We are unlikely to forget the look on Anthony Blinken’s face when the word ‘dictator’ slipped out of Joe Biden’s mouth. You could read his mind, couldn’t you? The Secretary of State was furiously thinking, ‘I could kick that old man!’ Of course, what Biden said was perfectly true. President Xi is a dictator. But at these international conferences everyone is supposed to pretend this is not the case. Perhaps Biden didn’t realise he had uttered the word out loud? Or perhaps he is an old man who doesn’t care if he bluntly speaks the truth? If so, good on him for that! Our English word ‘dictator’ comes straight out of Latin. In the Roman empire a magistrate appointed with plenary powers (‘complete’ powers) during a time of emergency could be called a ‘dictator’. It comes from the Latin word ‘to speak’ meaning that this magistrate’s word was law – whatever he says, goes. Then by the 1500s ‘dictator’ was being used to mean ‘any absolute ruler’. These days it means, in particular, the opposite to democracy. Saying Xi is a dictator should be no more shocking than saying he’s Chinese – it’s what everyone can see. And occasionally it is nice to have people discomfited by an uncomfortable truth.

There are times when all we want to say to bleating politicians is, ‘Enough, already!’ The Oxford English Dictionary insists on the comma in the middle and the exclamation mark at the end. They offer this definition: ‘already is used as an intensifier after a word or phrase, especially to express impatience or exasperation.’ The Oxford experts have traced it back to at least 1903, and say it is an American, especially Jewish, usage. It certainly follows the classical pattern of those colourful Yiddish expressions we know and love. But William Safire says it was the Globe and Mail newspaper in Toronto that made this a popular and widespread expression – using it 22 times between 1977 and 1983. Obviously there was a sub-editor at that paper who took a real shine to this Yiddishism. Safire has found a Yiddish expression ‘genug shoyn’ which translates as ‘enough, already!’ Lexicographer Sol Steinmetz says it arose among migrant Yiddish speakers living in New York. And, he adds, it had become common by the 1930s. Journalists digging into the dark side of politics might well be driven to exclaim, ‘Enough, already!’