Dewberries: Here's your license to insult

Name-calling is nothing new, but during any political season, it's in especially high style.

So in honor of both traditional insult-flinging and this modern age of verbal warfare, we summon the spirit - and the lexicon - of The Bard to guide us.

With the assistance of Dr. Bill Prosser at Coeur d'Alene Charter Academy and his astute students, we have acquired the Shakespeare Insult Kit. The kit provides three columns of insulting words employed by The Great One. Insulters are directed to select one insult per column, in any order one wishes, but each insult must be prefaced with "Thou."

While the terms range between biting and outright disgusting, there isn't an acknowledged cussword in the bunch. What's really cool is that your political adversary will understand he/she is being insulted, but won't know the full extent of your invective until retiring to study the complete works of Bill Shakespeare.

We don't have room to share with you the contents of those three columns (you can find them by searching Shakespeare Insult Kit online). However, just to get your insult limbs loosened up before engaging in political debate with your neighbor, here are some of the combinations one of the Charter students provided. It is our hope that employing this insult manual will actually cause verbal combatants to laugh out loud, forget their differences and venture forth to yon tavern for mutual refreshment.

Insulters, on your marks, get ready...

Thou saucy, common-kissing flirt-gill

Thou fobbing, flap-mouthed foot-licker

Thou lumpish, milk-livered giglet

Thou beslubbering, beetle-brained strumpet

Thou yeasty, toad-spotted maggot pie

Thou goatish, folly-fallen hugger mugger

Thou mangled, motley-minded flap-dragon

Thou craven, crook-pated canker-blossom

Thou artless, bat-fowling dewberry

Thou churlish, clay-brained boar-pig

Thou paunchy, rump-fed lout

Thou surly, guts-griping harpy

Thou frothy, fly-bitten fustilarian

Thou roguish, pox-marked coxcomb

Thou unmuzzled, sheep-biting miscreant

A fustilarian, by the way, is a scoundrel, and a giglet was, in Shakespeare's day, a wanton woman.

In conclusion, this is as good a time as any to admit that we have, on more than one occasion, been artless, bat-fowling dewberries. Fortunately, we got better.