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Letter to the editor: ‘Weasel wording’ signals Collins’ lack of courage

On New Year’s Day, on our Portland Press Herald front page, we saw that Sen. Susan Collins is “open” to calling witnesses at President Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate. With all due respect to weasels, Sen. Collins is a master of “weasel wording,” defined by Webster as words “used to evade or retreat from […]

On New Year’s Day, on our Portland Press Herald front page, we saw that Sen. Susan Collins is “open” to calling witnesses at President Trump’s impeachment trial in the Senate.

With all due respect to weasels, Sen. Collins is a master of “weasel wording,” defined by Webster as words “used to evade or retreat from a direct or forthright statement or position.”

Observed closely, Collins employs vocabulary that gives the impression something meaningful has been said when really she is ambiguous as usual, trying to speak to both Republican and Democratic sides of the street. And Collins frequently uses the word “inappropriate.”

In her mind, unable to politically risk condemning Sen. Mitch McConnell for pledging ahead of time that he will coordinate trial strategy with President Trump, she judges it “inappropriate.” What a weak weasel word! How sad, and what a lack of courage to state a position, any position. As they say, one who tries to please everyone winds up pleasing no one,

Judith C. Tydings

South Thomaston