pollyspeak

English

Etymology

From pollie +‎ -speak, with spelling shift.

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Noun

pollyspeak (uncountable)

1. (slang, Australia, derogatory) Political spin; speech used by a politician that is equivocal or mendacious.
   • 2000 June 30, Harold Wood, “ANOTHER 'MADDIE' STRIKES.”, in aus.general‎^[1] (Usenet):

     Sure, put them as a batch/job lot with their own kind. Put them in the public gallery of any Australian parliament and force feed them ‘pollyspeak’.

   • 2001, Marc in Oz, “Vote with your wallet”, in alt.politics.greens (Usenet):

     It isn't difficult to make one's life meaningful without the mumbo-jumbo of pollyspeak and endless streams of words, words, words...

   • 2011 March 25, i||||||||||||||||| 2.0, “Coal jobs "safe": Combet”, in aus.politics‎^[2] (Usenet):

     It is pollyspeak or polyspeak or doubletalk, or lies.
     No GST
     No ETS
     Coal jobs safe = they are truly fucked now
     on a quick scan I didn't see he actually said they would be safe, tahts^[sic] part of the trick, say something they want to be interpreted as 'safe' but not actually say it. The[y] have years of practise, they are really good at it.

See also

• spin doctor