That was sent to me by my son Chris, who is quite far along toward his goal of reading a biography of every U.S. President.
In the 22-year history of this blog, I've never used the word "bloviate." Twice, though, I've quoted someone else:
1. My November 1, 2019 post, "An impeachment trial would help Joe Biden — because Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar, and Cory Booker would all face the obligation to do their job as Senator," quoted NY Magazine writer Ed Kilgore, who wrote: "[An impeachment trial] could be a boon to non-senators — particularly Joe Biden, who can bloviate to his heart’s desire about the lessons he learned on impeachment and all the issues involving Trump during his 44 years as a member or presiding officer of the Upper Chamber...."
2. On October 7, 2004, the first year of this blog, I quoted Al Franken, who was boasting about his radio show on the radio network Air America: "We do a different kind of show. I'm not the mirror image of Rush Limbaugh. I do a totally different kind of show. I don't bloviate for three hours and pull stuff out of my butt and mislead and lie. We're very scrupulous about our facts. I'm proud of that." (I do go on to quip about whether Franken "did in fact bloviate," so count that as my using the word if you must, but I'm really still essentially quoting him.)
In both of those instances, the user of "bloviate" is insulting someone else. President Harding, the popularizer of the word, used it about himself, self-deprecatingly.
***
Here's the biography — commission earned — "Warren G. Harding: The American Presidents Series: The 29th President, 1921-1923." Warning: It's by John Dean. Chris says: "It’s part of a series of very short books that I use when the options are very limited." He's relied on that series to read about William Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Franklin Pierce, and Benjamin Harrison.
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52 comments:
Bill O’Reilly popularized “bloviate” a lot on his show.
The Nebraska State Bar Association paid convicted felon, John Dean, a speaker’s fee.
Dean was born in Akron, Ohio, and lived in Marion, the hometown of the 29th President of the United States, Warren Harding, whose biographer he later became.
As just an old country lawyer, bloviate has long been one of my favorite words. (used to describe others, of course, but not myself, I trust.) It's not exactly onomatopoetic, but it certainly sounds like what it is.
Dave Begley said...
The Nebraska State Bar Association paid convicted felon, John Dean, a speaker’s fee.
---------------------------------------------------------
Are you objecting to his appearance altogether, or that he was paid a fee? Or that was paid a fee by the Bar Association?
I've used bloviate while talking to friends, and usually in a self-deprecating manner. It's a good word.
An impeachment based on no facts
Dean was a turncoat like michael cohen although the latter was higher level felon (7 million in taxable income)
Wilbur:
I object to everything. No way the NSBA should have rewarded a disbarred lawyer and felon.
I readily confess to chronic bloviation. I also indulge in flummery from time to time. Evidence is scattered throughout these comment archives.
In the 80s no one really turned on Reagan in this way but by the 00s it was a bumper crop
Franken who defrsuded air america investors and was rewarded with a senate seat
You don't need a weathervane to know which way the wind bloviates.
Gavin Newsom was seen bloviating using his $100 “Newsom Kneepads” in Davos.
https://store.gavinnewsom.com/kneepads/
Harding broke the progressives spell, that could not be allowed
That some of his cabinet had issues fall daughterty and co
I readily confess to chronic bloviation. I also indulge in flummery from time to time.
Maybe I've been reading too much Mencken, but I prefer bamboozling the booboisie with my brummagem buncombe.
My instinctive reaction looking back, having watched it unfold at the time, when I hissed and booed John Dean like everybody else, and watching American politics since, is that Dean was probably put under a great deal of pressure to "confess" and accuse his "accomplices" and that a straight arrow lawyer like he was probably didn't really want to go to prison for years, and so he folded.
Archie Bunker was right, Nixon got railroaded.
"...meaning to loaf about..."
Like most of the country, a polar vortex bloviated into the region last night and now sleet is rattling against the windows as it continues its bloviation...
Harding also invented the term "founding fathers."
Wince at 648 - I recall that also.
They made so much of a production about it, with the book and the miniseries as an object lesson
Something they never did for johnson aides like bobby baker for instance
And the full tear jerking for clinton staffers because evil ken starr
Maybe Harding and not Trump was #1 in self-deprecation.
What a great project for our 250th! I’ll bet David McColloug( has a few great volumes. The one on LBJ that came out recently by Robert Caro looks like doorstop material though. Has Walter Isaacson written any presidential bios? I’d be very interested in something on Grover Cleveland. My great great aunt was a noted opera singer in Washington during his administration and quite pursued by the diplomatic set.
If Chris is going in order, he should next encounter the outstanding biography of Coolidge from Amity Shlaes. Coolidge wasn't a bloviator at all and every word he spoke mattered.
If this post was Ann's invitation to bloviate, we have certainly accepted. Old country lawyers may bloviate, but those city lawyer just keep nattering on and on.
I think Harding also gets credit (or perhaps blame) for bringing “normalcy” into widespread use.
No he and evan thomas wrote an apologia for the establjshment the wise men (they looked askance at nixon who wantsd to break their strsnglehold)
"The one on LBJ that came out recently by Robert Caro looks like doorstop material though"
I don't think anything new from Caro about LBJ has come out since the 4th volume in 2012. I, like many others, am waiting for Volume 5.
Otherwise known as the gift of gab.
I like that word. For me it doesn't have to be terribly negative. It brings to mind a lot of gas coming out of someone who is obviously inflated. It doesn't seem to fit a thin person even doing the same thing.
I think it fits Trump's style perfectly. I'm impressed by the guy's work and accomplishments, but I don't listen to him much. I don't usually care much what politicians say. I've already heard enough bloviation over the years.
"The one on LBJ that came out recently by Robert Caro looks like doorstop material though."
We're waiting for the final volume of the LBJ series, but there are 4 volumes, all quite long, and they are phenomenal. Chris has read them. So have I.
There are also the 3 great volumes on Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris. Really great!
You may not use the verb bloviate, Ann.
But on occasion you do bloviate. The post on Mann yesterday might qualify.
Not a complaint or criticism.
John Henry
"If Chris is going in order, he should next encounter the outstanding biography of Coolidge from Amity Shlaes. Coolidge wasn't a bloviator at all and every word he spoke mattered."
He didn't begin by doing them in order, but at this point, he's finishing them in order.
"I don't bloviate for three hours and pull stuff out of my butt..."
That's because in order to 'bloviate' you have to know your subject matter enough to sustain the attention a worthy bloviator needs. Besides, SNL had writers that pull stuff out of their butt to make him (Al Franken) sound funny.
I thought I check just in case: "No, Al Franken did not write "Deep Thoughts" for Saturday Night Live (SNL). The segment was written and narrated by Jack Handey, a real writer and comedian on the show."
’I also indulge in flummery from time to time.’
When that happens just eat a Tums.
As for William Henry Harrison, Chris could have saved time by referring to this poem by Denise Rodgers:
Bundle Up!
(A William Henry Harrison Poem)
A hero on the battlefield;
he really knew his stuff.
A man, a fighter, hard as nails,
so brave, so strong, so tough.
But also, kind of stubborn
when his story's done and told.
He stood out in the winter air,
so brisk, so damp and cold.
He took two hours to give his speech
Inauguration Day.
No scarf, no hat, no overcoat.
The sky was dank and gray.
He caught a cold, grew very ill,
took quickly to his bed.
And then in less than thirty days,
this president was dead.
And so this man's sad legacy
(if I may be so bold)
is wrap up tight and bundle up
outside when it is cold!
HL Mencken on Harding:
"He writes the worst English I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a sort of grandeur creeps into it."
More bloviation from Mencken here:
https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/comedy/hl-mencken-balder-and-dash
There's been criticism recently of "The Power Broker," Robert Caro's Robert Moses biography, for being unfair to its subject, so maybe LBJ will be getting a reevaluation too. Caro, though, wouldn't have spent all this time on Johnson, if he didn't have some love for Lyndon.
Al Franken: "I don't bloviate for three hours and pull stuff out of my butt and mislead and lie."
And he didn't. He was saving that for his Senate Campaign.
In searching for Audio biographies of Harding, I came across this title: "The Bloviator" https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Bloviator-Audiobook/B07SRWL1FH
I've had Bloviate in my vocabulary since High School (~75 years)
Was Harding's (or his speechwriters') style so terrible? It was certainly inflated and very far from the straightforward, plain style. We've become as cynical about politics and politicians as Mencken was, but Harding's speechifying seems benign compared with what we usually get now. He was (or his ghostwriters were) aspiring for something that he (or they) couldn't take hold of.
Wilson was high minded while he was stealing you blind and segregating dc for his pal thomas dixon
Bill O’Reilly used the term on the few occasions I watched his show.
I would just like to note, for any who might be interested, that Teddy Roosevelt's train car, from which he campaigned, has been faithfully restored, and sits just outside of Manchester Vermont, on the preserved farm of Abraham Lincoln's son, and you can, as I have, pose for a picture from the same platform he spoke from.
The Lincoln farm is great too, faithfully restored, and mostly the original bucolic setting still obtains, with only one unfortunate bit of modern relative sprawl visible from the mountain top where it sits.
You could also visit nearby the reconstructed orphanage where Chester A Arthur was dropped off at 4 years old, and which, being close to the Canadian border, raised questions as to whether he was a citizen. Though being a reconstruction, it's not much to see, but it has pleasant grounds, and some walking trails. And you have the Coolidge Historical Site nearby, if you want to make a real trip of it.
Prime Biden was the epitome of bloviate. Who can forget the length of his hearing questions, or remember a word of them?
I grew up in the town that considers Harding a native son. We learned about him in elementary school the way we learned about Washington and Lincoln (although less hagiographical, but still focused on the good). I've been to the Harding museum a few times in my life. I never knew he was associated with the word "bloviate." I'll have to read that biography.
"Bloviate" is just "blow," said more fancily.
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