circumlocution

To borrow the indelible circumlocution of the New York Times, the deal is “a foul-tasting sandwich” that both parties have ultimately decided to eat—while describing it publicly as, you know, a normal sandwich.

“You’re now a beautiful, strong flower, who must protect your delicate petals and clean them regularly,” she adds, in one of the film’s more hilarious examples of motherly misunderstanding and circumlocution.

“Little Dorrit,” the 1857 novel by Charles Dickens, lampoons the omnipotent “Department of Circumlocution,” whose stupefying procedures keep the heroine down.

“On both sides, there’s been a lot of circumlocution and attempted Churchillian rhetoric about the precedent to be followed during an election year to fill a vacancy,” Mr. Kennedy said on Fox News.

His clumsy circumlocution reflects a desire to wriggle out from answering for the consequences of one’s own choices, a basic inability to make a defense masquerading as a defense.