It’s the rhetorical equivalent of having your cake and eating it. No wonder politicians love it Sometimes an unfamiliar ancient Greek word can mask a rhetorical device that’s as commonplace as salt.

Here's a big bow-wow to President Bush, a dog guy. Or so I thought. He came all the way to California for a town-hall meeting over the weekend to do a little PR on his tax cut, but he failed to ...

Yesterday’s post addressed the use of litotes in California’s broker-dealer suitability rule. Litotes can be an effective rhetorical device, but as Judge Frank H. Easterbrook observed, it is also ...

I have been practising my litotes. You never know when the skill will come in handy, and it's easier than Pilates. You just need to say that a movie was not bad, or the spa was not unpleasant, or the ...