All the epidemiologists and politicians are talking about flattening the curve, by which they don’t mean– at least not necessarily – reducing the total area under the curve, i.e. reducing the number of people who’ll eventually contract Covid 19. Even… Read More ›
rhetoric
LESS IS MORE
If you want to know whether you’ve been reporting or commenting, count your adjectives and adverbs. The most effective commentary comes across as reporting, because it lets the facts speak for themselves. If they can’t, and so they have to… Read More ›
THE RHETORICIAN AND THE PHILOSOPHER
A Janus word is one that means one thing but also its opposite. Example: sanction. There are word-pairs that sound like they mean the opposite but don’t, like flammable and inflammable. And then there are word-pairs that sound like they… Read More ›
THE SUMMA POLITICA
I’d like to buy the world a Coke. I imagine you would too, though perhaps we’d both make it something a little lower in sugar. Unfortunately, making the world a better place for some people, even for the vast majority… Read More ›