Re: OT: interestin' factoids (mostly language-related)

Paul Bennett wrote:

> > In England, the Speaker of the House is not allowed to
> > speak.
>
> Just plain wrong.  Not even an understandable misunderstanding.
I suppose that what is meant is that the Speaker, like the chairman of
any deliberative assembly, in normal circumstances does not argue either
for or against any motion, nor vote except to break a tie.  Obviously
he or she must utter words on many occasions, but does not "speak" in
the technical parliamentary sense.

ObLang: I find it interesting how "factoid" has mutated from the original
sense of "false but widely believed statement" to the CNN sense of
"true but little-known statement".

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