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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWait...WTF???
Shouldnt it be it started out as a mountain but turned out to be a molehill?
Not mouse?
President Malaprop.
underpants
(182,623 posts)dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)rogerashton
(3,920 posts)Lindsay
(3,276 posts)but I'd read this morning that it is, indeed, a Russian idiom.
Link to tweet
Text for the twitter-deprived:
Here is some context as to the expression Putin used during his chat with Trump. Its popular in Russia. Senator Pushkov, a senior deputy in Russias upper-house Federation Council, described the Mueller report as a mountain that birthed a dead mouse.
OldEurope
(1,273 posts)In his "ars poetica" Horace wrote: "parturient montes. nascetur ridiculus mus". Translation: The mountain was in labor, a tiny mouse was born.
This is a popular saying in Germany, too.
PCIntern
(25,482 posts)lunatica
(53,410 posts)Its easy to see how a small mound on the ground would be exaggerated into a mountain, but on the face of it what does a mountain giving birth to a mouse mean?
OldEurope
(1,273 posts)Someone announces a huge betterment, like changing the lives of many poor people, or a cure for cancer. And then it turns out it was only a new recipe with some wild herbs.
In US politics it could be a president declaring the overcoming of a rogue state like North Korea and then achieving zero. You see the irony
.
lunatica
(53,410 posts)It seems to be like a mountain really being nothing more than a molehill. The opposite action. Like the scary booming Wizard of Oz being just a small man behind the curtain.
Hekate
(90,560 posts)...but I like it flipped around like this -- that the mountain already exists, but produces only a "riduculus mus," something insignificant.
Ohiogal
(31,912 posts)know how to speak English?
Siwsan
(26,250 posts)That's my guess.
UniteFightBack
(8,231 posts)spanone
(135,792 posts)and that our 'president' is quoting him. what thee fuck?
NastyRiffraff
(12,448 posts)but he can barely speak English, so he'll fail at that, too.
UTUSN
(70,646 posts)PCIntern
(25,482 posts)UTUSN
(70,646 posts)lpbk2713
(42,738 posts)There aren't any surprises that way.