This is really getting quite tiresome. If you are one who watches the news at least once a day, you hear a series of words that, once latched onto by TV anchors and politicians, seem to turn into, say, kudzu vines or cancer, spreading and metastasizing to the point that they have totally saturated (and choked) the verbiage market. That said, here are a few of my favorites … or should I say, most hated and most cliché:

• Change: Since the election is over, this one isn’t quite as prevalent as it was, but during the campaign season — as in every campaign season — it was noxious. While now-President-elect Barack Obama, perhaps, was capable of instituting the most change if elected, both candidates used the word ad nauseum to attempt to separate themselves from political buffoons, lobbyists and the current administrations failings. We heard, “Change we can believe in” from the Obama camp, and we heard the shockingly unclever turnaround, “Friends, that’s not change we can believe in” from McCain. Since Obama was capable of instituting the most change, quite literally, since his win would have meant a different party in charge of the highest office in the land, we at least thought his calls for change were coherent. McCain’s continual declarations that he too would bring change was laughable — unless, of course, he meant the kind of frightening change of a much older, less healthy (than Bush) man in the White House, who, if he died, heaven forbid, would leave us with Sarah Palin. Now, that would certainly have been change, but unfortunately friends, it wouldn’t have been the kind we could believe in.
• Vet: That’s right, no longer can the word “vet” simply mean a veterinarian or veteran. The media has latched onto this like a stray cat on fish bones. We can no longer use evaluate or analyze or discern or study up on or any other comparable phrase. All must be now and forever vetted. Vet, vet vet.
• Tap: Nope, not with your hands. And don’t tap the Rockies, at least now until you’re done reading this. “Tap,” with its almost taboo connotation, seems like a bizarre way to convey that Obama has appointed another person to his administration. I suppose the intended meaning is that Obama is “tapping” the resources of whoever he has named. But in headlines, we simply get: “Obama taps Richardson for commerce spot.”
• Wall Street/Main Street: This little gem came to the fore most recently during the bank fallout, and politicians have used it to comfort those in Anytown, USA by saying that propping up Wall Street is not the only important decision lawmakers must make. They also must find ways to help out Main Street, the little guy, Joe Schmoh, and the like.
• And finally, the winner for the most ubiquitous buzzword of the day: bailout. We seemingly bailout those companies who traditionally, have packed their pockets quite full of giant sums of money that you and I will never see. When they need help, we trip over ourselves to save them because saving them means saving jobs and saving future economic strife, while no one is standing in line ready to bailout the small business down the street who is just as affected by the economy as the big guys, yet has no one’s sympathy and no one’s extra resources to make it through. After all this, we haven’t come to the heart of the issue yet: We allow such companies to swell to the heavens, so that they become so massive and influential that their very failure would the entire economy into disrepair. Something is wrong with such a system.

And on that happy note, I leave with a quote from Benjamin Franklin about debt, which has been the cause of much of man’s economic woe for centuries:

Let honesty and industry be thy constant companions, and spend one penny less than thy clear gains; then shall thy pocket begin to thrive; creditors will not insult, nor want oppress, nor hungerness bite, nor nakedness freeze thee.