I’m happy for the Edwards endorsement,* but share the distress of those concerned about sweetie:
Our candidate is the smoothest orator in the recent history of American politics. Hillary Clinton is usually the one who misspeaks. We’re giving bloggers and newspapers too much ammunition. Especially when this is the second time he’s called a woman sweetie on the campaign trail.
Striking sweetie from our candidate’s vocabulary is an admittedly modest measure, but this is linguistic change we can believe in.
Via Ann Bartow.
*Chris Crain at first saw a gender slight in that endorsement but returns in an update to conclude that he saw, instead, “a subtle hint to Hillaryland and her supporters that his heart isn’t in it.”
UPDATE: Obama apologized in a voicemail for the reporter:
That’s a bad habit of mine. I do it sometimes with all kinds of people. I mean no disrespect and so I am duly chastened on that front. Feel free to call me back.
The emailer who forwarded the statement is generously forgiving, “for someone who is the father of two girls, it’s probably a word as natural as ‘Hello.'”