{"id":17853,"date":"2016-11-07T23:33:02","date_gmt":"2016-11-07T23:33:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=17853"},"modified":"2016-11-07T23:33:02","modified_gmt":"2016-11-07T23:33:02","slug":"punditry-produces-its-share-of-annoying-phraseswords","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=17853","title":{"rendered":"Punditry produces its share of annoying phrases\/words"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Thank goodness this election season is coming to a close.<\/p>\n

The next one is likely to commence the moment we know who the next president will be. Then what? We’ll get a fresh dose of annoying phrases and\/or words from the punditry and political class to which we listen on cable and broadcast news programs.<\/p>\n

I’ve collected a number of these words and phrases over the years.<\/p>\n

My newest member of the annoying phrase pantheon is “baked in.” Pundits are saying that voters’ opinions of the two major-party presidential candidates are baked in<\/em>, which is a kind of shorthand for saying that their minds won’t change … no matter what we learn about the candidates.<\/p>\n

A good friend of mine is annoyed by the word “pivot.” We hear that one when politicians seek either to (a) change the subject of a discussion or (b) change his or her mind on a public policy issue.<\/p>\n

Let’s not forget “double down.” Mark Halperin and John Heilmann — two of the best political journalists in the business — wrote two “Double Down” books chronicling the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections. When a politician doubles down<\/em>, that means he or she is ratcheting up the rhetoric on a policy statement that more than likely has been met with a negative response..<\/p>\n

Don’t they ever “triple” or “quadruple” down?<\/p>\n

My all-time favorite pundit phrase — which politicians of all stripes have adopted — is “at the end of the day.”<\/p>\n

I ought to initiate a new drinking game. Take a\u00a0swig of hooch every time you hear a politician or pundit say “at the end of the day.” I listen for this phrase whenever I am watching a TV news discussion.<\/p>\n

I have a theory about why pols and pundits are so fond of “at the end of the day.” It’s a set-up phrase. It is meant to convey an aura of wisdom for the very next thing that’s coming out of the mouth of the pol or the pundit.<\/p>\n

“Well, Chris, here’s my thought on that. At the end of the day, we are going to learn that the sun will set in the west tonight.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Do you get my drift? When the TV smart guys use “at the end of the day,” they mean to make themselves sound smarter, more urbane, more sophisticated than they really are.<\/p>\n

We’ve heard a lot of this kind of rhetoric over many years. It annoys the daylights out of me.<\/p>\n

I’m going to settle in the for the night. At the end of the day, I’ll be sure to double down on doing something worthwhile\u00a0this evening before I pivot from my baked-in routine.<\/p>\n\n

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Thank goodness this election season is coming to a close. The next one is likely to commence the moment we know who the next president will be. Then what? We’ll get a fresh dose of annoying phrases and\/or words from the punditry and political class to which we listen on cable and broadcast news programs. … Continue reading Punditry produces its share of annoying phrases\/words<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,13,14],"tags":[1546,2978,3652,6662],"class_list":["post-17853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media-news","category-national-news","category-political-news","tag-election-2016","tag-media","tag-politicians","tag-pundits"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17853"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17853\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17855,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17853\/revisions\/17855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}