Woody Cavenaugh

Here's a list of words and phrases that should be banished from our vocabularly. While this list is good, I think we could all add a few things to this list.

I for one would like to see an end to the phrase "Fair and Impartial" which as best as I can tell means "My opinion is better than your opinion.".

Another one for the axe ought to be "Read My Lips". This is the verbal version of a slight of hand technique, "Look over here while I do something sneaky while you are distracted."

"Ask your doctor about..." This is in the language of corproate drug czars "You've got cooties! You need to buy our stuff, but unfortunatly your doctor has to perscribe it...damned doctors....Make them write you a perscription now or you will die...and your little dog too."

"Easy View", while this is a very clever way of saying "Rerun" it just seems slimy. Like Pre-owned, or "Gifted and Talented" You never really know what you are getting. I remember when it was suggested I start attending "Gifted and Talented" classes. My mother had to ask if it meant I was up for a college scholarship or a helmet and mittens.

There are a whole bunch of terms worth banning that are specific to the State System those of you who work for the state will recognize them. Things like:

"Transparent Change" This is IT for "It worked ok for me".

"Functional Title" This phrase means, "you are going to do high level work for low level pay."

"Reorganization" translates into, "We have no idea what's going on, so we hired a contractor for a hundred thousand dollars a month who is going to tell us what they think."

"Functional Manager" this means, "That guy who makes less money than you is now your boss, just not on paper."

"Candidate search process" is state political speak for "We already know who we are going to hire but we have to pretend we don't and interview a bunch of people to satisify state law" In the colloquial South this is also know as a "Possium Hunt". <--spelled with a P and not an O.

"Recommendation" means "Something we ask for so you think we actually care what you think."

On second thought, I probably shouldn't bring up bannable state phrases, this blog could take days to write and in the end communications in the state system would become nothing more than a series of meaningless hand gestures. All that silence would get on my nerves.