Obama warns of the "old okey-doke"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Care for a SWAG?   Mine is that the idea comes from peolpe saying "Everything is [or is gonna be] OK" [or "be okey-dokey"] when the interlocutor knows that it can't be and won't be and that the first speaker is knows it too.

  JL

Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: Obama warns of the "old okey-doke"
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The one that is basically just a variation on "okay," Scot.

How "the (old) okey-doke" (never with the final -y) as "scam," sucker
play," etc. came about I have no idea.

-Wilson

On 1/24/08, Scot LaFaive wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Scot LaFaive
> Subject: Re: Obama warns of the "old okey-doke"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> >My goodness, Amy! How old are you? I first heard "okey-doke(y)" used by my
> mother, now 96, >and her friends in the late 'Thirties!
>
> Which "okey-dokey" sense do you mean here? Like Amy, I've never heard of the
> sense used by Obama. But then again, I'm just a Yankee boy and it might not
> have made it up here except to mean "OK."
>
> Scot
>
> On Jan 24, 2008 11:34 AM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender: American Dialect Society
> > Poster: Wilson Gray
> > Subject: Re: Obama warns of the "old okey-doke"
> >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > My goodness, Amy! How old are you? I first heard "okey-doke(y)" used
> > by my mother, now 96, and her friends in the late 'Thirties!
> >
> > The expression was so popular that, in the "Forties, there was even an
> > in-the-days-of-knights comic-book character named "Sir Oakey Doakes."
> > Before that, Edgar Bergen's hick dummy, Mortimer Snerd, used
> > "Okey-dokey!" as a catch-phrase.
> >
> > Mortimer:
> > "How can you tell the difference between a Cadillac and a Cadiddlac?"
> >
> > Edgar:
> > "How?"
> >
> > Mortimer:
> > "By the "diddle" in the middle!
> >
> > -Wilson
> >
> > On 1/24/08, Amy West wrote:
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > > Sender: American Dialect Society
> > > Poster: Amy West
> > > Subject: Re: Obama warns of the "old okey-doke"
> > >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > That sense is new to me, but that ain't saying much. I use
> > > "okey-dokey" for "OK", and get some giggles when I do. I always learn
> > > stuff here.
> > >
> > > ---Amy West
> > >
> > > And any work by Arnold that is dismissed by others as "merely
> > > descriptive" is still tons more illuminating to me than analytical
> > > works by others.
> > >
> > > >Date: Wed, 23 Jan 2008 22:20:55 -0500
> > > >From: Benjamin Zimmer
> > > >Subject: Obama warns of the "old okey-doke"
> > > >
> > > >From Sumter, SC...
> > > >
> > > >---
> > > >
> > http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/01/when_obama_call.html
> > > > Obama used the friendly setting to urge voters not to be fooled by
> > > >what he said were untruths coming from Hillary Clinton's campaign.
> > > >"They're trying to bamboozle you. It's the same old okey-doke," he
> > > >said, using a slang phrase for a con. "Y'all know about okey-doke,
> > > >right? It's the same old stuff."
> > > >---
> > > >
> > > >--Ben Zimmer
> > >
> > > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
> > come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> > -----
> > -Sam'l Clemens
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Sam'l Clemens

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