Blunt and Direct Unwelcome

I read this article the other day in The Wall Street Journal online version.

It must be free because I don't have a subscription.

The title is Paulson's Stature Takes a Beating Among Lawmakers.

I guess it was the title that caught my attention and then the article itself was interesting enough to hold it.

I was particularly interested in a portion of the article which I quote as follows including my own emphasis in bold:

Interviews with lawmakers suggest the uphill battle is partly of Mr. Paulson's own making. A former chief executive of investment bank Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Mr. Paulson is blunt and direct, an attitude that doesn't play as well before Congress.

There you have it.

Blunt is an interesting word. In this context it means "without subtlety or evasion"; "candid"; "forthright"; "devoid of any qualifications or disguise or adornment"; or, "crude, unadorned".

If anyone is interested I have decided to adopt my own style for using commas and semi-colons outside of quotes when in a list. Sorry if this offends anyone. Since we live in a day when language is quickly evolving I have decided to exercise my own liberty.

Actually I think Paulson could have been a lot more direct but I suppose that would have created panic which was one of the things the politicians were trying to avoid.

Not that it was a secret for sure. Anyone that was paying attention to the bank borrowing from the Federal Reserve would have understood that there was nearly complete paralysis in the lending markets. The implication of that is hard to avoid. But not many people pay attention to bank borrowing from the Federal Reserve apparently.

I do think it is true that we do not prefer blunt politicians on a national scale at least. We like our national pols to be sophisticated, worldly, subtle, loquacious -- anything except blunt. We like them to tickle our ears and resemble some imaginary ideal that exists in our collective, national subconscious. We like them to fit perfectly in sound bites and video clips.

Maybe I will dig out Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and watch it again sometime to soothe my inner idealist.

Monday evening I have to attend a city council meeting. I wonder how blunt I should be? Probably not very if I keep in mind what is good for me.