"Bentley's Second Law of Economics: The only thing more dangerous than an economist is an amateur economist!" has been cited in print since at least 2002. There is no evidence who…
Entry in progress -- B.P. Wikipedia: Lame duck (politics)A lame duck is an elected official who is approaching the end of his or her tenure, and especially an official whose successor has already…
The name "mortgage mom" was coined in a September 5, 2006 article in the Washington (DC) Post by Jeffrey H. Birnbaum and Chris Collizza: "'Mortgage Moms' May Star in…
"A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government" was written by environmentalist Edward Abbey (1927-1989) and published in 1989. "His government"…
The saying "drain the swamp" has had a long history in American politics. The saying originally meant to "drain the swamp" to get rid of malaria-carrying mosquitoes. Victor…
"Moola" (also "moolah" or "mulah") means "money." Many derivations have been suggested from many languages, but all are lacking in historical citations. A…
The Daily Kos is a progressive political blog, founded in 2002 by Markos Moulitsas. The blog gets its name from the second syllable of the name "Markos." Members of the Daily Kos…
Entry in progress -- B.P. Wikipedia: We are all Keynesians now"We are all Keynesians now" is a now-famous phrase coined by Milton Friedman and attributed to U.S. president Richard Nixon.…
The political term "Rockefeller Republican" takes its name from Nelson Rockefeller (1908-1979), the Republican governor of New York from 1959 to 1973, who then became vice president of…
Baruch College global business professor Edward Goldberg wrote the The Globalist of March 2010 about "the 'Newocracy,' the United States' new aristocracy who are the true…
"What's a Grecian urn (i.e., earn)?" is an old joke. The answer is sometimes: "About 30 shillings a week." John Keats's poem, "Ode on a Grecian Urn" (1820)…
Entry in progress -- B.P. Wikipedia: MoneybombMoneybomb (money bomb, money-bomb, fundraising bomb) is a neologism coined in 2007 to describe a grassroots fundraising effort over a brief fixed time…
"Lear jet liberal" (or "Learjet liberal") is a more modern version of the 1969 New York City term, "limousine liberal." A "Learjet liberal" might be a person…
The libertarian Reason monthly magazine started a "Hit & Run" blog in 2002. Reason readers have been called "Reasonoids" since at least 2004. The nickname…
The Daily Kos is a progressive political blog, founded in 2002 by Markos Moulitsas. The blog gets its name from the second syllable of the name "Markos." The website uses the color…
Arthur Bloch's 1977 bestseller, Murphy's law and other reasons why things go wrong, included a food joke: "Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage." The coleslaw joke is still…
An old saying of Washington, D.C., is that a politician or a bureaucrat "came to do good and stayed to do well." In other words, the individual came to do good (for others), but stayed to…
"Hatriot" (hate + patriot) was used in the 1990s by football fans deriding the NFL's New England Patriots. The term became popular in 2004 and especially during the "tea…
The term "gliberal" (glib + liberal) has had a long -- though infrequent -- usage. Newspaper columnist Walter Winchell used "gliberal" in 1947; Averell Harriman used…
A "glibertarian" (glib + libertarian) is someone who professes libertarian views of limited government, but who actually supports government programs in practice. A…