Cliche Turnover
by digby
Walter Shapiro has written a piece I wish I’d written: he’s compiled a list of the most shopworn political cliches and explained their origins:
According to my rough calculations, our political tongue — the language of campaigns, elections and, yes, governing — is sustained by an army of maybe 10,000 professional babblers. They are the Quoted (White House officials, members of Congress and big-time candidates), the Quote Creators (speechwriters and press-release purveyors) and the Quote Users (reporters, columnists and TV correspondents).
And taken as a group — with some notable exceptions — they display all the originality of second-graders telling knock-knock jokes.
Think I am exaggerating?
read on … I particularly like this one:
Maverick: John McCain’s only lasting accomplishment since the 2008 election has been single-handedly to destroy this great 19th century American word that honored Thomas Maverick’s refusal to brand his cattle. William Safire in his indispensable “Safire’s New Political Dictionary” defined a maverick as “one who is unorthodox in his political views and disdainful of party loyalty, who bears no man’s brand.”During his 2000 presidential primary campaign, McCain appeared to be the personification of such a maverick as he challenged Republican orthodoxy on tax cuts, campaign reform and the divine right of George W. Bush to the GOP nomination. A Google search of book references shows much greater use of the word maverick when McCain was running for president than when “Maverick” starring James Garner was a hit 1950s TV Western. A NEXIS search unearthed 1,088 media references describing McCain as a maverick in 2000 alone.The media mob (myself included) stuck with this sobriquet far too long as McCain morphed into an off-the-rack Republican senator. Even when McCain claimed in a Newsweek interview before this year’s Arizona GOP primary, “I never considered myself a maverick,” the magazine insisted on using as its subhead: “A maverick fights for his political life — and his soul.” McCain’s amnesiac denial of his unbranded political history (a 2008 McCain campaign ad proclaimed him — you can guess what’s coming — “the original maverick“) makes a mockery of the political legacy of Tom Maverick.The next time a national political figure shimmers with party-be-damned independence, we should dust off that other evocative 19th century political coinage — mugwump. Derived from an Algonquin word, mugwumps were originally Republicans who bolted the GOP in 1884 to protest the nomination of James Blaine for the presidency. Mugwump will become a particularly useful term in 2012 if the Republican Party fractures over the presidential candidacy of Sarah Palin — McCain’s other enduring contribution.
Now, I like a good cliche. At times they can be very useful ways of communicating something quickly and evocatively. And I think the blogosphere is doing a lot to modernize the political cliche. But if I hear Gloria Borger thespit out the word “pork” one more time I’m going to scream.
And let’s not even get started on the sports metaphors…
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