Can You Libel A Scaramucci? Can You Catch A Cloud And Pin It Down?

I would like to take a moment to appreciate a new word in our collective vocabulary:  scaramucci. It seems likely that eventually this word will be as oft-used as the word fuck simply because the word is so versatile.

A scaramucci is a unit of time, in between a week and a fortnight.

A scaramucci is a sad little man trying desperately to cling to the wispy shreds of dignity left to him after a spectacular self-inflicted public failure.

A scaramucci is a failed writer who can't get a publishing contract.

Your coworker who constantly undermines you could be called a scaramucci.

It's a useful word for road incidents: "I thought maybe his wife was giving birth and that's why he was driving like a scaramucci."

A scaramucci is a person who lacks the range but is blithely unaware of that fact.

You know that guy at the lunch counter who thinks if he holds up the whole line to flirt a bit he'll get free guacamole and then gets mad at the cashier if he has to pay for his food in full, holding up the whole place further? That guy is a scaramucci. (This works equally well in other situations; the little black dress girl holding everything up because she thinks she's way hotter than she needs to be to hop the line for the club is a scaramucci. The old lady who's arguing with the cashier over expired coupons even after the cashier says fuck it and just puts in the fifty fucking cents themselves to make this woman leave is a scaramucci.)

A scaramucci is a Black Knight sort, the kind of person who might still challenge you to a duel when you've taken off both his arms already.

That guy at the bar who gets super-entertaining on his third lager and starts yelling insults at the Queen or the President or whoever is on the news behind the bar is also a scaramucci.

A person who has become unhinged by ambition is a scaramucci.

A person who is trying to suck their own cock is not a scaramucci.

Someone who chaotically fails upward might be a scaramucci.

Mostly, someone who's got thinner skin than any other public figure in the nation, someone who can dish it out but can't take it, someone with such a thin veneer of self-esteem that they practically exude mercurial instability: that person would be a scaramucci.

It's a hell of a good word.

Many thanks to Anthony Scaramucci for being the bloke he is and threatening to sue his alma mater's student newspaper for calling him “an unethical opportunist and who exuded the highest degree of disreputability.” I had been searching for a decent word that was as flexible as the word fuck and here one is, fully formed.

Oh, and also? you might call an unethical opportunist who exudes the highest degree of disreputability a scaramucci.

[ newsweek] ]

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