[Ads-l] "Curtain-measuring" - confidence of ousting an incumbent office-holder

[Ben Zimmer]

"Drapes" and "curtains" have both been used. After a discussion on this
list back in '08, I wrote about political drape/curtain-measuring back for
Language Log and Word Routes:

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=763
https://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/drapes-curtains-and-an-old-political-standby/

My research got picked up by the New York Times blog, The Caucus:

https://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/25/measuring-the-window-treatments/

On Thu, Nov 1, 2018 at 3:06 PM Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:

> Didn’t it use(d) to be “measuring the drapes”?
>
> > On Nov 1, 2018, at 2:37 PM, Peter Reitan <pjreitan at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
> >
> > "curtain-measuring" - confidence of ousting incumbent office-holder.
> >
> > State of the Midterms: Analyst predicts bigger House gains for Dems as
> Pelosi eyes gavel
> > Adam Shaw
> > By Adam Shaw | Fox News
> >
> >
> >
> > Foxnews.com story about increasing confidence that Democrats will retake
> more seats in the house than previously expected.
> >
> > "Even some in Pelosi's party are cautious about the pitfalls of
> overconfidence, amid recent reports of veteran operatives warning that the
> curtain-measuring echoes Democrats' confidence in the lead-up to the 2016
> election, which now-President Trump won."
> >
> >

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org