wreck of America played the starring role in an off-beat drama featuring a competitor that sued it for trademark infringement.Today, the Owings Mills-based rental car company will return to center stage when its president serves as a witness in a lawsuit Enterprise Rent-A-Car Co. recently filed against Hertz Corp. in a similar case.Kenneth L. Blum Jr., Rent-A-Wreck president, said the whole scenario has become a comedy of sorts -- bizarre and laughable.At issue is the use of the phrase, "we'll pick you up," in advertisements by rental car companies.

Your phrase "irate tea party protesters regard federal civilian employees as enemies of the people" is just unbelievable ("Help for the jobless?" Feb. 20). Is this a phrase of the day from Media Matters or Moveon.org? It is so spurious that I find it hard to believe a sane person would put it in anything sent out for a million people to read. I stopped watching MSNBC due to their continuous attacks on people rather than ideas, and you are more and more doing the same thing. The U.S. cannot continuously borrow 40 cents on every dollar it spends and last very much longer (see Greece)

"No problem!" Have you noticed that the traditional words "You're welcome" have largely been replaced by that trite phrase? It bothers me. It especially bothers me when I'm purchasing a good or service from someone, and the following all-too-familiar conversation takes place: Vendor: "Here's your receipt, ma'am. " Me: "Thank you. " Vendor: "No problem. " Actually, it is a problem. What I expect is to be thanked for my patronage - not to be dismissed with this casual, automatic response - a response that indicates to me that the person does not get what "you are welcome" means.