title: How to use `assign()` or `get()` on specific named column of a dataframe?
body: <p>Is there a way to assign a value to a specific column within a data frame? e.g.,</p>
  
  <pre><code>dat2 = data.frame(c1 = 101:149, VAR1 = 151:200)    
  j = "dat2[,"VAR1"]"  ## or, j = "dat2[,2]"
  assign(j,1:50)
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The approach above doesn't work.  Neither does this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>j = "dat2"
  assign(get(j)[,"VAR1"],1:50)
  </code></pre>