As we like it

A rather nasty verbal virus is creeping into our language: the merging of the idiomatic constructions ‘cold as it may be, at least the sun is shining’; and ‘as cold as it was yesterday’. In the first example, the conjunction ‘as’ is the equivalent of ‘though’; in the second the two ‘as’es indicate comparison or equation.

So what a horrid hybrid is this comment (from The Times, no less) on our current financial difficulties: “This mother of all bail-outs” acts as “some kind of gigantic and much-needed backstop, so that we know that, as bad as it still might get, we won’t have to take our money and put it under the mattress”.

To say “This may not be as bad as it will get” is allowable – comparing badness now with badness in the future. But it is barmy to equate ‘future badness' with our not needing to put our money under the mattress, which is presumably a good thing.

Also from The Times, reporting on the England v. Australia World Cup Rugby match last November: "As blindingly good as Australia were, they were aided and abetted [cliché !] by one of the worst performances by a national team in living memory". Again, this sentence, as it is written, is nonsense, all because of that introductory 'as'. That and the balancing 'as' three words later, form an idiom of comparison that could almost be construed as equating 'blindingly good Australia' with 'one of the worst performances in living memory'. Not at all what the reporter meant.

“Good as it is, your poem has not won the prize”, a panel of adjudicators might say. In this idiom, ‘as’ means ‘though’. If the adjudicators say “As good as your poem is, you have failed to win the prize” the poet (as a perceptive language craftsman) might well remark ruefully “What does the panel think is so good about failure ?”

As we like it