{"id":22904,"date":"2017-07-06T02:38:35","date_gmt":"2017-07-06T02:38:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=22904"},"modified":"2017-07-06T02:38:35","modified_gmt":"2017-07-06T02:38:35","slug":"declaring-war-on-this-overused-cliche","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=22904","title":{"rendered":"Declaring war on this overused cliche"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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I am declaring a state of war with a phrase that is driving me stark raving mad … I’m tellin’ ya.<\/em><\/p>\n

“At the end of the day” has emerged as the most annoying clich\u00e9 in the modern English language.<\/p>\n

I just watched an interview on MSNBC’s “Last Word” show hosted by Lawrence O’Donnell, one of my favorite TV pundits\/commentators. He didn’t use that phrase. O’Donnell apparently knows better.<\/p>\n

Oh, no. It came from his guests: foreign policy wonk John McLaughlin and Nicholas Kristof, a New York Times columnist who is known for his expertise on Far East issues.<\/p>\n

I heard Kristof drop “at the end of the day” twice in the span of about 15 seconds while responding to a question from O’Donnell. It’s particularly disappointing to hear it come from Kristof who, as a journalist, I am quite certain would never write that clich\u00e9 in one of his NY Times columns.<\/p>\n

(As an aside, I want to share with you that Kristof and I are “homeys” of a sort, as we both grew up in Oregon. I came of age in the Portland suburbs; Kristof grew up in the Willamette Valley.)<\/p>\n

Here’s my theory on “at the end of the day” and its purpose for those who keep using it. It’s a setup phrase. I’ve concluded that whoever uses the phrase to preface a conclusion, it is to lend credence — a sort of gravitas<\/em> — to whatever point the individual is trying to make.<\/p>\n

“At end of the day, I am quite certain you have to stay hydrated during the hottest periods of the summer.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Do you get it?<\/p>\n

I do not yet know how this war I have declared will develop. I don’t have a strategy for waging it. I guess I’ll just start by pledging never to use it in this blog — except to call attention to its annoying quality; I also will pledge never to be caught dead saying it out loud.<\/p>\n

If only these talking heads would toss the phrase into the crapper.<\/p>\n\n

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I am declaring a state of war with a phrase that is driving me stark raving mad … I’m tellin’ ya. “At the end of the day” has emerged as the most annoying clich\u00e9 in the modern English language. I just watched an interview on MSNBC’s “Last Word” show hosted by Lawrence O’Donnell, one of … Continue reading Declaring war on this overused cliche<\/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],"tags":[1026,3155,6600,3360],"class_list":["post-22904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media-news","tag-cliches","tag-msnbc","tag-nicholas-kristof","tag-ny-times"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22904","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=22904"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22904\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22906,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22904\/revisions\/22906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}