Political Usage
In 2000, during a Labor Day event, then candidate George W. Bush made an off-hand remark to his running mate, Dick Cheney, that New York Times reporter Adam Clymer was a "major league asshole." The gaffe was caught on microphone and led to a political advertisement chiding Bush for "using expletives ... in front of a crowd of families," produced for Democratic opponent Al Gore.
In February 2004, American media reported that during a rally of supporters, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called Bush "an asshole" for believing his aides in supporting a coup against Chavez in 2002. The word in the original Spanish was "pendejo", and in news coverage the word was widely, though incorrectly, translated as "asshole"; the meaning of the word varies substantially in Latin America, and in Venezuela its meaning is closer to "fool". The following year, in September, Nightline host Ted Koppel said to Chavez on national television, "I'm going to perhaps shock you a little, but these are your words. You called President Bush an asshole," to which Chavez replied, "I've said various things about him. I don't know if I actually used that word."
Read more about this topic: Asshole
Famous quotes containing the words political and/or usage:
“Cant is always rather nauseating; but before we condemn political hypocrisy, let us remember that it is the tribute paid by men of leather to men of God, and that the acting of the part of someone better than oneself may actually commit one to a course of behaviour perceptibly less evil than what would be normal and natural in an avowed cynic.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“...Often the accurate answer to a usage question begins, “It depends.” And what it depends on most often is where you are, who you are, who your listeners or readers are, and what your purpose in speaking or writing is.”
—Kenneth G. Wilson (b. 1923)