“ad fontes!”
the strategy consisting in deliberately making a shocking announcement in order to divert attention from a difficulty in which one is embroiled—from the image of throwing a dead cat on the table—first defined in 2013 by Boris Johnson
Read MoreUSA, 1974—the news media’s practice of giving credence to the other side of an opinion or action in order to seem fair, even though that other side is objectionable
Read More
USA, 1973—a euphemism for a lie—coined on 17th June 1973, during the Watergate scandal, by Ronald Lewis Ziegler, President Richard Nixon’s Press Secretary
Read MoreThe Guardian, UK, 23 May 1978—used by one Lionel Bloch to designate—and denounce—the rhetoric employed by the advocates of the communist regimes
Read More
obsession—from Dickens’s ‘David Copperfield’, in which Mr. Dick is unable to write his memoirs because of the intrusive image of King Charles the First’s head
Read MoreMEANINGS – attractive articles of little value or use – practices or beliefs that are superficially or visually appealing but have little real value or worth ORIGIN The noun trumpery, first recorded in the mid-15th century, is from the French noun tromperie, which means deception, trickery. This was one of the original meanings in […]
Read More
word histories 