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War on 'war'

We have really cheapened the metaphor of war. Can I call a truce?

Almost as sick as the expression "it went viral." (That usually means you have seen it on two different websites or have gotten an email about it. All too often TV uses it as an excuse to do a story, no matter if the content is just awful crap.)

The first "war" I recall (that didn't involve actually shooting and bombing and mess kits) was the War on Poverty, in the '60s.

As far as I can tell, poverty either won or fought us to a stalemate, as in Korea. That was a real war.

For the past couple of weeks I've been making a list of things we make "war" on. The list is not exhaustive:

War on Women

War on the Poor

War on the Rich

War on Terror

War on Smoking

War on Coal

War on Gluten

War on the Unborn

War on Christmas

That's a lot of "war" going on.

Can you add some to the list?

Can we maybe avoid carelessly throwing "war" in the future – and stop hanging the suffix "gate" on every scandal?

Thank you.

Recess