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For a piece of average English thrown in the 1300s, "lodestar" makes a surprise comeback.
On Wednesday, the New York Times published a dispatch written by a senior White House official about intra-administrative efforts to curb President Trump's worst tendencies and ideas. The revelation of a bubbling resistance movement inside the west wing opposing Trump on the basis of his "amorality" sparked a mad rush to identify the writer. Who does this nameless being raise triumphantly from the Washington marsh?
The identity could be there in the writing. Commentators and wheelchair linguists have started looking for clues, such as graduate students sweating "Finnegans Wake". One of the strangest pieces of verbiage to leave the room was "lodestar". [John] McCain, "said the author. "But we will always have his example – a guide to restore honor in public life and our national dialogue."
The term – "a star who guides or guides," says Merriam-Webster, "a source of inspiration, model or guide" – was one of the hottest topics on Twitter a few hours after its publication Wednesday .
It synchronizes with a greater truth of the Trump era. In hyperactive bursts, characters and unlikely phrases are suddenly replaced by a new meaning. Republicans James B. Comey ("Comey Is My Homey") and Robert S. Mueller III ("That's Mueller Time") are now progressive heroes. The costumes of Hulu's "The Handmaid's Tale" have become symbols of women's rights.
Now, "lodestar" has become a rallying cry for the anti-Trump camp.
Does this mean that the word could be the key to the skeleton to unlock the identity of the masked avenger known as Lodestar? Are the administration staff looking for leftover bags in the west wing of refrigerators marked "Lodestar?" Scroll through the Internet archives to see who used to have a pseudonym AOL Instant Messenger " LODESTARRR316 "?
The feverish speculation even put Vice President Pence in the position of internal editor. Thursday morning, NBC News reported Pence's office had officially denied any involvement in the play. The guessing game, however, continued.
[All the speculation that’s fit to tweet: Who wrote that anonymous Times op-ed?]
[‘Wild,’ says Trevor Noah. ‘The whole time we’ve been dealing with the watered-down’ Trump.]
But the archaic word of preparation of SAT is perhaps not as eloquent as many assume. "Lodestar" is a fairly common phrase – whether you are a dead medieval English poet or a Washington politician.
"Lodestar" for the honor has been a cliché for 500 years, "said Mark Liberman, professor of linguistics at the University of Pennsylvania, at the Washington Post.
Liberman said the word may come from a navigation term, another way to refer to the North Star.
The Oxford English Dictionary, the Bible with words and words, identifies the first written usages of "lodestar" or "lode sterre" in 1374 and the works of Geoffrey Chaucer, considered the father of English literature and author from "The Canterbury Tales". . "The dictionary quotes the epic poem of the author" Troilus and Criseyde ":
"Biesche I yow myn hertes fre lady", writes Chaucer, in English medium, which today reads as a good impression of a Russian bot on Twitter. "It's here that you're laughing at me. For God's rents, my just deserve.
According to OED, the original meaning of the term was "a star that shows the way; especially the polar star. However, in the space of a few hundred years, the word has taken on a symbolic weight.
"Going back to the 14th or 15th century, there is a metaphorical use referring not to the polar star but to any principle or person or idea or purpose used to guide," said Liberman. "If you want to flatter someone or say something nice about somebody or principle as a source of advice, then you call them" lodestar "."
Liberman pointed out how writer Raphael Holinshed used the term metaphorically in describing Henry V in 1586:
So, from person and form, this prince rightlie representing his heroic affections, of size and proportion large and mania, rather light, a little long at the neck and black hair, with a kind, eloquent and grave face was his tongue, and with great grace and power of persuasion: to conclude, was a maiestie who died and who died a father in the princess, lode-starre in honor and shimmer of magnificence: the more his life was exalted, the more he lamented his dead, and famous around the world.
The link between the story and the l & # 39; honor, or the use of the term for a guiding moral light rather than a real navigation tool, is blocked. "This sort of thing has not really changed in 600 years," Liberman said.
Politicians and lodestars also have a long-standing relationship.
"In a situation where you want to invoke the idea of a fixed guiding principle that you can always orient yourself to, no matter what seems confusing, it's a useful metaphor," said Liberman.
One of the first fans to use "lodestar" in modern American politics seems to have come from Jack Kemp, former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
In a speech in 1989, Kemp described the ownership of housing as "lodestar ,. . . the light guide "of his time to the HUD. In a 1991 interview with the Washington Post, Kemp also used "lodestar" listing his accomplishments. Eight years later, when discussing gun control with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Kemp again dropped the word.
"All of us have a responsibility to help this country turn to the right base for the 21st century," he said at the time.
Over the years, "lodestar" continued to make appearances in political rhetoric, in 2000 at a press conference on President Bill Clinton's historic trip to Vietnam. Sandy Berger, who served as Clinton's national security advisor, told reporters that the United States had "a clear policy" while striving to repair relations between the two countries.
This is not at all an American phenomenon. Liberman pointed out that the word often comes up in North Korean propaganda. Earlier this year, in a statement praising Kim Jong Un's "outstanding" efforts to bring the two Koreas closer together, the North Korean government called the dictator "the sun of the nation and national reunification" .
But perhaps the American politician who likes to say the most "lodestar" is Vice President Pence. A search for the word and name of Pence in the news archive yielded over 200 hits. Whether on the ground as a member of Congress at a hearing in the US House of Representatives or during the presidential campaign speech, Pence managed to present "many speeches and statements. "
In an interview with CNN in 2005, Pence called for "making this state-owned vessel the backbone of a balanced federal budget." It would not be the only time for Pence to use the test with reference to the budget. the same context in 2009 and again in 2011.
Pence also used the term respectful to refer to Kemp, his companion "lodestar". When the HUD secretary was diagnosed with cancer in 2009, Pence wrote an open letter calling "Kemp's optimistic belief in the American dream – the power of free markets and entrepreneurial capitalism" a "pillar of my nascent political career" ".
Outside the political sphere, Pence still found a say, including in a 2009 Father's Day message.
"My father, Edward J. Pence, has been gone for more than 20 years, but it's still part of my life," the statement said. "Her values, her love, her dedication to the family are always guides for me."
But the frequent use of "lodestar" by Pence does not necessarily mean that he is the anonymous hero of opera. On the one hand, the Times said that the author's work "would be compromised" when he was exposed. As a government official, the vice president can not be fired, only charged.
In May, an anonymous leak from the White House told Axios that it was common practice for the sources to keep listening to the verbal tics of their colleagues. Thus, when their own words appear in the media, they can trace a false trail for leak hunters.
"To cover my footsteps, I usually pay attention to the idioms of other staff members and use them in my original quotes," said the official to Axios. "It throws me the odor."
Thus, "lodestar" could easily have captured Pence's propensity to the end and dropped it in the Times like a sham.
Liberman, the linguistics professor, also warns against any attempt to link "lestestar" to the potential identity of the author on the basis of a single text.
"It is difficult to attribute paternity to this document," he said. "Among those who would be on the list of potential authors, the information we have about their previous work includes both some of the things they wrote and things that staff members and speech writers wrote for them."
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