IDIOMS IN THE NEWS!

Superbowl, 2/5/09:
"With two of his teammates running interference and sealing off the defenders, he easily scored a touchdown for the Steelers."
Running interference is the idiom and it means interfering with the defense so the offence man can score, in this case The Steelers.

Sports Illustrated, 11/6/06:
"The World Series: They're the best. So Deal with them." (the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals baseball team)
To find the meaning of "deal" (verb) click on "Games and Cards."

NY Times, 5/31/06:
Headlines for an article about John Prescott, Britain's "avowedly blue-collar worker deputy prime minister..." and whether he should resign over playing croquet "when he was, technically running the country in the absence of Prime Minister Tony Blair." It's not cricket is a term used for not being proper. "

NY Times, 5/6/06:
AS Porter Goss, former director of the CIA, announced his departure he said, "the agency he had led was 'on a very even keel, sailing well."

NY Times, 9/15/04:
Representative Porter J. Goss, Republican of Florida, testifying to the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee: "Mr Goss portrayed himself as a vigorous proponent of intelligence reform... He made it clear that he did not know whether Mr. Bush might promote him to director of national intelligence,if Congress creates the post, and said only that he would 'play the cards that are dealt to me."

NY Times, 9/1/05:
Mr. Albaugh, previous head of FEMA (U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency), referring to President Bush and the New Orleans disaster: "He wants numbers, he wants to be able to show that the ball is moving down the field."

Monday quarterbacking:
An official when asked about the disaster in New Orleans stated it was not his job to be a Monday quarterbacker, in other words not to state what went wrong after the "game" or disaster.

John Roberts in U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings:
"It's my job to call balls and strikes, not pitch or bat." and. also, " judges are like umpires--umpires don't make the rules; they apply them." This is an analogy of a judge as umpire, not batter, not making legislation, but deciding the constitutionality and precedents of such legislation.

NY Times 10/29/05
Baseball Metaphor/Idiom used by Mr. Patrick J. Fitzgerald, special counsel in the I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby case:
In response to questions about possible charges in disclosing classified information or the identity of confidential government agents, but not currently pending in Mr. Libby's case, "Mr. Fitzgerald would not say ...whether he believed that Mr. Libby had in fact violated either law. He said that question had been impossible to answer, because Mr. Libby's misleading answers to investigators and the grand jury had obscured what actually took place. He likened his problem to that of a baseball umpire who was unable to make a call because of sand thrown in his eyes."

USA Today, Friday, 3/25/2005:
Headline, "Bush's second term won't be a rerun of his first." Paul Light, a professor of public service at NYU says: "The odds are against Bush, but he as little to lose by trying. 'Why not throw the long ball? If he fails, it won't be because he didn't control the policy agenda or because the Cabinet strayed from the message. It will be because he aimed too high, and that's not necessarily a bad thing for second-term presidents."

February 7, 2005, NY Times, Superbowl ads:
"Just a Game? Right, and we're just a plane." (NetJets ad)

"The advertising equivalent of the Hail Mary." (Infinity Broadcasting
Company)

September 15, 2004, N.Y. Times
Representative Porter J. Goss, Republican of Florida, testifying to the U.S.
Senate Intelligence Committee: "Mr Goss portrayed himself as a vigorous
proponent of intelligence reform... He made clear that he did not know whether Mr. Bush might promote him to director of national intelligence,if Congress
creates the post, and said only that he would 'play the cards that are dealt to me."

January 12, 2005 NY Times
At Condoleeza Rice's Senate confirmation hearings for the position of
Secretary of State, "One Republican senator using a football metaphor (stated)...that in her new job, she would be much more exposed... You're going to be flushed out of that pocket all the time,...You're going to be passing for the first and 10, but you're going to be running most of the time you're throwing."