There is a linguistic term known as the “drift of the signified,” in which a word or symbol remains unchanged, but the meaning of the word or the thing being represented by the symbol changes over time. For example, the word “gay” used to apply to anyone happy and carefree, whereas now it means something else entirely; another example would be the red flag of the Soviet Union, which began as a symbol of anarchic revolt but ended up as a symbol of mindless conformity.
Lately, the political left has been trying to shift the term “populism” to be a synonym for, among other things, “racism” and “xenophobia.” That was just one of the fallacies that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi trotted out during an Oxford Union debate last month in the U.K. where she received a well-deserved drubbing from opponent Winston Marshal. That was far from her only malapropism.
Pelosi — a self-described…
