"pretzel palace"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Cf. the earlier "Puzzle Palace [on the Potomac],"  'the Pentagon,' later
'the National Security Agency' (HDAS files 1960).

JL

On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 1:27 PM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "pretzel palace"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Aren't these all California entities? Makes sense that Jerry Brown would
> use it.
>
> I am frustrated that Google refused to come up with these sites for me.
>
> DanG
>
>
> On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 12:28 PM, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com
> >wrote:
>
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> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: "pretzel palace"
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > The earliest hits on GB I see are in 1975, both from US government
> > institutions.
> >
> > One is at http://ow.ly/aVsGI:
> >
> > On the one hand, our type of organizational structure was criticized by
> > our Governor, department of health, press, and others as a "pretzel
> palace"
> > and our 1976 Medi-Cal contract was renewed on the express condition that
> we
> > combine our...
> >
> > 1979 "Time" (http://ow.ly/aVtES) talks about economic policies:
> >
> > He termed the Administration's energy and economic policies "a pretzel
> > palace of confusion."
> >
> > 1991 "The Profit Motive and Patient Care: The Changing Accountability of
> > Doctors and Hospitals" (http://ow.ly/aVsXU) talks about convoluted
> > organizational arrangements:
> >
> > The president of HMO International, one of the for-profit management
> > companies that was associated with a prepaid plan, likened the convoluted
> > organizational arrangements to a "pretzel palace." He said in
> congressional
> > testimony that HMO International's "organizational structure [of
> different
> > corporations and partnerships] is almost incomprehensible, onerous to
> > manage, duplicative of expense, and in a word, it is wrong."
> >
> > Someone else wonders what "pretzel palace" means at
> >
> http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/67768/what-does-a-pretzel-palace-mean
> .
> > The answers include a suggestion that brittleness has to do with it, but
> > that doesn't seem to match the evidence.
> >
> > Also, the expression "Byzantine pretzel palace" occurs twice in GB.
> >
> > Benjamin Barrett
> > Seattle, WA
> >
> > On May 15, 2012, at 7:46 AM, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
> >
> > > Jerry Brown yesterday said of California's budget "It=92s a pretzel
> > palace =
> > > of
> > > incredible complexity.=94
> > >
> > > I have never before seen the phrase used before in the context of
> > financial
> > > complexity.
> > >
> > > GB shows a hit in Asia Sentinel from 2006:
> > >
> > > "Restructuring negotiations were colored by controversy over a
> > bewildering
> > > corporate pretzel palace that included a shadowy series of banks in the
> > > Cook Islands and Cayman Islands and countless legal challenges..."
> > >
> > > It's talking about corporate structure instead of budgeting, but
> similar
> > > enough for my taste.
> > >
> > > The use of the phrase implies to me, however, that it is expected to be
> > > familiar to an Asian audience in 2006. Does anyone have any insight
> into
> > > the use of the phrase?
> >
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> >
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