Words, Mere Words!

What an amazing time we live in! All things are possible, the old tried and true challenges have been replaced by spanking new ones including how to interpret the discovery of a life form that replaces phosphorous with arsenic...nothing is as it was before.

Take words, for instance. It used to be that a spill was a definable amount of something that suddenly was somewhere it wasn't supposed to be. But not any longer. But since British Petroleum had that, uh, spill we can now refer to a free flow of an undetermined amount of something as "a spill". (Refer to 6-11-2010 post.)

Now we have a new one. "Leak" The big story this week is the "Leak" of sensitive cables provided by the nefarious Wiki-Leaks website. Most definitions of this widely used word center around the undesired escape of liquid or gas. Only one definition refers to the "anonymous unauthorized disclosure of confidential information." So our new understanding of "leak" can now mean the forewarned release of unauthorized classified information acquired by theft through a publicly accessed media venue and reproduced worldwide by myriad reputable news organizations. Hmmm. That sort of gives it a whole new spin, doesn't it?

The last I heard, the mere unauthorized possession of classified material was a criminal offense. But with this new tendency toward mutant word definitions we can safely assume that it is neither an offense nor criminal to possess, distribute and reproduce classified information.

I really feel sorry for Hillary Rodham Clinton. First she had to live with the redefinition of what "sex" is or is not and now she's having to battle the definition of "leak".

Truly, amazing times we live in!