corrente

Today's Froomkin column is so damn good I have to link to its various parts separately. For starters, he generously links to another WaPo writer's story on a soon-to-be-hot book:

If you've never dropped the word "dubyavirus" into casual conversation, urged that an official be "ashcrofted" or commented upon "The Cheney Effect," then you haven't seen the future, at least the future according to McSweeney's.

The ever-expanding genre of anti-Bush books has now entered the reference field. Coming in August from McSweeney's, the publishing house founded by author-activist Dave Eggers, is "The Future Dictionary of America," a Utopian tome set "sometime" beyond the present.

Contributors include Eggers, Stephen King, Kurt Vonnegut, Jonathan Franzen, Wendy Wasserstein and more than 100 others. Proceeds will be donated to "groups working for the public good in the 2004 election."

Author T.C. Boyle offers several definitions of "environment," including "a conceptual space, like the airspace over Iraq, which will create a sucking void if not filled to repleteness with high explosives."

Attorney General John Ashcroft inspired novelist Robert Coover to coin "ashcrofted," when one is "removed from or disqualified for public office on grounds of religious delusions."

Joyce Carol Oates presents "dark natter," which she labels "continuous chatter of an ominous sort."

Cartoonist Art Spiegelman contributes "ralphnadir," which is "the lowest point in any process," so low that the process must be changed.

Some examples:

-"The ralphnadir of America's unrepresentative two-party system led to the establishment, in 2012, of our current proportional allnite-party system."

For your ordering convenience (pre-ordering in this case as they still have it as "not released yet") a link to Amazon.com. Yeah, the price is kinda awful but you've got some big names here (Vonnegut, Stephen King, etc.) and it comes with a music CD, so at least there's a fair amount of bang for your bux.