The Joys of Gooder English: New uses for the word "McCarthy"

Sic semper tyrannus

Thanks to recent events in Washington the word “McCarthy” has been finding its way into common usage among English-speaking peoples. It’s a versatile word that has multiple meanings, often understood once the context is known.

For example let's examine this statement to see the importance of context: “Their Coach called all the wrong plays. He really pulled a McCarthy out there on the field.” In this context it is clear that "pulling a McCarthy" means the coach, according to the 2023 edition of "Webster's  Dictionary of Evolving Slang", is "one who possesses no leadership skills, no strategy, an inability to unify his team, and is, in short, a classic nitwit who consistently stumbles into chaotic, humiliating defeats."

I've listed below a number of ways in which the word "McCarthy" has come to express multiple meanings in contemporary usage:

1. “She’s such a McCarthy*. Pathetic. She wants to be our HOA President so bad I almost feel sorry for her.” 
*clueless ineptitude cloaked in naked ambition

2. "I McCarthyed* my bowels. I'm sorry, nurse."
* failed to control my caucus

3. “Did you hear about his ex-wife’s lawyer?  The guy is a total McCarthy*." 
*spineless weasel with a tan

4. “Don’t McCarthy* me, Sargent. You better be true to your word. This is war.” 
*betray trust, break a sworn oath

5. “There goes our next CEO. Climbing all the way to the top over all the bodies  of the people he stabbed in the back on his way up. What a McCarthy*.”
 *power mad opportunist, dumb as a Lincoln log 

Not Kevin McCarthy

6. “In the age of burlesque, vaudeville and radio a famous ventriloquist named Bergen worked with a dummy named Charlie McCarthy. That dummy was no Kevin McCarthy*.” 
*a sawdust-brained, nut-less eunuch with Trump’s head so far up his husk when Trump talks his lips move at the same time

7. “Gin! I won! I pulled a McCarthy*!! I won!” 
*When a card player realizes they can never win with the hand they’ve been dealt they claim a winning hand. Sometimes called "pulling a Governor Lake"

“Could’ve been a disastrous flood but you McCarthyed* the crumbling dam just in time. Now let's run!" 
*rigged a temporary fix, applied multiple band-aids, kicked the can down the road, postponed the hard work of actually addressing the problem

“Congratulations on your retirement. You’ll be remembered like a true McCarthy*.” 
*A forgotten embarrassment, a historical blip, a feckless joke

“This insane new director we got to replace the lunatic we fired? He’s really out of his mind, right? It’s the McCarthy* effect, right?” 
*the devil you know is always better than the devil you select to be your next Speaker of the Mad House.

Next week, here at “Joys of Gooder English” we’ll look at what’s bestest for the future of the English language by diagramming a run-on sentence from Donald Trump’s X feed. He has all the best words.