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May 25, 2012
Mark Clayton: Is Hillary's State Dept. hacking Al Qaeda? Not quite
Erika Bolstad: Temple cancels Wasserman Schultz speech
The Kosher Gourmet by Ethel G. Hofman: The former president of the International Association of Culinary Professionals, whose members included the likes of Julia Child, is back with contemporary Shavous cuisine: Ruby Fruit Soup, Sweet Noodle Kugel with Cheese, Key Lime Curd, Calsone Casserole Frittata with Wild Mushrooms, Sun-dried tomatoes and Olives, Baked Tilapia with Pepper Cheese Cream and Brown Sugar Shortbread
May 24, 2012
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The Kosher Gourmet by Penelope Wall: PHILLY CHEESE STEAKS --- hold the steak!
May 23, 2012
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The Kosher Gourmet by Emma Christensen:A simple way to do fish right
May 22, 2012
Warren Richey: Can US group challenge overseas surveillance act? Supreme Court to decide
Thomas M. Anderson: Walking Away From a Mortgage
The Kosher Gourmet by Megan Gordon: Enjoy a celebration of the most rich and layered flavors: Black bean, sweet potato and quinoa chili
May 21, 2012
Mark Clayton: Cybersecurity: How US utilities passed up chance to protect their networks
Howard LaFranchi: NATO summit: Who will foot the bill for long-term Afghanistan security?
Chris Farrell : Earn Dividends in Emerging Markets with This WisdomTree ETF
Stephen Whiteside, Ph.D. : Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: Social anxiety disorder --- or just shy?
Guy Jackson : Victim's father regrets death of Lockerbie bomber
The Kosher Gourmet by Mario Batali: Famed chef's veal shoulder farsumagru: A festive meat course for late spring
May 18, 2012
Rabbi Berel Wein: Striving: The People of the Book's Book for (All of) the People
Steven Goldberg: 5 Great Stock Picks and the Exchange-Traded Fund that Owns Them
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The Kosher Gourmet by Carolyn Malcoun: DIY healthy lunchbox treats: HOMEMADE FRUIT BARS for kids and brown-bagging adults alike
May 17, 2012
Warren Richey: Teacher fired for being unwed and pregnant can sue religious school, court rules
Josh Mitnick: Netanyahu's 'centrist' coalition is already proving it's anything but
Steven Goldberg: Earn Dividends in Emerging Markets with This WisdomTree ETF
Amina Khan: Research links coffee to lower death rates
The Kosher Gourmet by Faith Duran : Cheesy Potato Breakfast Casserole with Cheddar and Sun-Dried Tomatoes
May 16, 2012
Carmen Terzic, M.D., Ph.D. : Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: A variety of exercises can help improve balance
Melissa Healy: National strategy on Alzheimer's disease aims to halt it by 2025
The Kosher Gourmet by Joyce White : GOODNESS GRACIOUS: GREENS! 4 winning recipes that are no longer just for down-home folks (Includes expert tips & techniques)
May 15, 2012
Kristen Chick: Obama administration resumes arms sales to Bahrain despite serious unresolved human rights issues. Activists feel abandoned
Pat Mertz Esswein: Homes are now affordable again and mortgage rates are low. What you need to know before you buy
Kathy Kristof: Our Practical Investor Fights Inflation with These 6 Investments
Sue Hubbard, M.D.: The Kid's Doctor: Lactose intolerant young child? Check again
The Kosher Gourmet by Kathy Hunt: Spread a Little Excitement with EXOTIC CONDIMENTS (4 RECIPES)
May 14, 2012
Lisa Gerstner: How to Protect Your Identity, Finances If You Lose Your Phone
Harvard Health Letters: Heart disease and dementia
The Kosher Gourmet by Megan Gordon: MANGO COCONUT OAT MORNING MUFFINS are a bright but hearty delight
May 11, 2012
Jessica L. Anderson: Get the Best Deal on a Used Car
Jett Stone: Forget face-lifts and fake knees. Scientists have seen the fountain of youth --- and it's broccoli
The Kosher Gourmet by Chef Mario Batali: The famed chef's vegetable dish that tastes true to the season: FAVAS AND SUGAR SNAP PEAS WITH POTATOES AND TARRAGON
May 10, 2012
Sergei L. Loiko: Putin sends warning to U.S., NATO in Victory Day speech at Red Square
Mary Rourke: How being a 'mentch' got Vidal Sasoon his start and fighting in Israel's War of Independence provided him with confidence and a strong sense of his own identity
Jeff Bertolucci: Get Home Phone Service for Less Than $10 a Month
The Kosher Gourmet by Betty Rosbottom: Gleaming with its golden, crimson, and snowy white hues, this silken smooth and creamy STRAWBERRY ORANGE TRIFLE looks impressive, but is easy to prepare
May 9, 2012
Sharon Palmer, R.D. How you can reduce your risk -- or delay -- chronic diseases associated with aging
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Jewish World Review
Dec. 8, 2010
/ 1 Teves, 5771
Murderers' Row, Or: Exit Laughing
By
Paul Greenberg
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
What was the greatest baseball team in history?
The 1927 New York Yankees regularly lead the list of nominees for that distinction. The sluggers at the heart of the Yankee line-up came to be known as Murderers Row: Earle Combs (CF), Bob Meusel (LF), Babe Ruth (RF), Lou Gehrig (1B), and Tony Lazzeri (2B). The names still ring in the annals of the game, or rather resound -- like the crack of a bat.
It isn't just the ball that great players can knock out of the park but the language. For those of us with a taste for malaprops of all sizes and shapes, whether gosh-awful or just off base, baseball may be a richer mine of mangled syntax than politics and Hollywood combined.
The position that seems to produce the richest crop of these howlers may be manager. For the dugout has as many characters as any position on the field. In baseball as in business, management is the place to look for the kind of lingo that sounds as if it's just survived a bad wreck.
That thought came back on reading of the death of George Lee (also and better known as Sparky) Anderson, who led teams in both the National and American leagues to World Series championships. He also deserves inclusion in the triumvirate of baseball managers who could turn the language every which way but loose. They'd mangle a phrase without malice aforethought, so natural were their verbicidal tendencies.
The undoubted leader and undisputed champion of this trio had to be Yogi Berra, whose language remains the gold -- well, brass -- standard of the trade. By now so many Berra-isms have entered the language that they constitute a dialect of their own, and to review them would to risk a sense of deja vu all over again.
It's hard to pick a favorite, but high on the list would be gems like, "Nobody goes there any more, it's too crowded," and "You can observe a lot just by watching." Can't argue with that. Yogi also had his take on the game itself: "Baseball is 90 percent mental and the other half is physical."
The English language never stood a chance when Yogi took it on, any more than pitchers did when they had to face Combs, Meusel, Ruth, Gehrig and then Lazzeri.
By now it scarcely matters whether Yogi Berra actually perpetrated these literary offenses. (The technical term for them may be Irish Bulls.) Even if he didn't coin all the beauts credited to him, Yogi was bound to be given the credit/blame for them. If only to lend them a spurious authority. The way every witticism of the Roaring Twenties was attributed to Dorothy Parker. Or as Yogi himself once put it, as only Yogi might: "I never said most of the things I said."
Batting second in this line-up was the all too imitable Casey Stengel, whose verbal miscues were as various and colorful as his baseball career. Among his classics: "Good pitching will always stop good hitting and vice-versa."
Casey Stengel hit his high point July 8, 1958, when he was called on to offer his expert testimony to the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Anti-Trust and Monopoly (the Hon. Estes Kefauver presiding). Mr. Stengel was there to clarify baseball's exemption from the ant-trust laws, and before he was through, he'd clarified the subject beyond all understanding. To cite just one impenetrable example from the official record:
Senator Kefauver: "I was asking you, sir, why it is that baseball wants this bill passed."
Mr. Stengel: "I would say I would not know, but would say the reason why they would want it passed is to keep baseball going as the highest paid ball sport that has gone into baseball and from the baseball angle, I am not going to speak of any other sport. I am not here to argue about other sports, I am in the baseball business. It has been run cleaner than any business that was ever put out in the one hundred years at the present time. I am not speaking about television or I am not speaking about income that comes into the ballparks: You have to take that off. I don't know too much about it. I say the ballplayers have a better advancement at the present time."
There, that cleared everything up. After an interminable hour or two of similar testimony, the distinguished senator from Tennessee turned in frustration to Mickey Mantle, the famous slugger who'd accompanied Casey to the hearing. Maybe the senator was hoping for a translation. There was something akin to desperation in his voice as the learned senator asked: "Mr. Mantle, do you have any observations with reference to the applicability of the antitrust laws to baseball?"
To which the sage Mantle, who knew how to bunt as well as hit, replied: "My views are about the same as Casey's."
Now that was masterful. And concise. There are times in congressional testimony as in design that less is more.
If you'd like to hear an audio of Professor Stengel explaining the anti-trust laws to the mystified honorables on this congressional committee, and you don't want to miss it if you're as big a fan of (a) the malaprop, and (b) baseball as I am, then just click onto http://www.history.com/audio/casey-stengel-on-anti-trust-laws.
You'll find ol' Case's lecture a mix of S.J. Perelman, Groucho Marx and Dr. Doubletalk. The wonder is that the English language survived it, kind of.
Sparky Anderson was no slouch at this linguistic sport, either. When he entered a sentence, there was no telling where or if he'd come out. When he wasn't leading the Cincinnati Reds or Detroit Tigers to their triumphs in the World Series, he maintained a tenuous hold on the language, which would regularly escape from his uncertain grasp. It happened often enough for his wife to suggest that he take grammar lessons. But he demurred. As he recalled on being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame at Cooperstown, "I told her it ain't gonna help me. Or should I say, 'It ain't gonna help me none'?"
Perhaps it's just as well Sparky never paid overmuch attention to the finer linguistic points. To reform the language of Berra, Stengel and Anderson -- the linguistic version of Tinker to Evers to Chance -- would have been an act of desecration. You might as well cavil at Dizzy Dean's classic description of how Phil Rizzuto slud into second base.
Paul Greenberg Archives
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JWR contributor Paul Greenberg, editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, has won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing. David Barham, editorial writer there, contributed to this column. Send your comments by clicking here.
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