"Nu-Cue-Lar" -- what does it mean?

It boils my blood whenever I hear this mispronunciation. But it occurred to me what it means when Bush does it: it's a symbol of willful ignorance, of stubborn refusal to pay any attention to reality.

Is there any other explanation for such a blatant error?

Why don't people correct him? Surely there are educated people who can't stand hearing it either!!

There's not even any basis whatsoever for this being a "regional" thing, or some sort of accent or anything like that!

How does the spelling NU-CLE-AR morph into NU-CUE-LAR???

It'd be like biology teachers telling students that the nu-cue-lus was the part of the cell where the DNA is. How long would a biology professor (I mean a real one, not the newly minted intelligent design ones) last at a university if he were teaching his students that?

Where does this willful ignorance come from??? I hate it, it's so indicative of many things about our country today.

I say if a person cannot pronounce this word correctly, they forfeit any right to hold a public office at any level.

It's the only way he can read, and even then he gets it wrong :rofl:

their finger on the button IMO, I think Carter talked like that to, it is SOOOOOOOOOO annoying. Catering to rural dumbfucks, I believe. He knows better, but he's the "decider"

but there was never a book written devoted to "carterism's". He is the opposite of bush when it comes to public speaking.

That's so bizarre. Maybe he thought there were two Ls, nucllear, and it was the Spanish pronunciation, like tortilla?

:sarcasm:

That drives me up the wall, too, but I'll tell you what's worse - the people who know better and actually do find it charming. There are more of them than I care to think about.

it makes me sick beyond belief, there's nothing worse than ignorance, feigned or not, and ESPECIALLY over this particular word!!

Shit, if it were "bananas" or something completely innocuous, maybe I wouldn't care as much, he could wallow in his own filthy puddle of stupidity.

But for crying out loud, *this* particular word has some serious meaning, now more than ever.

Mispronouncing it shows his contempt for science, pure and simple.

school in the south.

It's always been a code to me, that the speaker is either military or southern or both. It's a cultivated barbarism by those groups.

It's not quite as much of a twit giveaway as either "joolery" or "reality" for "jewelry" or "realty."

Don't want to disrespect the "military" as a whole, but in some ways this doesn't surprise me.

I worked around guys that did the guidance systems for ICBMs, and worked at NORAD/Cheyenne Mountain for a while, where "nuclear" often entered the conversation.

those Hooked on Phonics tapes. :dunce:

stupidity, ignorance and illiteracy; of spitting in the face of intellectuals (especially scientists); of reveling in the Abrahamic doctrines of "god's chosen" and "might makes right"; of slyly and obliquely displaying the Klever Klan Kostume of bigotry against academics and the French: the schoolyard bully who says "I won't say it right and you can't make me" -- and, yes, it makes me gnash my teeth every time I hear it: the emperor of the world and he can't even pronounce the weapon with which he intends to annihilate us all.

But he isn't feeble-minded -- not by a long shot. He is the most dangerously predatory, viciously sociopathic head-of-state in American history; his Bush-is-a-moron scam is a maliciously clever ploy directly derived from the Christian belief that "the smartest thing the Devil ever did was convince people he doesn't exist" modified accordingly: the smartest thing Bush ever did was convince us he is an idiot.

but I never see even one whit of evidence, never ever ever (I mean, of the words that come out of his mouth).

I have never known a bright person who could hide their intelligence completely and always. It would have to be the devil himself to pull that off. And I'm not sayin' it's not.

that is, that Islamic theocracy in Iraq, ethnic cleansing in New Orleans and genocide via the Medicare Prescription Drug Lord Benefit are all expressions of clandestine policy (which they surely are since they clearly express Big Business intent) -- then the picture instantly becomes terrifyingly clear.

_________
Edit: typo.

I believe he's evil incarnate, but I doubt I'll ever be convinced that he's intelligent.

I believe that this destruction of our country is intentional, and that there are actual intelligent masterminds calling the shots. I will never believe that Bush is that person.

achievement." I believe you are right there are even more malevolent masterminds behind him, but he was raised from birth to be part of the malevolence: in a particularly grotesque way, an American version of Louis XVI.

the submarine force at that, we were threatened with being slapped if we ever pronounced it like that.

And that was back in the early 70s.

That's the way people who can't read pronounce it. I was amused how MacNeil/Leherer had a right wing shill on about a week ago who insisted pronouncing it that way, when you could tell he knew it sounded stupid.

I've never ever seen anyone challenged publicly. Why?

Don't shoot me - I'm just the messenger on this one. But it's considered rude to correct other people's speech.

And I think most of the time, it is rude and snarky and elitist.

But not in this case. In this case, I'd like to see him called on it. I'd like someone to ask him "Why, fercryinoutloud, is a college graduate so proud of being too ignorant to correctly pronounce one of the scariest words of our time?" and while they're at it, I'd like them to ask "George, really now, I mean seriously, about that accent. Isn't it time to stop faking it? You know, people do notice that Jeb doesn't have one."

No shooting here

He can change the pronunciation to anything he feels like....So...he just decreed it henceforth!(See? He just has to declassify the English Language!)

Is Howard Dean an educated doctor?

"Anes-TEE-sia" for anesthesia.

Its not spelled that way and my dictionery says its not pronounced that way. I hear it more and more.

Jimmy Carter mispronounces 'nuclear' the same way.

Nuke-U-Liar

maybe he thinks

nukular = popular

He's been told and won't (or can't) change. :shrug:

it morphed into NEW--CUE--LER

and that's how it did it...sounded too much alike for simple minds to grasp