It's not as elegant as some languages, but neither is it as impenetrable as, say, an economics textbook or the iTunes user agreement.
"We have our own language on Capitol Hill," says Don Ritchie, head of the Senate Historical Office.
That language — the budget terms and political euphemisms that fly freely through the air in Washington, D.C. — often ends up seeping into the nation's discourse.
Reporters and bloggers pick up and spread terms such as "sequester" and "debt ceiling limit." The next thing you know, you just might find yourself using such jargon as you talk with friends about what a mess the country is in. But most people understandably might not be able to tell a COLA from a COBRA. It's primarily Beltway insiders who speak fluent acronym.
"Politics, like any other field, has its own language, its own jargon," says Martin Medhurst, a professor of political science and rhetoric at Baylor University. "It would be an odd field that didn't."
Beltway Berlitz
Match these terms to their correct Washington meaning:
Conference
A) A meeting you hope to sneak out of to play golf.
B) The way the House and Senate align different versions of legislation.
Impoundment
A) What happens to your car after it gets towed.
B) A power presidents had not to spend funds approved by Congress, up until 1974.
Message
A) Something that pops up on your phone.
B) Any thought or idea expressed briefly in a plain or secret language and prepared in a form suitable for transmission by any means of communication.
Oversight
A) Something that has been overlooked.
B) Increased attention to an issue, say, the Benghazi killings.
Reconciliation
A) The course your marriage counselor hopes you'll take.
B) A procedure for matching new budget policies with existing law.
Answers: (B) in every case. The definition for "message" is official Defense Department language. "Oversight" is a trick question, because (B) is correct on Capitol Hill while (A) is correct everywhere else.
— Alan Greenblatt