When articulation is impossible, gesticulation comes to the rescue.

I'm willing to zap conservatives when they do things that are not libertarian.

To 'know your place' is a good idea in politics. That is not to say 'stay in your place' or 'hang on to your place', because ambition or boredom may dictate upward or downward mobility, but a sense of place - a feel for one's own position in the control room-is useful in gauging what you should try to do.

The Republicans do not look on the Democrats as the evil empire.

On the analogy of 'Dictionary Johnson,' we call Fred R. Shapiro, editor of the just-published Yale Book of Quotations (well worth the $50 price), 'Quotationeer Shapiro.' Shapiro does original research, earning his 1,067-page volume a place on the quotation shelf next to Bartlett's and Oxford's.

The perfect Christmas gift for a sportscaster, as all fans of sports clichés know, is a scoreless tie.

It behooves us to avoid archaisms. Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.