by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist
Claire McCaskill may have been born just-up-the-road-a-piece in the big town of Rolla, Missouri, but her family was living in the small town of Houston, Missouri, on the occasion of that big event back in 1953. Houston is just-up-the-road-a-piece from my current residence of West Plains, Missouri. The population of Houston was just over 2,000 in 2010, making our Claire a quintessential small-town girl from the Ozarks.
I'm a few years older than Claire, but not many, and she has scored many fine achievements during her time on the planet, certainly more than this old typist. Claire headed into politics at a young age after graduating from college and law school and managed to serve a couple of terms in the Missouri Legislature. From there she went on to become the prosecuting attorney in Jackson County (Kansas City), and was then elected to two terms as our state auditor.
While Claire was still in her second term as state auditor, she challenged our sitting Democratic governor, Bob Holden, in a primary election and defeated him. That act of political sabotage did not sit well will some members of her party, and it likely played into Claire's loss of the general election for governor in the fall to Roy Blunt's son, Matty.
(Interestingly, Matt Blunt, who was predicted to be a rising star in the Republican Party, left politics after only one term as governor, saying that he had accomplished all he set out to do. There is a story beneath that departure that does not require much digging. Today Matt is a lobbyist along with all of the other adult members of Roy Blunt's family.)
After the loss to Blunt, McCaskill spent two years drying her powder and finishing up her term as state auditor - and then she managed to get elected to the US Senate as a Democrat from Missouri, a post that she held for two complete terms from 2007-2019. After losing her senate seat in 2018 to whippersnapper Josh Hawley, McCaskill has turned to a career in the media and currently works as an on-air news analyst for MSNBC and NBC News.
Having a job in a national news organization gives Claire a perch from which to take potshots at one of the people she undoubtedly sees as responsible for costing her the cushy job in the senate. That poisonous toad is Donald John Trump. Earlier this week Claire took to Twitter and spit some of her own poison back at our so-called commander-in-chief. She had this to snarl:
She had options. Over the past few weeks the website Dictionary.com has been publishing an internet article that lists synonyms for the word "poop". "Poop" itself can be used in several different ways: the noun "poop" or something that you might step in on the way to the barn, the verb "poop" or the act of excreting bile from the body through the anus, or the adjective "pooped" meaning just plain tired or worn-out.
Using "poop" as a noun, the way McCaskill used "shit," opens up opportunities to select other options from a list of synonyms. "Excrement" is a fairly common alternative that most people would recognize. An older and less well known form of that is "excreta." The word "ordure" is an even older way of glamorizing "poop."
"Scat" is a common way of describing animal "poop," particularly that which is found out in nature. "Muck" which means "moist farmyard dung, decaying vegetable matter, or manure" and goes back to an old Norse word for cow dung, is acceptable as well - and particularly for a "journalist" such as McCaskill. That is, after all, where the term "muckraking" originated. The article also talked about "coprolite" or old, sometimes fossilized "poop," and "feculence" which is another way of describing the dregs of "poop" such as those found in the botton of porta-potties.
And add to all of those the ones not specifically mentioned by Dictionary.com as synonyms - words like "feces," "dung," "manure," and yes, even "shit!"
All of that natural fertilizer talk reminds me of a story about another Missouri Democratic politician who was also a colorful talker. The story goes that a friend once told Bess Truman that she should work on getting President Truman not to use the term "cow manure" when speaking in public. "Oh please, no!" Bess reportedly replied, "You have no idea how long it took us to get him to say 'cow manure!'"
One suspects that Harry would have loved Twitter!
Citizen Journalist
Claire McCaskill may have been born just-up-the-road-a-piece in the big town of Rolla, Missouri, but her family was living in the small town of Houston, Missouri, on the occasion of that big event back in 1953. Houston is just-up-the-road-a-piece from my current residence of West Plains, Missouri. The population of Houston was just over 2,000 in 2010, making our Claire a quintessential small-town girl from the Ozarks.
I'm a few years older than Claire, but not many, and she has scored many fine achievements during her time on the planet, certainly more than this old typist. Claire headed into politics at a young age after graduating from college and law school and managed to serve a couple of terms in the Missouri Legislature. From there she went on to become the prosecuting attorney in Jackson County (Kansas City), and was then elected to two terms as our state auditor.
While Claire was still in her second term as state auditor, she challenged our sitting Democratic governor, Bob Holden, in a primary election and defeated him. That act of political sabotage did not sit well will some members of her party, and it likely played into Claire's loss of the general election for governor in the fall to Roy Blunt's son, Matty.
(Interestingly, Matt Blunt, who was predicted to be a rising star in the Republican Party, left politics after only one term as governor, saying that he had accomplished all he set out to do. There is a story beneath that departure that does not require much digging. Today Matt is a lobbyist along with all of the other adult members of Roy Blunt's family.)
After the loss to Blunt, McCaskill spent two years drying her powder and finishing up her term as state auditor - and then she managed to get elected to the US Senate as a Democrat from Missouri, a post that she held for two complete terms from 2007-2019. After losing her senate seat in 2018 to whippersnapper Josh Hawley, McCaskill has turned to a career in the media and currently works as an on-air news analyst for MSNBC and NBC News.
Having a job in a national news organization gives Claire a perch from which to take potshots at one of the people she undoubtedly sees as responsible for costing her the cushy job in the senate. That poisonous toad is Donald John Trump. Earlier this week Claire took to Twitter and spit some of her own poison back at our so-called commander-in-chief. She had this to snarl:
"Can you even imagine having the responsibility of leading this great nation and not caring enough to read vital information needed to keep America and our military safe? Not even giving a shit to prepare for calls with world leaders? Such arrogance and stupidity."There you have it. Claire said "shit." That's her Ozark heritage slipping out and then hitting the fan.
She had options. Over the past few weeks the website Dictionary.com has been publishing an internet article that lists synonyms for the word "poop". "Poop" itself can be used in several different ways: the noun "poop" or something that you might step in on the way to the barn, the verb "poop" or the act of excreting bile from the body through the anus, or the adjective "pooped" meaning just plain tired or worn-out.
Using "poop" as a noun, the way McCaskill used "shit," opens up opportunities to select other options from a list of synonyms. "Excrement" is a fairly common alternative that most people would recognize. An older and less well known form of that is "excreta." The word "ordure" is an even older way of glamorizing "poop."
"Scat" is a common way of describing animal "poop," particularly that which is found out in nature. "Muck" which means "moist farmyard dung, decaying vegetable matter, or manure" and goes back to an old Norse word for cow dung, is acceptable as well - and particularly for a "journalist" such as McCaskill. That is, after all, where the term "muckraking" originated. The article also talked about "coprolite" or old, sometimes fossilized "poop," and "feculence" which is another way of describing the dregs of "poop" such as those found in the botton of porta-potties.
And add to all of those the ones not specifically mentioned by Dictionary.com as synonyms - words like "feces," "dung," "manure," and yes, even "shit!"
All of that natural fertilizer talk reminds me of a story about another Missouri Democratic politician who was also a colorful talker. The story goes that a friend once told Bess Truman that she should work on getting President Truman not to use the term "cow manure" when speaking in public. "Oh please, no!" Bess reportedly replied, "You have no idea how long it took us to get him to say 'cow manure!'"
One suspects that Harry would have loved Twitter!
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