How To Say The F Word Without Saying The F Word Or Something Like That

By Iam Chilling

Let's say a Vice President drops the F-bomb while telling a President how awesome he thinks his new historic legislation is. Firstly: this is great. Secondly: this leaves news writers in something of a bind. Let's look at how a few of our favorite sources handled this tricky writing challenge:

The New York Times: "Mr. President, this is a big ... deal," [Biden] said, adding an adjective between big and deal, that begins with 'f.'

FOX News: "This is a big f---ing deal," he informed the president, without shorthanding the adjective in the sentence.

The Los Angeles Times: Headline: Vice President Joe Biden embraces health care bill signing with profane term

Newsday "This is a -- big deal," he apparently told Obama while shaking his hand. And where you see -- in the quote above, imagine a word that starts with the letter F.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution: Biden then embraced the president and said in his ear -- loud enough for the mikes to pick up -- "This is a big [expletive] deal." And he didn't say Fargo.

And I must say I am proud and moved that NPR went with "f-ing": "This is a big f-ing deal," he said to President Barack Obama this morning at the White House. (We've cleaned up his language a bit.)

In the interest of simplicity, from now on, I'm going to go with: Biden said to President Obama, "This is a big :) deal," except instead of a smiley emoticon, imagine there's a word that in some contexts means "lovemaking," as in: "This is a big lovemaking deal, Mr.President."

Cedar's Takeaway:

I think it's time to deregulate the F Word. I don't say it, except well sometimes but that would be in very close situations, and never above a whisper, and never ever with a video camera rolling, at least not since college.

But frankly I don't care if the Vice President said it, he is a pig and everyone knows that. He's not only a pig he's stupid. But if you wait to express yourself with a limited vocabulary go ahead.