Actually, the argument is stronger in the other direction.  "Ghost" connotes more of a "soul", a spiritual essence ... whereas God has no essence but merely existence.  So the term spirit better captures the notion of an existence without essence.  In fact, the Latin term anima would be closer to the notion of "Ghost" ... and yet the Church does not use the phrase anima sancta (which would correspond most closely to "Holy Ghost").

ALL the Romance languages (languages derived from Latin -- Italian, Spanish, French, etc.) use their variant on the word "spirit", and the same "imprecision" would apply to them, as their word for spirit has the same broad range of meaning in their respective languages.

Your argument is not with me, but with the translators and creators of the Duoay-Rheims.  They used 'Holy Ghost' over 90% of the time...not by accident.

Yet Ghost still has fewer meanings than 'spirit', so it's still more precise and a better choice, even if less precise than in the past.

I agree that was not, strictly speaking, modernism.  But it was part of a general movement based on a belief that the Church needed to be updated and improved - the aggiornamento of Vatican II.  

Any change made around that time, even ones that are not intrinsically wrong, is going to fall under suspicion.  I think that is reasonable enough, given the  amount of wrong thinking happening then.

I see this as another one of those issues comparable to the "meat sacrificed to idols" controversy of the New Testament. Even if there is nothing wrong with saying "Holy Spirit" in itself, it is likely to be offensive or scandalous to other trads.  That is a good enough reason to refrain from doing so.

Offensive or scandalous?  Really? 

I see this as another one of those issues comparable to the "meat sacrificed to idols" controversy of the New Testament. Even if there is nothing wrong with saying "Holy Spirit" in itself, it is likely to be offensive or scandalous to other trads.  That is a good enough reason to refrain from doing so.

At MOST it might raise an eyebrow.  It's not even close to the "meat sacrificed to idols" scenario because that was a material participation in idolatry.  I know a guy who says "blessed are you" etc. in the Hail Mary; most people think he's a dolt but that's as far as it goes.  But, by the way, when praying in public, I do say Holy Ghost because I follow whatever convention is being used where I'm at and will not make a scene, a distraction, or disturbance to do the contrary.  I was simply stating my personal preference, all things being the same.  I would have a much harder time praying the Hail Mary with "blessed are you" because I consider that a bit disrespectful.

On a similar note, when receiving Holy Communion in the Eastern Rite, I follow their custom of standing to receive Holy Communion ... because, again, I won't cause a distraction to do the opposite.  Not to mention that kneeling would increase the risk of a mishap/spill due to the manner in which they distribute Holy Communion.  I'm sure that many Traditional Catholics would be aghast.  But kneeling is a decidedly Western custom and standing is not considered disrespectful in the East.  So, when in Rome (I mean in the East), do as the Romans (or Easterns).

I disagree for the reasons stated regarding the existence vs. essence of God.  It may be more circuмscribed in its range of meanings, but that limited range is actually incorrect philosophically and theologically speaking.

My real motive for asking this question was from my own private prayers to God..wondering which would please Him, Ghost or Spirit. 
I have retrained myself to say Ghost as I said before in another post, but some of my prayer books have Spirit and I was finding myself mentally changing it to Ghost because I thought I had to. 
After awhile it had really felt silly to me to keep doing this, but I didn’t want to rely on just my feelings of it. 

Two things:

One:  Before retiring, I worked with many, many Protestants.  In fact, there were few Catholics where I worked.  Virtually all of the Protestants I worked with used the King James Bible exclusively even to the point of claiming that other versions of the Bible were inspired by Satan (especially the "evil" Catholic Bible which, they would tell me, the Church forbid me to read :o).  When referring to the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, they never used, "Holy Ghost."  By the way, the place I worked was the U.S. Army and those Protestants were from throughout the United States.

Two:  Today, I view the Holy Ghost/Holy Spirit issue as more a political question.  A person today who usually uses the term, Holy Ghost, identitifies himself as a Traditional Catholic.  The person who usually uses the term, Holy Spirit, does not identify himself as such, though I would not say that he idenitifies himself as a Protestant or a Novus Ordo Catholic; he merely is clearly not identifying himself to others as a traditional Catholic.

Holy is from "heileger" meaning "holy" in German.
Ghost is from "Geist" meaning "spirit" or "ghost" in German.

Spirit is from the Latin "Spiritus" meaning "spirit" or "ghost".

It's clunky to use one Germanic word and one Latin word. 

Excellent,  it makes sense, who can argue with that?