According to Merriam-Webster:
"Interregnum" - the timing during which a throne is vacant between two successive reigns or regimes; a period during which the normal functions of government or control are suspended; a lapse or pause in a continuous series.
Great word. Rachel Maddow used it last night.
Got me wondering if people who use words like that are showing off, or using the word to achieve word economy. By word economy I mean saying a lot with one word or one short highly intellectual phrase.
I'm going for the latter.
Interregnum is a good word. I like the sound of it.
I also like, and I have hammered this home before, that in using that word and others like it, she is assuming her audience will understand it.
She is assuming intelligence rather than to assume stupidity, which is what reality TV is all about.
Bill Maher does it. George Carlin used to do it.
Enough. Gotta head off to The Asylum.
You better believe I will not be using the word interregnum in that meaningless world.
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