Irony is dead (part 747489)

Andrew Sullivan writes:

ALL-TIME MALKIN AWARD NOSTALGIC ENTRY: How could we forget the classic Pat Robertson fund-raising pitch:

Given that the only clear reason for the existence of the Malkin award is her calling bullshit on Andy’s fundraising drive pathetic cries for money, mixing up Malkin award and fund-raising pitch really takes things up to a whole new level.

Meanwhile, Andy and his anonymous reader receive another F in German from us:

MISC: It turns out that the correct spelling is “verklemmt” …

if you spell it the German way, which I think most people would. The Yenta character on Saturday Night Live used the word as if it were Yiddish, but it’s not–it’s high German for “overwrought”–it just sounds Yiddish and funny to the English ear.

Leo says:

Unmittelbare Treffer
uptight = verklemmt

Funny how right Leo can be sometimes.

We’d also add that we’ve only ever heard of high German in reference to the spoken language — not to indicate that some words have different meanings in, say, Hannover and Stuttgart. (On this point though, we’ll happily defer to any native speaker that might be around.)

Bonus points:

Verklemmt is an actual German word that is still in use, and means shy, self-conscious, repressed. Verklempt sounds Yiddish to me, and probably has a similar meaning.

PS: How is it that a self-proclaimed inventor of the blogosphere still can’t manage to have a separate link for every post, choosing instead to post several items as one? JFC get a clue.

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