I can’t stand this kind of name change, because it’s not really a name change. There’s a certain cowardice to going from American Telephone and Telegraph to AT&T to just ATT. Or from British Petroleum to B.P. to just BP. Or Kentucky Fried Chicken to KFC. It’s as if these companies want to keep their old names while claiming to have new ones. I can see why this works in a committee meeting. “It’s the best of both worlds! Modern and hip while maintaining our ties to the past!”

But it doesn’t fool anyone; it just confuses a lot of people and gives corporate spinners a talking point to hide behind. If you want to change your name, change it. But don’t pretend you’re something new when you go by the same initials you’ve been going by for decades or generations. I mean, how lame would it be if NR claimed we are no longer National Review but simply NR? What would be accomplished by that? Though it is shocking that the NAACP still clings to its acronym.

The worst example of this pseudo-acronym inflation (PAI) is the SAT, which once stood for the Scholastic Assessment Test and the Scholastic Aptitude Test but now stands for nothing, which is why it’s apparently called the SAT Reasoning Test (an old G-File on this, if you’re interested). If you can’t even decide what your own initials stand for, why should we take anything you say too seriously?

JG out.