You...You Moderate, You!

Quote:  “Rudy McRomney is not a conservative.”  Presidential aspirant Jim Gilmore, speaking on CNN’s “The Situation Room.”

 

Figure of Speech:  portmanym (PORT-man-nym), the figure of conjoined names.  From the words portmanteau and eponym.

Ronald Reagan’s Eleventh Commandment was “Thou shalt not speak ill of thy fellow Republicans.”  So much for the Eleventh Commandment.   Gilmore charges that fellow Republicans Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, and Mitt Romney have been caught on videotape expressing “moderate to liberal views.” What’s more, Romney and Giuliani have admitted to living in the Northeast.  Which must mean they condone sexual perversion and mass transit.

Gilmore kills three political birds with one figurative stone, smooshing the front-running trio into one portmanym, Rudy McRomney. Figaro made up the word portmanym by portmanteau’ing portmanteau (the merger of two words and their meanings) and eponym (a word named after a person).  Gilmore’s portmanym turns his opponents into a single waffling moderate (who looks alarmingly like Ted Kennedy in our photo reconstruction).

Just don’t tell Hillary Obamwards.

Snappy Answer:  “Don’t ever change, Governor, or we’ll call you ‘Gilmorph.’”

For more fun ways to screw up the English language, click here.