GAAP: acronym:
generally footnoted in annual reports as "Generally Accepted Accounting Principles."
This is of course inaccurate, as it is widely known that accountants have no principles. More nearly properly rendered as "Generally Accepted Accounting Practices."

GDP: acronym:
new name for GNP; Heaven for the GOP.

GOP: initials:
Grand Old Party: the Republican party.
Generation Of Patriots to their defenders, Greedy Old Plutocrats to their detractors.

GRAS: acronym:
Generally Regarded As Safe; the FDA's version of "if it was good enough for Grandma it's good enough for you."

Gadfly: n.:
a source of irritation that provides no value to anyone but the gadfly; cf. consumer advocate, tax activist.

Gaffe: n.:
a declaration in the idiom of the public figure.

Gag: n.:
a certain class of jokes; so named for the reaction they elicit.

Gag rule: n.:
a judge's order to shut up the lawyers outside the court room; so called because they are such a bad joke.

Galilee: proper name:
traditional Land of the Risen Son.

Galley: adj.:
a term that has two common occurences in English: galley slave and galley proof. Writers and editors are aware of the reasons for the association.

Gang: n.:
surrogate family for the child who needs a whole village to raise him.

Gang-banger: n.:
gangster wannabe. The basic banger is a lad who tries to look like a man by wearing clothes that make him look like an 8-year old wearing his dad's old clothes.

Gavel: n.:
miniature mallet. Used by a sitting judge to make symbolic striking motions in exercising control of the court. This is often a sublimation of his desire to bash in the head of one of the attorneys.
The miniaturization of the gavel, relative to its ancestral mace, illustrates the diminution of the judge's authority. The tendency of judges to overstep their authority represents an attempt to reverse this historical decline in power.

Gay Nineties: n.:
the last decade of the 19th century. Activists had hoped to reprise in the 20th, but the accession of the religious right makes the characterization of that decade as the Anti-gay 90's much more realistic.

General anesthesia: n.:
a medical procedure which has a similar effect on attention, awareness and sensitivity to the experience of falling in love.

General confusion: n.:
senior staff officer.

Genetic engineering: n.:

1. technology from someone born to the craft.
   
2. heir-conditioning.

Genial: adj.:
possessing a character trait — cheerfulness — seldom found in genius.

Genital: adj.:
sexual; from the latin for "beget." The same root gives us "genitive": possessive. Obviously, the connection between sexuality and possessiveness is deeply rooted in our culture.

Genius: n.:
cleverness, or a person exhibiting that cleverness, especially if I wouldn't have thought of it myself but could recognize it quickly when I saw it.
Edison's formula of 99 percent perspiration and 1 percent inspiration misleads many to the conclusion that if they waste enough energy working up a sweat, people will think they're smart.

Genocide: n.:

1. a legitimately dirty word that has been debased to mean any attempt to move an ethnic pressure group back toward merely equal rights.
   
2. activist term for birth control.

Gentile: n.:
one who lacks gentility.

Gentleman: n.:
one who acts in such manner as never to give offense -- unintentionally;
a man who recognizes and honors the responsibilities of elevated status, in addition to its perquisites.
This class of behavior is so much a luxury that it was once restricted to the landed classes; now it seems to be restricted to fictional characters.

Geocentric universe model: n.:
egocentric universe model.

Geography: n.:
that discipline which allows us to document that we are lost.

George: proper name:
the prince who was a frog, who put the "Duh" back in "Dubya."

Gerbil: n.:
a rat with a really good press agent.

Gerontocracy: n.:
the result of the advantage of incumbency; the ultimate goal of the Gray Panthers and of southern-state districting practices.

Gerontology: n.:
a branch of gastroenterology: the study of old farts.

Gestalt: adj.:
of a philosophic principle which holds that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.
This result is generally achieved by the straightforward procedure of not counting all the parts.

"Get government off the backs of the people": slogan:
get the police out of the boardroom and back into the bedroom.

Get off: phrase:
get it on, successfully.

Gigolo: n.:
a man who has enough faith in his opinion of himself as a great lover to stake his livelihood on it.

Gin: n.:
Satan's sweat, to the temperant;
Tears of the Lamb to the tippler.

Gingrinch: n.:
portmanteau word containing gin, a seducer of wills, and grinch (q.v.), a notorious killjoy; hence, the personification of a hangover.

Glamor: n.:
marketable substitute for beauty.

Gland: n.:
popular scapegoat for obesity.
"Your glands are fine. You are suffering from an overactive fork."

Glans: n.:
part of a sex organ: "You and your glans | make this romance | too hot to handle."

Glass: n.:
architectural material used for the construction of ceilings in companies that hire women.

Glory: n.:
traditionally, one of the two great motivators, the other being love.
They missed fear; and never underestimate the power of human spite.

God: n.:
the entity created by the religious to stand as scapegoat for their greed and lack of foresight.

Godzilla: proper name:
mascot of Japan, Inc.

Golden Age: n.:
the "Good Old Days;" fictitious product of a deficient memory;
the result of looking back through rose-colored glasses.

Golden arches: n.:
proof that he is smart enough to piss in his boots.

Golden fleece: n.:

1. tax credits for political contributions.
   
2. hair transplants paid for with tax dollars.

The Golden Rule: credo:
Do unto others.
The fundamental social principle of Christians -- and most others.

The Golden Rule: clause:
whoever has the gold gets to make the rules.

The Golden Rule: n.:
the civil code for living under the Law of Moses.

Golf: v.i.:
chase a little ball along grassy fields saturated with pesticides, in the direct sun, raising one's stress level; all in the name of health.

Good: adj.:
I like it.

Good Cause: n.:
one I approve of.
The question is, why do good causes so often produce such bad effects?

Good taste: n.:
esthetic judgement that coincides with mine.

Goose: n.:
important bird of folklore, noted for its melodious voice, its incisive cleverness, its aggressiveness and its monogamous mating habits

Gore: n.:

1. lap piece of a lady's garment.
   
2. the gruesome inner contents of the body.
   
3. one section of the skin of a hot-air balloon.

1. something we do to other peoples' oxen to get them to change their perspective.
   
2. to bore with great force.

Gossamer: n.:
fabric as substantial as a politician's assurances, as tranparent as his protestations.

Gossip: n.:
the most sought-after currency in social commerce. If you can't say anything nice about someone, pass along the most recent gossip.

Government: n.:
the agency that spends what you earn; a monument to the proposition "What's yours is mine, what's mine is my own."

Graffiti: n.:

1. proof of the illiteracy of a race which has learned to write on walls.
   
2. publishing by the inconsiderate for the illiterate.
   
3. "Mene, mene, tekel upharsin."

Graft: n.:

• the lubricant of the machinery of public policy.
  
• An institution which allows an official to spend millions in pursuit of a hundred thousand dollar per year job, profitably.

Gram: n.:
metric measure for the weight of something of not much substance, except for drugs. Extensively used for weighing with balances, especially for commodities of high price.

Gramm: n.:
political measure of not much substance. Extensively out of balance toward the high-priced side.

Grandparent: n.:
a parent empowered to take revenge on its children.

Gratitude: n.:
resentment in party clothes.

Gravity: n.:
that property of Nature that causes things to fall down instead of up.
The only energy source that has never been known to fail.

Great White Hope: n.:
a shark that entertains the troops at Christmas.

Great: adj.:

1. large;
   
2. good.

Greater good: n.:
a legal defense wherein the defendant undertakes to convince the court that the defendant's beliefs and values should be honored above the law. Commonly used by environmental activists who have committed sabotage and by Right-to-Life advocates who have committed arson or murder.

Greatest tax increase in history: slogan:
any measure by the opposing party that resulted in increased revenues.

Greed: n.:
the motivating force behind modern society; the engine of Industry.

Green: n.:

1. the color associated with the environmental movement.
   
2. the color of putrefaction and decay; the hue of illness.
   
3. the color of money.

Greenmail: n.:
extortion in the boardroom;
industrial piracy, where the treasure is not buried, but merely "sheltered."

Gresham's Law: n.:
"Bad money drives out good":
a broadly applicable principle of human conduct, equally true when applied to politics, religion, laws, etc.

Grief: n.:
the emotion of absence. Not, as it is practiced by those Americans of northern European ancestry, absence of emotion.

Grinch: proper name:
a sour character whose jealousy of other people's joy leads him to seek to take away the sources of that joy.
The original was a character in a children's book by Dr. Seuss.

Gubernatorial: adj.:
pertaining to a large frog in a small pond.

Guilt: n.:
natural secretion of the conscience gland. The fuel which the fires of religious devotion burn.

Gullible: adj.:
qualified for membership in the Great Electorate.

Gun: n.:

1. a metallic demon which skulks about seeking innocent bystanders to murder.
   
2. a popular scapegoat to the Left for failed social policies.
   
3. Colonel Colt's Patent Equalizer.

Guru: n.:
holy teacher. From the roots "goo" a sticky, slimy substance, and "roo" a creature with a deep pocket.