A Brief Discourse on the Importance of Etymology in Tomorrow's Election

How is everyone tonight?

That’s wonderful. I’m doing well. I have alcohol. I have an excuse to wear a nice dress. The worries I have about what tomorrow will bring are…manageable. Some dear friends of mine, however, are encased in a kind of…heinous bubble of rage and fear that formed sometime in January and has been growing smaller and smaller and smaller, culminating in tonight’s denseness, when the stress has collapsed in on itself and become a black hole for many Americans like you and me, who dread the questions that will be answered tomorrow with the kind of anxiety usually reserved for the apocalypse.

And if you feel that way there’s only so much you can do to combat that. Vote. If you’ve never voted before, start. Drink. If you don’t drink, start. If neither of these options are available to you, and I am of course speaking to the underage alcoholics in the room, then I offer a third source of comfort: a brief discourse on the importance of etymology in tomorrow’s election.

I find tremendous comfort in word roots. This may seem like a small thing, a tremendously nerdy thing, but I find that when you break down some of the words that have been frequently abused in this election, and understand just what they mean, and just how much power they have, these words stop sounding like an attack against which we cannot fight, and begin sounding like our secret allies.

For instance. ‘Senator’ comes from the Latin root ‘sen,’ which means ‘old man.’ That’s not threatening. That’s someone who smells like baby hair and sweaters, and falls asleep during ‘Wheel of Fortune.’ We have nothing to fear from old men, senators, or old-man-senators. They just want to be invited to dinner every week, and for the pie to be served the way they like it: right in front of them where they can pretend they still see clearly. Dementia’s a bitch, and we should be more understanding towards those in this election who are obviously suffering from it.

‘Ballot.’ From the Italian ‘ballotta,’ which means ‘little ball’ and refers specifically to little balls made of stone or metal. So, when you cast your ballot tomorrow, imagine that you are chucking a marble right into the eye of the candidate you don’t want. That’s fun. That’s like middle school.

‘Socialist.’ This is a fun one. Latin. ‘Socio.’ ‘Companion.’ A socialist, in the truest sense of the word, is a person that enjoys people. Which is why I a bit thrown yesterday, when I was canvassing for Obama in Indiana, by the genuine concern shown by a man on a motorcycle rode by and commented on my sticker by shouting, “Y’all aren’t spreading socialism, are you?” I like to think that in general I spread only tolerance and good feeling for all my fellow humans, but that’s a goddamned lie. I am not pleasant enough to be a socialist. So I answered him truthfully. I said, “No. Not socialism. Just change.”

Sen. Ballotta. Socio. Breathe deeply and repeat.

And this word-root meditation technique extends to the names of the candidates themselves. A lot of vicious fun was had with Obama’s last name being one letter away from ‘Osama,’ but that’s really just coincidence and has nothing to do with the meaning of the names. Spelling is for children, and Republicans. Etymology is about what things stand for. So let’s look at the Republican candidates names.

It’s interesting that few have pointed out that McCain means ‘son of Cain,’ and that Cain was the first murderer, which all the Christians in real America should know. I am also surprised that the Obama campaign has not pointed out that Palin comes from a Dutch word that means ‘evil cunt.’

That’s not true. There are actually three possible origins for the name ‘Palin.’ In French it’s ‘unexplained.’ In Old English it’s ‘follower.’ And in Welsh it’s ‘to serve at table.’ Combine the three and ‘unexplained follower brought to the table’ gives us a more complete picture of Palin’s origins.

Tomorrow we elect a president, a figure traditionally thought of as the most powerful person on Earth. This is a gross misconception that was beaten into us for the last eight years. President. It comes from two Latin roots. ‘Sedere’ which means ‘to sit.’ And ‘prae’ which means ‘before.’ The president is an individual that sits before us, representative of us, but not in control of us. The last eight years were not heinous because George W. Bush is an evil man who entered into a position of leadership with the intent of harming this country. The last eight years were shameful because George W. Bush is a stupid man that was not elected, and we allowed him and his supporters to bulldoze us into handing off the office of presidency as though anyone could do it. The last eight years are our fault, not because of what George W. Bush did, but because of what he was allowed to do without consequences. That’s on us, and we fucked it up. To think, what could have been avoided, if more people took Latin.

And as long as we remember this, as long as we have learned our lesson, whoever is elected tomorrow will find that we are watching them like hawks. The president sits before us, not the other way around, and ‘impeach’ comes from the French word ‘empecher,’ which means ‘to prevent.’

And Change, the oldest English there is, which means ‘balance returned when something is paid for.’ We have paid dearly. Balance is coming.

And then there’s Hope, which possibly comes from lower German, ‘hop,’ ‘leaping in expectation’.

I’m sure this little speech has done little to help those of you that feel the apocalypse encroaching. But, for the record, ‘apocalypse’ means ‘to bring out of hiding,’ so the apocalypse coming tomorrow is nothing more and nothing less than the true face of America being revealed, and no matter what we see, at least we’ll know where we’re going. Either way, one side will feel as though catastrophe has struck.

But all catastrophe means is ‘inundated with change,’ and, personally, that sounds like what we want, what we need, what we deserve. Tomorrow will be our finest catastrophe.