So, Sen. Hilary Clinton, in an interview with Good Morning America [1], used a word that even she realised is "terrible" after uttering it. She preceded the "we will totally obliterate them " with "they have to look very carefully at their... society". The immediate response is obviously WTF? What does that have to do with the "society"? Is this now a social issue? So you are planning to "attack" the society? Again, she realised how idiotic she had been, because she ammended it to "those people who run Iran need to understand that." So, the society or the people who run Iran?

I suppose all these stems from the much advertised glorification of ignorence in the American society, the habit of making opinions with only half-knowledge, and what I think is the biggest problem here: not enough words! Yes, Sen. Clinton genuinely seemed lost for words and could not find a better word to replace the "society" with.

The same seems to be true about her use of "obliterate". It really means "strike out" (ob: pre-verb meaning "efface" and literati: letter, word). She obviously was at loss for a word, and she stumbled upon a word, and she only fully figured out the word after she uttered it. It is easy to see, she even paused a bit before saying it, looking for something.

The result was a statement eerily close to the alleged Ahmadinejad statement of "wiping-out Israel", the wipe-out closely resembeling strike-out. While some argue that the Persian expression of "remove from history" would mean to stop the existence of the government of Israel, not wipe-off the map (the phrase does not exist in Persian and was thus translated idiomatically and cynically into English), the word "obliterate" leaves no doubts. It means to "wipe-off", really, to destroy. Couple it with a "look at the society" and it adds up to killing off the Iranians.

Now, Senator Clinton, would it not have been better if you bought one of those "improve your vocabulary and climb up the ladder of success" help-yourself books? I realise that George Bush has brought down the standards of Public Oration (a staple of successful politics since the time of Demosthenes and Cicero) and anything will be an improvement, but honestly, outdoing him is hardly an achievement. An SAT prep class, might I suggest?