Nor Will We Support the Rumor That Bill Wears Thongs

Quote:  “We aren’t going to get in the middle of a disagreement between the Clintons and someone who was once one of their biggest supporters.” Robert Gibbs, Barack Obama’s campaign spokesman.

Figure of Speech:  apophasis (a-PAH-pha-sis), the deny- it- then- say- it figure.  From the Greek, meaning “denial.”

Media mogul David Geffen, who used to be a big Clinton donor, now supports Barack Obama.  Geffen trashed both Clintons in an interview with Maureen Dowd, the New York Times’ catty columnist, saying Senator Clinton’s refusal to apologize for her Iraq War vote was “typical of Hillary.”  He went on to imply that Bill remains a horndog.  Pow!

Hillary’s spokesman grabbed his rhetorical light saber and went after — not Geffin, but Obama.  “The politics of trash!” cried Clinton flack Phil Singer. Wham!

Then Obama mouthpiece Robert Gibbs  stepped into the fray by denying he was stepping into the fray.  His quote is a fine apophasis, in which the orator makes a point by denying he’s making it.  It’s a delicious form of political irony that makes you look objective while you’re anything but.

Let the 2008 Democratic Civility Campaign begin!

Snappy Answer:  “With neutrality like that, who needs attack ads?”

A Fine Upstanding Liar

Quote:  “Kids learn two messages:  ‘Always tell the truth,’ and the other is, ‘Not really.’”  Robert Feldman, a social psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, quoted in the Washington Post.

Figure of Speech:  equivocation (e-quiv-o-CA-tion), the figure of lying but not really.  From the Latin, meaning “to call equal.”

Dr. Feldman claims that your average person tells a lie every 5 minutes.  The most popular people fib every 50 seconds.  How can that be?  Figaro has an answer.

The psychologist’s syntax may be a little dicey, but much of what he describes counts as equivocation, a figure of circumlocution — the art of speaking around a subject.  Kids learn this pretty early.  “Parents venerate Washington and Lincoln,” Feldman says, “but also tell their children there are instances you should not be honest:  ‘Tell your grandmother you like the gift even though you really don’t.’ “ 

Now, your brighter kid will try to split the difference by equivocating — saying something technically true in a way that’s meant to deceive.  Is this lying? That depends on what your definition of is is.

Figaro expects that those noble sorts who lie the least tend to focus on the past and present, where the truth sits unassailable.  Arguments that use these tenses are the most susceptible to anger, because they focus on blame (“Who used up the toothpaste?”) and values (“A good wife doesn’t let the toothpaste run out.”)

As Figaro explains in his book, the most productive arguments — and the most popular people — focus on the future.  (“How are we going to keep the toothpaste from running out?”)  Since we can only guess what will happen in the future, the truth lacks the high standing that it has in the other tenses.

We would never encourage you to lie, of course.  But taking a short detour around the truth now and then (say, every 50 seconds) can lead to happy marriages and well-ordered nations.

Snappy Answer:  “Figaro has never told a lie.  Except for this one.”

The Salmon Suggest a Different Kettle of Fish

Thought you might like the latest question on Ask Figaro:

Dear Figaro,
Please tell me where “different kettle of fish” comes from.
Jarrad

Dear Jarrad,

Sigh.  Mucking out the origins of idioms is not Figaro’s bag, baby (to coin an idiom).  But this one is interesting. 

A “kettle of fish” once referred to a fancy riverside picnic (the original river was the Tweed, in Britain) where jolly al frescans tossed live salmon into boiling pots of water.

“Different kettle of fish” is a variation of “fine kettle of fish” or “rare kettle of fish.”  They’re an ironic way of saying, “This is no picnic.”

Put that in your pot and boil it.

Fig.

Down on the Pharm

Quote:  “The drug dealer is us.”   John Walters, White House drug czar, quoted in Time.

Figure of Speech: antiptosis (an-tip-TOE-sis), the pronoun changer.  From the Greek, meaning “case change.”

Teens continue to drop marijuana for prescription drugs, according to a federal report.  It’s a matter of convenience:  instead of a sketchy street corner manned by lawless entrepreneurs, your psychotropic teen can rely on the medicine cabinet, courtesy of Mom and Dad.

Figaro tips his figurative hat to the drug czar and his nice antiptosis, a figure of speech that switches a pronoun from the subjective case (I, we) to the objective (me, us) or vice versa.  “We are the drug dealer” is more correct but less effective, as Tarzan must have known when he introduced his self to Jane.  (Yes, we meant to do that.)

The czar borrows his particular antiptosis from the comic strip Pogo, which portrayed philosophical swamp creatures during the sixties and seventies.  “We have met the enemy,” Pogo said famously, “and he is us.”

Snappy Answer:  “Really? Got any Darvon?”

Smile When You Run That.

Quote: “It’s a public policy issue of how much surveillance creep we will tolerate in the 21st century.”  Howard Bass, a lawyer who got Minneapolis’ red-light camera system overturned, in USA Today. 

Figure of Speech: epiphonema (e-pih-pho-NEE-ma), the strategic sound bite.  From the Greek, meaning “speak out upon.”

Scientists have released research showing that intersection surveillance cameras really do stop people from running red lights — by 96 percent in a Philadelphia study.  When the cameras were removed in Virginia Beach, violations tripled.  So the issue is all about reducing traffic accidents, right?  Or about getting drivers to obey the law?

Neither, says attorney Bass.  It’s about civil liberties.

Figaro loves the rhetorical punch of “surveillance creep,” which Bass borrowed from the military’s “mission creep.”  The lawyer’s version is a very cool, if slippery slopish, epiphonema — a figure of thought that proves the antiquity of the sound bite.  Long before gel-coiffed pols preened on Fox, the ancients summed up arguments in a memorable passage or phrase.

There’s no better way to label an issue.  Who is pro-accident?  Who’s openly anti-law?  Nobody.  But few people other than Dick Cheney are for surveillance creep, either.

Master the epiphonema, and the world is your rhetorical oyster.

Snappy Answer:  “What about lawyer creep?”

Let 'Er Rip

Quote:  “Chainsaw Drew.”  Nickname of Harvard’s first female president, Drew Gilpin Faust.

Figure of Speech:  metonymy (meh-TON-ih-mee), the quality-name swap.  From the Greek, meaning “name change.”

Harvard won a trifecta with Dr. Faust:  she’s a woman, a hard-nosed manager, and the owner of a scary name.  The new president succeeds the rhetorically club-footed Larry Summers.  (See Figaro’s take on him here.)

The media describe  Dr. Faust as a gender pioneer, but we suspect that Harvard’s exasperated governing body is more interested in her ability to control the university’s $3 billion budget and its wild herd of academic cats.  Dr. Faust comes from the Radcliffe Institute, where she cut a quarter of the staff, thus earning the moniker “Chainsaw Drew.”

The nickname qualifies as a metonymy, which in turn counts as one of the central tropes, or figures that say one thing and mean another.  (Its siblings are the metaphor, synecdoche, and irony.)  This particular swapper takes a quality associated with a subject — cost-cutter — and applies it to a name or thing — Chainsaw.

Apparently, Faust prefers her gory nickname to the gender label.   Stop calling me “woman president,” the woman president insists, using a syncrisis:  “I’m not the woman president of Harvard, I’m the president of Harvard.”  But as Figaro notes in his book, one should not counter a label by repeating it.  The woman president (okay, we’ll stop) is simply strengthening those  synapses in the brain that link “woman” with “president of Harvard.”

Snappy Answer:  “Nice Faustian choice.”