PUMA

An acronym for "party unity my ass," this term was the rallying cry of Clinton supporters who backed her candidacy even after many party leaders called for consensus around Obama in order to ensure a unified Democratic front going into the general election. As Barrett of doubletongued.org points out, PUMAs hoped to bring the Clinton-Obama fight "to a head-to-head smackdown vote at the [Democratic] convention." Instead, Clinton threw her support to Obama well before the convention. This word, which disproportionately described female voters, recalls TIME's 2007 buzzword of the year: cougar, i.e., an older woman seeking younger men.

TIME parses the top buzzwords of 2008:

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