I agree with Merrill Perlman on this:
Journalists seem to love certain words that no one actually uses in normal conversations. Have you remarked on the “acrimonious” divorce your friends are going through? (Almost 300 hits in Nexis in the past month.) How about those “temblors” that have shaken the world recently”? (More than 300 uses in the past month.) Did you ever note that your favorite team has been “beset” by injuries? (Nearly 700 hits.) Have you ever said that you were “slated” for surgery next week? (More than 3,000 hits.)
All of the words are perfectly good English, but people just don’t talk that way. They’re really jargon—non-idiomatic uses of words that rarely appear anywhere but news reports.
Journalism, written or spoken, should be conversational, so it can make a better connection with the audience. Depending on audience, the language can be informal, even slangy. But these words go in the opposite direction
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