Acronym Hell

I've been thinking a lot about acronyms lately.  We use some of them so often they have become words unto themselves.  Take NASA, for example.  I'm sure if you asked people on the street what those four letters stood for you'd get a lot of wrong answers.  Does it make a difference if some people think it's an Agency and others an Administration?  Or that the first two letters do not stand for North American?  Not a bit.  Everybody know what NASA does, just as they know what the CIA and the FBI do.  Acronyms save you time, it's easier to say NASA then National Air and Space Administration.  There are some acronyms, however, which seem to have been created by lazy pudding heads.  Take POTUS, for example, an acronym for President of the United States.  I think this is pretty freaking stupid.  If you're an American citizen living in the United States, and you're talking to someone about the President, you're not going to use POTUS unless you want to sound like an ass.  Everybody knows which president you're talking about.  You do not need to clarify which president.

And then there's FLOTUS (First Lady of the United States).  What kind dick calls her that?  Yet I was checking out the headlines on the MSNBC website and there it was - FLOTUS, not First Lady.  I live in Pennsylvania and we have, as does every other state, a Governor.  When his wife is introduced at functions she is called the First Lady of Pennsylvania.  Maybe, instead of calling her that, they should call her the FLOP.  Shouldn't the same principles be applied to every First Lady of every state?  Do you see where I'm coming from?

Then, of course, there is the SCOTUS.

Justice Scalia tries to cure SCOTUS with broccoli 

The first thing that crossed my mind when I heard SCOTUS had nothing to do with the Supreme Court.  I thought the reporter had mistakenly dropped a consonant and was speaking about male genitalia.  When I understood my mistake I new for certain that Pudding Heads abound.  Think about it?  Doesn't SCOTUS sound like some weird testicular fungus?  Something Justice Scalia might truly be suffering from?  Or Justice Thomas?  Sounds a bit vulgar, doesn't it?  The sort of thing our parents might whisper about a bad neighbor?   "I hear he has scotus."  I know some people might disagree with me, but I think it definitely doesn't describe the highest court in the country.

For the most part, I believe this is just one of those crazy fads which sweeps through the halls of Journalism from time to time.  Some pudding head some where was trying to be cool and catchy.  I doubt very much if the general public is going to adopt POTUS, and FLOTUS, and SCROTUS... I mean SCOTUS into their vocabulary.  It will pass.  But until it does we will have to endure this acronym hell.