Slime Mold Beetles named in honor of Bush, Cheney and Rummy

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05145/509748.stm

Thanks to a couple of administration-admiring entomologists, now President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld have slime-mold beetles named in their honor.

We assume it was meant as a compliment.

Burdened with the task of naming 65 newly discovered species of slime-mold beetles, entomologists Quentin Wheeler and Kelly B. Miller decided to recognize the national leaders in a different kind of way. The famous beetles are Agathidium bushi, Agathidium cheneyi and Agathidium rumsfeldi.

The first word in each name is the genus of a new species. The second word ends in "i" when named after a person. The last names of the person or persons who describe a species is added as a third part of the name; so in this case each beetle also has Wheeler and Miller tacked on.

<snip>

But there are millions of Americans, say about half the electorate, who believe the designation is appropriate for less flattering reasons.

If I was a slime mold beetle I'd be pissed to be named after these slimey Repukes.

[kliljedahl]

1. I thought it was the other way around

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