US soldier killed by a "vehicle-born improvised explosive device."

[displacedtexan]

I'm absolutely speechless. I've heard everything now.


U.S. Soldier Killed in Car Bomb Attack in Iraq
Sat May 22, 2004 12:35 AM ET


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A car bomb has killed a U.S. soldier and wounded three others in an attack south of Baghdad, the U.S. military said Saturday.

It said the soldiers, from the 1st Armored Division, were patrolling near the town of Mahmudiya, 19 miles south of Baghdad, when their vehicle was hit by a "vehicle-born improvised explosive device."

a little more...
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=5224941

[greatauntoftriplets]

1. A homemade car bomb??

Sure is easier on the tongue.

[havocmom]

4. Yeah, but it sounds more high-tech & dangerous the other way.

Car bomb sounds so 'anybody can do it' and makes us look weak. Also, hard to drum up support for expensive missile defenses so junta pals can get the rest of the cash in the Treasury if people start saying 'car bomb'

CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB
CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB
CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB
CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB CAR BOMB

Yeah, we need a whup ass missile defense system with a whupp ass price tag so we can be safe! Sorry kids, the schools will just have to close; hey, let's all go to the park bench and wake up Grandma!

[displacedtexan]

7. Excellent point!

You should author a blog!

[jobycom]

8. It's not a car bomb, it's a homicide bomb!

Hey, the intent is to kill, not to become a car!

[LittleApple81]

2. It should be vehicle-borne (carried by the vehicle). I think English

has become a second language for everybody.

[displacedtexan]

3. That really does look funny: "born of a vehicle" ????????

English is not the military's strong suit, is it?

[jpgray]

5. Editors today are just laughable

In an article regarding the 9/11 commission's softball treatment of Rudy, Kean was quoted as saying they shouldn't have spent so much time 'complementing' him.

:eyes:

[displacedtexan]

6. LOL!

That's what you get when you hire the bottom of the bell curve, basing your personnel policies on political affiliation only.

[jobycom]

10. Written English. People get their English from TV these days

That's why people confuse except with accept, then with than, mute with moot, etc. They hear a phrase and use it without understanding it.

[markses]

11. Seems like they hear it and understand it

but just don't know the proper spelling.

[jobycom]

12. They don't understand it, either.

People say "for all intensive purposes," because they think that's what they've heard, and they don't understand the actual meaning of the phrase. Same with "Mute point--" What the hell is a mute point? A point that doesn't speak? If people thought about the phrase before they mindlessly parrotted it, they wouldn't use it because it said nothing. If they had seen the phrase written, they would know that "moot" must mean something different, and would extrapolate what it meant from the context, or look it up.

It's the "Verbal Advantage" mentality. If you use big words, you are smart whether you needed to use the big word or not, rather than if you are smart you begin to use more complex language because you need more complex language to express your more complex thoughts.

It's not just spelling.

[htuttle]

13. Humans use of language is far closer to birds than we like to admit

While it's more complex than bird calls, it's built on the same foundations. We didn't lose our reptile brain when we grew frontal lobes -- they are built around it.

I've been thinking that political catchphrases are an awful lot like bird calls. Meaningless in themselves, they get repeated to elicit certain reactions that people have been conditioned to have in response to them.

"Liberal, Liberal, Liberal"
"Cock-a-doodle-doo"

See, not much difference.

[jobycom]

15. Phrases become words in themselves

When people hear a phrase often enough, they use the whole phrase like a word, not concerned with the individual words that make it up. Politicians and advertisers repeat phrases so that they become imbedded in memory, and effect the way a person thinks about a subject.

Not sure on the bird calls. "Cock-a-doodle-doo" is still a human word, and isn't really that close to the actual sound a rooster makes. It does not capture the rythym and the pitch change. But I agree there probably are rythyms and sounds and linguistic constructs that affect us on a basic level. Like rythym in music mimicing our heartbeat.

[markses]

14. Hmmm

I agree with you, but these are curious examples.

1) "For all intents and purposes" is a kind of empty phrase anyway - I'd wager that even people who spell it and speak it correctly don't actually mean it in the way the words mean (i.e., for any given intention, and for any given goal, the situation remains the same). It's an empty and probably obsolete filler statement, and without the finely nuanced philosophical distinction between "intent" and "purpose," largely redundant in common usage. So I agree in part. People say it because it is legal talk and they think it makes them sound "smarter," but it really doesn't have much meaning even when used correctly, which is perhaps why it is often garbled. Compare another often misused "legal" phrase "Time is of the essence." Of course, it is usually a contractual binder - "Time is of the essence...of this agreement" - but people often use it to mean "Hurry up," or some such.

2) When someone says "It's a mute point" (although I have never heard this variation), I think most people get the contextual meaning, which is pretty close to the common usage of "moot point." Bottom line: It doesn't matter; it's irrelevant, etc. Compare Joey's "It's a moo point" on Friends. It was funny. His explanation was "It's a cow's opinion. Y'know. It doesn't matter." Of course, we all laugh at how dumb it is, but with respect to understanding was he really wrong? If he hears somebody say "It's a moot point," and mistakes the signifier "moot" for "moo," does he really misunderstand the meaning of the phrase? I don't think so. Here's an interesting discussion that says we all misunderstand "moot point" when we consider it an "irrelevant" point, or one that doesn't matter:

http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-moo1.htm

However, I'm more likely to stick to usage as the developer of meaning (language evolves).

[freeforall]

16. And their written English from the Internet

...which is absolutely appalling! Poor spelling, little or no punctuation....

[mike1963]

18. Maybe it was an adolescent Pinto...

:eyes:

[jobycom]

9. The writer and editor seem to know how ridiculous it is

That's why they put it in quotes at the end of the paragraph, to poke fun at it. Not that moe than ten percent of readers would notice.

Democrats: we're the top half.

[Jacobin]

17. Gee, I didn't know automobiles could birth bombs

Hope my car hasn't been fooling around at night while I'm asleep. If it is "in trouble", I'll have to go get it a bomb abortion. What will the fundies say?

I'm trapped between a rock and a hard place. :crazy:

[alcuno]

19. This soldier makes 800 US war dead in Iraq.

According to lunaville, the # was at 799 on 5/21 and so this makes 800. Every life is precious and I grieve for all of those who have been harmed.

[markses]

20. No, this one is accounted for by Lunaville within the 799

1st Armored Division, killed by IED attack, Mahmudiyah (i.e., south of Baghdad).