Discussion was had about pulling a “santorum” on Michael “Fear of Vagina” Smerconish. I think murcielago has the best suggestion:
You guys, come on. It’s already tailormade to be an adjective, the adjectival form of “Nice Guy ™”. As in, “I can’t believe that a totally smerconish guy like that thought he had a chance with you!” Or “I spent the afternoon chatting with Fred; he keeps complaining how girls aren’t interested in him, so I was telling him that if he’d just stop being so smerconish he’d be fine…”
It really rolls off the tongue better than “douchey”, don’t you think? I should enter it into the urban dictionary.
46 Responses to “New coinage?”
Leave a comment
Line and paragraph breaks automatic, e-mail address never displayed, HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>
Eh, I can’t be bothered to remember his name. It looks like it’s spelled wrong, even when it’s not. I hate words like that.
Kind of off-topic, but I just read Tess of the D’Urbervilles, and I think that Angel Clare, Tess’ horrible drip of a husband, might be a classic literary example of the Nice Guy.
If memory serves, you’ve got a degree in English, so you might appreciate the thought.
Oh, the joys of living in Philly. Hometown to all the cop killers and conservative assholes.
When I was in elementary school, my bus driver used to listen to Smerconish every single day, and I remember being disgusted by it even as a kid.
Smerconish is a nitwit.
Right around the beginning of the war ca. March 2003, he was doing weekly one-minute Sunday afternoon commentaries on KYW1060, the Philadelphia AM news station. He was going on about how all good Americans were of course “supporting the troops,” while those opposed were beneath contempt. He referred to the latter as “China Syndrome Liberals,” a term I haven’t heard before or since.
China Syndrome Liberals. Because if you are concerned about the safety of nuclear power plants, then you are a silly person.
Freak.
I used to listen to Mike Smerconish on AM1210 when I was working in the Philadelphia ‘burbs. I don’t listen now, not because I didn’t like him, but because I’m not working in that area.
Mr Smerconish had a very successful AM drive-time talk show, and 1210 “The Big Talker” has a 50,000 watt blowtorch for an antenna. He has substituted for Bill O’Reilly at least a few times.
If you think coining a word “smerconish” is going to upset him, you’re way off base. It’s been said that all publicity is good publicity, and for a radio talent on the rise, the fact that the Pandangonistae coined a word to show their distaste for him will only add to his résumé and his appeal.
It was when he switched his home base to “The Big Talker” from a station down south (Atlanta?) that Glenn Beck and his radio program really took off, and now he has a gig on CNN Headline News.
All y’all are going to do is help Mr Smerconish.
Because it so helped Santorum.
So Dana thinks it’s a bad idea? Meh… Dana’s stupid enough to think that decent healthcare in the US is a bad idea, and bigoted enough to think gay marriage is a bad idea. Wonder if he thinks verbing Smerconish is a bad idea because he’s stupid, or because he’s bigoted?
It’s not memorable enough. The reason santorum works is because “froth” is memorable.
How about
Smerconish = the sticky mixture of pre-cum and urine found on men with poor hygiene (sometimes found in men’s clubs).
???
I like it, actually. A lot. You could even do a back-formation after it caught on and have ’smercon’ replace “Nice Guy [TM]”.
It really did work with Santorum, by the way–I know someone who first heard the coinage and only later heard his name and was shocked that someone would have that as a last name.
I don’t think it’s mutually exclusive, Jes…. We’ve all known enough stupid bigots to know that the combination usually creates a feedback loop that just spirals around itself until such time as reality pops in and the head explodes.
It’s why all the shrubberies keep such a bubble around the boss - they’re doing well, personally, and when reality intervenes they’re all going to be scrod. So keeping reality out is a very high priority.
I don’t know…Why would we need a new word when we already have asshat, gas face, douchebag, fat loser, sexually repressed geek…etc etc etc. And Nice Guy® incorporates rich text.
Jesurgislac wrote:
Actually, J, I (very reluctantly) changed my mind, and concluded that the US should go to a single payer universal health care system. However, I don’t believe that single payer will bring good health care to the US; I think that it will decrease the quality of health care in the United States, just as your own fine country is seeing an exodus of “health tourists,” about 70,000 of them a year, because the British single-payer system is so crappy.
Ooooh, good call, Brian. The official reason for the outcry over that book was the frank discussion of sex in it, but honestly, I think it was more that Hardy just took on the patriarchy and exposed how evil it was. Poor Tess just tries to do everything right, and just gets screwed over and over because she’s a woman, a lower class one at that.
And the two faces of it is what I love. You have Alec d’Urberville, the blatant face of the evil patriarchy, a rapist and a general user of women. But then Hardy shows you the “nice guy” Angel Clare is just as bad, because his little shit fit that his wife had had sex just like him before marriage ends up ruining her just as surely as anything d’Urberville did to her. Good call.
All y’all are going to do is help Mr Smerconish.
What’s funny is you think it’s a GOOD thing that our culture rewards men for being giant, misogynist assholes. Funny, huh?
I’m happy to use Smerconish!
I hate the term Nice Guy to describe people who aren’t. Sarcasm just doesn’t context well in difference situations.
Neologism Rules! Soon we shall all be speaking German.
im already using it. and getting laughs from people who dont even know this blowhard dickweed — because the word just sounds funny; the spoken word evokessmegma & neocons. and so is repetative.
also good call on Angel…one of my most hated fictional characters. he should have been sissyslapped to an early death.
smerconish should ALWAYS be lower-case.
Should be spelled “Smirkonish.”
Dana: The United Kingdom doesn’t have a single payer national health insurance program, as is proposed. They have a national health service, which is radically different.
Additionally, Dana, if the “health tourists” were coming to the US to go to the Kaiser Permanente, you might have a choice. But from your Tory source:
Other than Germany, which has a multiple-payer universal health system, and Spain, which has a national health service like England, most of the countries listed are developing nations. It’s a fair criticism of the British NHS that people are going abroad for life-saving surgery, but it’s hardly a criticism of national health care in general. Cuba wouldn’t be a leading destination for medical tourism, nor would Americans themselves be leaving the country in droves for operations in developing nations.
That’s enough for me. “Smerconish” is now part of my lexicon.
Amanda wrote:
Was there some part of “all publicity is good publicity” that was unclear? Britney Spears thrives on it. Heck, what happened to Pandagon’s readership following the saga of your brief tenure with the John Edwards campaign?
But, having actually listened to Mr Smerconish for a couple of years, I know that he was actually pretty good at his job. He’s smart, witty, well-educated (he is an attorney), he’s written several books, and yeah, I do think he deserves more national exposure.
having actually listened to Mr Smerconish for a couple of years, I know that he was actually pretty good at his job.
His job is to stir up anti-woman sentiment among misogynists like yourself. So yeah.
Sign me up for the ADJECTIVE camp: smerconish doesn’t sound like a verb.
Now we just need a pithy definition, ala D. Savage’s constantly reiterated definition of “santorum”, and we’re on the way.
Something that we can apply to le douchebag Dana would be perfect. (Although “energy leech” is my latest for his ilk of troll.)
Dana: just as your own fine country is seeing an exodus of “health tourists,” about 70,000 of them a year
…says the Daily Mail. lesson for you, Dana: if you want to be taken seriously by a Brit, do not cite Daily Mail news stories as accurate and factual. If you want British news with a right-wing slant, the Daily Telegraph is the rightw-ing news site with most integrity: the Daily Mail is a joke. (Made for stupid, lazy rightwing bloggers like your pal Sharon, really.*)
You notice, though, that the Daily Mail knew better than to try and con its British readers that anyone would fly to the US for better treatment than in the UK. We may be only 17th in the world, but we’re far, far up the list from the US.
*And you know: I googled on Sharon’s blog and the Daily Mail, thinking she was sure to have picked up something from it, and was amused but not surprised to find that she has in fact picked up this very same story. Heh. She really is gullible, as well as a big fat liar.
Sign me up for the ADJECTIVE camp: smerconish doesn’t sound like a verb.
Yeah, i’d go for that. Dana and Sharon are smerconish bloggers.
oh right, like the USA doesn’t have it’s own health toursim. You’ll note that it’s often, though not exclusively, for the well-to-do’s elective surgery.
I suspect nearly all of the “health tourists” from the UK are getting dental treatment, which, although subsidised for everyone, is only entirely covered by the NHS if you’re poor, pregnant or under 16. They’re not going abroad because of government-funded treatment at home, but because of a lack of it.
I’ve lived and had treatment under both systems, and the NHS makes me bloody proud.
I was trying to think why “smerconish” reminded me of some sticky cheese-like substance, and then it hit me —
It already sounds awfully like “smegma”*! Smerconish would be related to the accumulated stinky kind, of course. *nods sagely*
*(From wiki: “a combination of exfoliated (shed) epithelial cells, transudated skin oils, and moisture, and can accumulate under the foreskin of males and within the vulva of females. It has a characteristic strong odor.”)
Sorry, J, but you haven’t disproved the story — or even challenged it.
The United States has the finest medical system in the world — for those who pay for it. Because of the free riders who don’t pay or won’t pay, we’ll wind up with something like yours.
You know, like this:
Or perhaps like our fine neighbors to the north:
Amazing! In the great single-payer scheme in Canada, waiting lists were more than half a year in Saskatchewan and Prince Edward Island, and the shortest average waiting time is more than a season.
Dana, I don’t need to. It’s a Daily Mail story. That’s like saying it’s a Washington Times story - citing it as an authoritative source proves that you’re a Smerconish blogger.
The United States has the finest medical system in the world — for those who pay for it.
Everyone in the US pays for your medical system - it’s the most expensive one in the world. And the worst of any developed country.
(okay, if this comment appears a squillion times, sorry — kept getting stuck in the “submit” step.)
By the way, can we also start a discussion on how everyone seems to universally accept “douchebag” as an insult? Would we accept “tampon” or “maxipad” — both similarly “tainted” by being in contact with a woman’s vagina?
I don’t think use of the word “douchebag” as an insult arises out of, nor does it currently express, feminist distaste for the phenomenon of douching itself (a hateful process that encourages women to kill healthy bacteria bytelling women their bodies are distasteful and yucky, and “unfresh”. Even if some feminists now use the word that way, I don’t think that’s its overall meaning or history.
I think it arises out of, and reinforces, the idea that anything that’s been in contact with a woman’s vagina is icky and gross, and thus the ultimate insult.
(”Asshat,” by the way, is one of my favorite new insults — conjures up a perfectly appropriate image of a person whose ass is where their head should be.)
Dana, the USA gets the worst value for it’s money when it comes to healthcare. We absolutely do not have the best system in the world.
p.s. And the USA has wait periods too. Your apparent belief that we don’t just shows that you haven’t had any major medical problems.
Don’t help Dana make threads about him.
Ahhh, Sarah, but I have! For some unknown reason (the doctor thought it was Crohn’s, but it isn’t), I’ve had some GI problems, and have always been treated immediately. When the doctor ordered UGIs and CT scans, they were performed that evening.
Of course, those were acute episodes. When I’ve needed to make routine appointments for a doctor’s or dental visit, even upon becoming a new patient (such as: when I moved), about a week has been the longest I’ve had to wait for an opening.
The same has held true for my wife and our children.
I’m sure that you’ve heard of long waits for diagnostic MRIs in Canada. In the Philadelphia metro area, there are so many MRI facilities that they have been advertising on the radio for people to schedule visits for “baseline” MRIs.
By the way, my wife is a registered nurse; we do have some knowledge as to how our medical system works.
well, dana, that’s nice. my average wait times, as a new patient:
for a dentist, 4 months.
for a GP/general checkup, 3 months, though more recently i was able to see a gynecologist as a new patient with a wait of only one month. that was, to me, amazing.
for a neurologist, 8 months. with a further wait of 2 months for an MRI to make sure the seizures i’d been having on a weekly basis during the entire time i’d been trying to see a neurologist were not, in fact, being caused by a tumor about to eat my brain. (and then it took another month after THAT to get me booked for a 48h EEG. and then i was able to get medication and slowly start functioning again, having lost my job in the meantime.)
this held true when i lived on the east coast, and it still holds true now that i’m living in the west. when i needed a full health workup with chest exam to apply for a work visa in the caymans, though? in the same week, and for a hell of a lot less than i’d have paid here.
currently, a friend of mine is trying to get treatment for some long-standing psychiatric issues. after a month and a half, he finally has an appointment. since he’s uninsured, it’s going to cost him well over $300, just for the first visit, not including whatever he has to pay out-of-pocket for the actual drugs. yep, greatest healthcare system in the world!
(those “baseline MRIs” you’re hearing advertised, btw, are likely not being done by reputable places, but rather by half-trained assistants at retail chain establishments. i’ve heard of those places, too. often they’re storefronts in strip malls. you can’t go there if you want something done for a diagnostic purpose. they also tend not to accept insurance.)
numad: Don’t help Dana make threads about him.
Oh, come on. Dana is smerconish! And his comments on this thread illustrate that perfectly.
Why on earth do y’all keep engaging this smercon Dana? He shot his wad ages ago, I haven’t seen him say anything new for months and months.
(also yay, I win at language, or something!
)
and to get in to see my OB-GYN for my annual, I had to wait three months. I have to make appointments to have my medication checked and refilled at least two months in advance - I had to reschedule an appointment that was originally for mid-July, and the first available one was late October. These are not famous or highly sought after doctors, or semi-retired only-take-appointments-two-days-a-week doctors.
Say it with me, Dana: anecdotes do not prove things.
thinking about it, dana, the fact that your wife is an RN may well have something to do with your unusually short wait-times. i was able to get an appointment with a no-chance-ever, well-regarded orthopaedist three days after calling his office, because my then-boyfriend’s mother worked at the same hospital. (it was an acute situation, one for which i’d already seen two orthopaedists who just wanted to bounce me to someone else, but even so, if i hadn’t had that connection, they’d never have found room for me.)
I once got referred to an endocrinologist; as I was having problems *now* the 4 month wait time they gave me seemed like too much. I canceled it, then after finding I had few options, called back to see if they could get me in sooner. Instead, I was given a 5 month wait.
I then called my GP in desperation to get the receptionists there to help me with getting a booking with a specialist. I got a 2 month appointment– with a doctor who had such limited English skills I didn’t understand him and I don’t think he understood me.
My dad had a six month wait on a follow-up on his HEART issues.
Color me NOT impressed with the general system in the US.
However, Kaiser Permanente is a non-profit; and has provided me with better service than any PPO I’ve been with.
linda,
i was totally thinking of douchebag as an insult for all the feminist reasons you listed. but you’re probably right that smerconishes view douchebag as an insult because of it’s relationship to the oh so scary vagina…maybe i should rethink my usage of it, and just go with asshat. although i’m starting to groove on smerconish.
WPHT, the “Big Talker” that hosts smerconish, is better known here in Philly for what those letters stand for: “White People’s Hate Talk” radio.
Ah, so Dana has the “I’bve got enough money, so fuck you poor poeple” attitude that’s so prevalent among his kind. “The US heathcare system is great because we keep out all you common rabble,” right, Dana?
Remember, conservatives have more class.
My mother has full coverage under a fairly generous Aetna plan. She had to wait two months for a spinal fusion, during which time her permanent nerve damage increased significantly, and the only reason she got in after “only” two months was that her condition was so severe. US healthcare, can’t beat it.
I had to wait 4 months to receive treatment for a chronic pain condition; during that time I was on crutches, unable to work, and in 24-hour extreme pain. That delay was not from the doctor - I only had to wait a month to be seen by her. It was from my health insurance (BC/BS of Philadelphia), which refused to pay for the only treatment that was effective.
Oh, and back on topic, I’m so proud of my home state for all of the new vocabulary that has come out of it in the last couple years … and all in the service of the progressive cause!
Linda, I didn’t think about that. Douchebag is my preferred insult, just because of the sound of it. There’s something about the sound that is just yucky. Smerconish does work the same way, though.