How words are used can be crucial to understanding and misunderstanding the world around us. The media lexicon is saturated with certain buzz phrases. They're popular -- but what do they mean?

"The use of words is to express ideas," James Madison wrote. "Perspicuity, therefore, requires not only that the ideas should be distinctly formed, but that they should be expressed by words distinctly and exclusively appropriate to them." More than two centuries later, surveying the wreckage of public language in political spheres, you might be tempted to murmur: "Dream on, Jim."

With 2002 nearing its end in the midst of great international tension, here's a sampling of some top U.S. media jargon:

* "Pre-emptive"
This adjective represents a kind of inversion of the Golden Rule: "Do violence onto others just in case they might otherwise do violence onto you." Brandished by Uncle Sam, we're led to believe that's a noble concept.

* "Weapons of mass destruction"
They're bad unless they're good. Globally, the U.S. government leads

Disturbing details of the US-led War on Terror have emerged recently. These details continue to expose the complicity of our anti-terror allies: Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. First, the Congressional report linking Saudi funds to terrorist activities further shows the two faces of Saudis in the US-led War on Terror. Then, as reported in an article in NY Times, Pakistan's proliferation of nuclear technology to North Korea in exchange for North Korea's missile technology questions Pakistan's shadowy role as a front-line state in the War on Terror.

The North Korea - Pakistan nuclear nexus is a major threat to the international security. By allowing Pakistan to continue proliferation of nuclear weapons technology to North Korea in exchange for missile technology, we may be undermining our own security as well as that of our democratic allies, namely, South Korea, Japan, India and Russia. Communist China, which borders both Pakistan and North Korea and has been known to supply key weapons technologies to both her rogue neighbors, has been an active participant in this game of deception.

The weapons inspection team massing in Baghdad under the indomitable Hans Blix is possibly the first such unit to be graced, if that's the word, with an experienced torturer. The Washington Post set the ball rolling last Thursday with a story by John Grimaldi to the effect that Harvey John "Jack" McGeorge of Woodbridge, Va., then in New York waiting to be sent to Iraq as a munitions analyst, is a figure of consequence in the world of BDSM, aka bondage, domination and sado-masochism.

Co-founder and past president of Black Rose, a Washington-area pansexual S&M group, and the former chairman of the board of the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom, McGeorge is also a founding officer of the Leather Leadership Conference Inc., which "produces training sessions for current and potential leaders of the sadomasochism/leather/fetish community," according to its Web site.

Grimaldi noted that "several Web sites describe McGeorge's training seminars, which involve various acts conducted with knives and ropes." McGeorge was interviewed in person by Blix and joined the team as a temporary staff member in December 2001.

Listeners don't get much news these days if they tune into commercial radio stations. Coverage of national and global events is scant at best, while local news -- once the pride of many AM radio stations -- is now an endangered species. The remaining community news is usually the "rip and read" variety from wire services.

But let's give credit where it's due. In the United States, thousands of radio outlets are doing a good job of gathering one particular type of news. The coverage is often meticulous and dependable as stations devote substantial resources to providing reliable up-to-the-minute information: If you want the latest news about traffic, in all kinds of weather, turn on the radio.

Using an array of helicopters, mobile phones and other assorted information relay systems, radio stations keep listeners posted on vehicular fender-benders, glitches, snarls and alternative routes. Where I live, a local "all news" CBS affiliate -- owned by the giant Infinity broadcasting conglomerate -- hypes "traffic and weather together" every 10 minutes, round the clock. And the quality of the traffic reports is impressive.

So let's join Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology Edward C. "Pete" Aldridge at a recent Pentagon press briefing, where he's addressing concerns about the Pentagon's bold new plan to have Admiral John Poindexter personally review exactly what you bought in Safeway last week and all the dirty movies you ordered up in Motel 6 last time you were on the road.

Poindexter, you'll recall, is the bespectacled seadog who, as one of Reagan's National Security chieftains, instrumented another bold effort in synergy, later known as Iran/Contra, which involved shuffling money and guns along the axis of evil from Iran to the Nicaraguan contras in defiance of U.S. laws at the time. Poindexter got nailed for lying to Congress but was later pardoned.