Baffle-Gab Thesauraus

As any self-respecting bureaucrat knows, it is bad form indeed to use a single, simple word when six or seven obfuscating ones will do.

But where is the Washington phrasemaker to turn if he is hung up for what Horace called "words a foot and a half long"? Simple. Just glance at the Systematic Buzz Phrase Projector, or S.B.P.P.

The S.B.P.P. has aptly obscure origins but appears to come from a Royal Canadian Air Force listing of fuzzy phrases. It was popularized in Washington by Philip Broughton, a U.S. Public Health Service official, who circulated it among civil servants and businessmen. A sort of mini-thesaurus of bafflegab, it consists of a three-column list of 30 overused but appropriately portentous words. Whenever a GS-14 or deputy assistant secretary needs an opaque phrase, he need only think of a three-digit number --any one will do as well as the next--and select the corresponding "buzz words" from the three columns. For example, 257 produces "systematized logistical projection," which has the ring of absolute authority and means absolutely nothing. Broughton's bafflegab guide:

A B C

0) Integrated Management Options

1) Total Organizational Flexibility

2) Systematized Monitored Capability

3) Parallel Reciprocal Mobility

4) Functional Digital Programming

5) Responsive Logistical Concept

6) Optional Transitional Time-Phase

7) Synchronized Incremental Projection

8) Compatible Third-Generation Hardware

9) Balanced Policy Contingency

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