Word: spinned
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Both Charles and the Queen have instigated shakeups in their staffs and their activities. The Queen is bringing in a new director of communications at Buckingham Palace, and Charles appointed a new deputy private secretary, Mark Bolland, who has extensive media contacts and is a friend of Blair spin doctor Peter Mandelson. The Queen has taken to making George Bush-like visits to such places as supermarkets, McDonald's, even a pub; bucking some 800 centuries of tradition, she has also agreed to do away with primogeniture (in which the eldest son receives the title in favor of an older...
...causes and loyalty to the truth are all virtues and often create terrible conflicts. People deserve tolerance in trying to resolve these conflicts. In criticizing Clinton for lying, his former aides are telling the truth, which is admirable. But it is also suspiciously convenient. Having risen to prominence by spinning for Clinton, they are now selling their disenchantment at Clinton's having gone a spin too far. In the immortal words of Liberace, they are crying all the way to the bank...
...another way, they are still spinning--for themselves this time. And, as Mickey Kaus pointed out in Slate in January, they're doing it without "a nanosecond of contrition," at least in public, for their former spin on Clinton's behalf. But then consistency is a hobgoblin of the pre-spin mentality. Although the truth about Monica, or something close to it, was forced out of President Clinton, we are still in the golden age of spin. Spin as a metaphor derived from "putting a spin on the ball," and meant putting your own twist on the truth...
...Even as spinning has become more egregious, the general attitude toward it has mellowed. Once it was disreputable. Then it became accepted, traditional, expected. Now it is positively glamorous. James Carville and Mary Matalin have become famous and wealthy by flaunting themselves as spin doctors. Every time you think the beyond-egregious Dick Morris has finally said something so preposterous that TV bookers will shy away, his appearances only increase...
...First, the very notion of spin implies a kind of moral neutrality in which any issue is subject to a variety of interpretations, all of equal legitimacy. My spin is that two plus two is four; your spin is that two plus two is five. After this break, we'll be joined by a woman who says that two plus two is three. Second, like drug addiction it gets worse over time because we build up a tolerance. Artifice that seemed outrageous during the Carter Administration seems routine today--not because the Clinton folks are inherently less honest, but just...