Posted on 07/19/2012 9:39:16 PM PDT by struggle
I hope you all wont mind this vanity, but my father and I were working (yeah, I know Obama's trying hard to put an end to that), and we started talking about how cable news talking heads have adopted repetitious cliches in their constant partisan battles on the tube.
Here are the top five I DESPISE: 1. At the end of the day... 2. Look,... 3. Speaking truth to power... 4. It is what is is... (a true exercise in tautology) 5. Literally... (when they're figuratively explaining a metaphor or hypothetical)
I can see why political discourse made George Orwell's blood boil so much. The linguistic bumpers that these talking heads punctuate their message with parse the core message to the point of making it meaningless.
Never an utterance of the "Far Left Wing"
The Soft Pro Choice vs. the Hard Anti-abortion
I haven’t heard this phrase in a while, but I found “Saturday night special,” referring to a pistol, to be particularly annoying. A “Saturday night special” must be a .38 special equipped with a timer that only allows it to be used between the hours of 6 PM and 12 midnight on Saturdays.
Often seen here: “freedom of speech”, “innocent until proven guilty”.
The non-apology apology, “I’m sorry if anyone was offended.”
>>#5 Misusing “literally” worst offender: Sean Hannity
That’s exactly who we were laughing at. Hannity will say dumb crap like “Obama is literally smashing the small business owner with a baseball bat” or some variant and hope someday that he’ll have an aide in-studio with a 2 sided sign that will show either “figurative” or “literal” so he knows when to use it.
Obama is really bad about using “literally” when he is off-prompter; his speech-writer never uses the word.
One thing that really impressed me is Rush Limbaugh. He is, outside of his oft repeated “official cliches”, probably one of the most verbose and varied speakers. He used braggadocious a couple days ago and I laughed my ass off. Ive never heard ANY speaker use that word in conversation before.
Opponents of President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative ballistic missile defense program were always calling it “Star Wars”—even though it had nothing to do with stars and was designed to deter wars.
“You’re a great American”—Sean Hannity
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"As everyone knows.." |
Both sides of the political spectrum are guilty of overusng “McCarthyism” to the point that it has become shopworn.
That is my Top Despised Phrase...it means "I give up - you must give up - it is what it is" - I go into a rage with the utterance of that phrase....
“Since it’s an ongoing investigation, we have no comment at this time.”
“Let me be clear” & its variations. Seems I haven’t heard that one as much lately, but it used to be a frequent offender.
"absolutely"
Clinton lied, no one died.
Dittos. A completely unhelpful phrase. It always infuriates me too, but I didn’t realize why until reading your comment.
Yeah, right.
I.
“the American people.”
I must have commented on that 20+ times to my wife and others. They are sick of me drawing their attention to it.
Why not just “Americans?” I think your last (3rd) explanation is right on.
Not a cliche, but notice the most intelligent president ever saying “fer” instead of “for.”
“Hitler!!!”
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