MORT’s Meanderings

Definitions.

There was a time when ‘the Dictionary’ (whichever one you had on the shelf in the family parlor) was the final arbiter of definitions. Sadly, that is no longer the case.

Case in point: Congressman Allen West, currently the elected Representative from Florida’s District 22, has been described by cowardly Democrat writers of letters-to-the- editor, as a ‘Bomb thrower’.

Obviously, for older folks who can still recall the gang wars of the Roaring 20’s, the term meant literally, someone who drove past the storefront headquarters of his rival gang in Chicago or New York City in a speeding Packard phaeton - and heaved a bomb through the plate glass window.

Wow. They would be right of course but, they’d be way behind the times. Today, ‘Bomb thrower’ is someone who can be counted on to tell the truth, consistently - - ala Congressman Allen West.

Words have meanings. Definitions have consequences. Oh, for the good ‘ol days.

MORT KUFF