Ratioed!

by Pa Rock

Word Collector

I heard a factoid on National Public Radio (NPR) the other day which said that the average English-speaker knows around 42,000 words.  Today I cross-checked that information with Google's Artificial Intelligence (AI) and received more detailed information.  Google says that:

"The average English-speaker is estimated to know between 20,000 and 35,000 words.  However, this can vary depending on factors like age, education, and exposure to different types of language.  Some studies suggest that adults, particularly those with higher education, may know close to 42,000 words."  (The AI listed the magazine "Science" as its source.)

Don Trump probably knows hundreds of words. 

I am unsure as to how many words I know, but when the kids finally lock me away in Shady Pines, I will try to smuggle in a stack of Big Chief tablets and a fist full of pens and spend my final days making a list of all the words I know, some of which will be quite impolite!

But I digress.  Regardless of how many words I actually know, today I can add a big 'plus one' to that number because  there has been a new entry in my aging vocabulary!

I probably became familiar with the word "ratio" in a junior high or high school math class.  In simple terms it is a way of comparing two or more quantities.  For instance, three of every four desserts brought to the picnic were cakes.  The cake ratio to all desserts was 3:4.

This morning I was reading a piece by pollster Dan Pfeiffer on Substack in which he was chronicling the growing displeasure in MAGA world at the Trump administration's secrecy over whatever materials it may or may not have regarding the life and death of child sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.  Pfeiffer referenced one of Trump's most recent posts on Truth Social platform in which Trump, who had once campaigned on releasing the Epstein files, was now downplaying the matter and saying whatever files there actually were had been written by Trump's long list of political enemies, and that the public should quit obsessing over them and let Attorney General Pam Bondi do her job.  

Pfeiffer then noted that Trump had been "ratioed" over that long and rambling post.  At that point I was shuffled off of the post by a "paywall" (another recent addition to my vocabulary) and was left wondering just what the hell it meant to be "ratioed."

However, my ignorance on the subject was destined to be short-lived.  Minutes later I was reading a Substack post by journalist Heather Cox Richardson in which she was also talking about the resurgence of the Epstein story and the MAGA world's extreme unhappiness that the Trump administration seems to be trying to bury it.  She, too, noted Trump's meandering and surreal post about the Epstein materials actually having been written by his (Trump's) enemies and being an unimportant distraction from the important business of him (Trump) using the government to exact revenge on those same enemies.

Heather Cox Richardson also said in her Substack column that Trump had been "ratioed," and she went on to explain the term for dummies like me.  Regarding Trump's crazy post, Ms. Cox Richardson had this to say:

"For the first time ever, Trump got ratioed on his own platform, meaning that there were more comments on his post than likes or shares, showing disapproval of his message.  According to Jordan King of Newsweek, by 10:45 this morning (Eastern Time) it had more than 36,000 replies, but only 11,000 reposts, and 32,000 likes."

So there you have it.  Trump got his butt "ratioed."  That's obviously not as painful as having it caned, but it's gotta hurt, nonetheless.

(And for the very few people out there who are older than me, a "paywall" is where an internet site blocks people who have not paid a subscription fee to access the site.)

(I grew up in a time when news was limited to just a very few sources, was generally about the same from channel to channel, and was paid for by toothpaste and cigarette companies.    Today it is more like a grocery store where you take the news sources that appeal to you personally from the shelf and pay for them at the checkout counter.  But that is grist for a whole other blog posting.)

(My deposits from the barnyard remain free!)