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Politics : Why is Gore Trying to Steal the Presidency? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (1515)	11/20/2000 11:36:08 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 3887

Does chad, by any other name, sound as goofy? By Charles Elmore, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer Monday, November 20, 2000 WEST PALM BEACH -- The Japanese have no word for chad, so Nami Yamamoto of TV Tokyo Channel 12 was doing her best to explain it Sunday. "I think I will probably say kami-kire, Yamamoto said, preparing an afternoon report for millions back home. "Kami means paper, and kire is a small piece. I don't have that much time to explain the whole thing, so I try not to get into details that confuse people." It's too late for Palm Beach County on that score, but now the rest of the world is having to deal with what to call the piece of paper that was punched, dimpled or made "pregnant" on the thousands of recounted ballots on which the 2000 presidential election depends. The Canadians, Australians and the British have no problem simply saying chad, of course, but for the French, it's a puzzle. A French wire service reporter considered using la miette, or crumb, before exclaiming in the media room of the Palm Beach County Emergency Operations Center: "Well, to hell with it, I'm just going to call it a chad." And so was coined: le chad. It's pronounced pretty much as in English, a major defeat for the French Academy, which tries to defend the mother tongue from English encroachment. Part of the communication gap with Tokyo is the simple fact that the chad is not native to Japan. "In Japan, you write down the candidate's name you want from a list," Yamamoto said. "That kind of mistake doesn't happen there." charles_elmore@pbpost.com