smoking gun
a proof that something bad has happened
TRANSLATION
smoking gun = der schlagende, unwiderlegbare Beweis (vor allem bei einer Straftat) --- GOOGLE INDEX smoking gun : approximately 2,600,000 hits
STATISTICS
IN THE PRESS
In his fourth day of testimony, former Andersen partner David Duncan admitted he also kept the so-called SMOKING-GUN memo that was written by an Andersen employee who testified early in the trial.
(BBC News)
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"There is no SMOKING GUN and therefore no justification for a military attack."
- Jack Straw, former British Foreign Minister discussing Iran's nuclear program
(BBC News)
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"There is no SMOKING GUN and therefore no justification for a military attack."
- Jack Straw, former British Foreign Minister discussing Iran's nuclear program
Did you
know?
smoking gun
noun
- something that serves as indisputable evidence or proof, especially of a crime
(The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
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WORD ORIGIN
There is an old adage "Where there is smoke, there is fire." In other words, if it appears that something is wrong, then something probably is wrong. Likewise, a smoking gun is considered undeniable proof that something bad has happened, assuming that the smoke means that the gun has just been fired. Therefore, a smoking gun is a way of describing information or material that provides obvious evidence of a wrongdoing or crime.
The term has been around since at least the late 19th century. In an 1893 Sherlock Holmes story, The Gloria Scott, Arthur Conan Doyle wrote of a murder aboard a prison ship:
We rushed into the captain's cabin... there he lay with his brains smeared over the chart of the Atlantic... while the chaplain stood with a smoking pistol in his hand at his elbow.
While "smoking pistol" changed in occasional usage to "smoking gun" over the years, it wasn't until the 1970s that it replaced pistol completely. And this was thanks to the Watergate controversy. The committee created to look into whether former U.S. President Richard Nixon was guilty of a crime was uncertain about impeaching him. Roger Wilkins wrote in a New York Times article on July 14, 1974:
The big question asked by the committee over the last few weeks was "Where's the smoking gun?"
Thus, in addition to other phrases like stonewall and dirty tricks, Watergate was responsible for making the "smoking gun" famous.
(sources: Safire's New Political Dictionary by William Safire, Random House, New York, 1993)
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SMUGGLE OWAD INTO TODAY'S CONVERSATION:
"Where there is no smoking gun, one should be careful about making accusations of wrongdoing."
noun
- something that serves as indisputable evidence or proof, especially of a crime
(The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
---
WORD ORIGIN
There is an old adage "Where there is smoke, there is fire." In other words, if it appears that something is wrong, then something probably is wrong. Likewise, a smoking gun is considered undeniable proof that something bad has happened, assuming that the smoke means that the gun has just been fired. Therefore, a smoking gun is a way of describing information or material that provides obvious evidence of a wrongdoing or crime.
The term has been around since at least the late 19th century. In an 1893 Sherlock Holmes story, The Gloria Scott, Arthur Conan Doyle wrote of a murder aboard a prison ship:
We rushed into the captain's cabin... there he lay with his brains smeared over the chart of the Atlantic... while the chaplain stood with a smoking pistol in his hand at his elbow.
While "smoking pistol" changed in occasional usage to "smoking gun" over the years, it wasn't until the 1970s that it replaced pistol completely. And this was thanks to the Watergate controversy. The committee created to look into whether former U.S. President Richard Nixon was guilty of a crime was uncertain about impeaching him. Roger Wilkins wrote in a New York Times article on July 14, 1974:
The big question asked by the committee over the last few weeks was "Where's the smoking gun?"
Thus, in addition to other phrases like stonewall and dirty tricks, Watergate was responsible for making the "smoking gun" famous.
(sources: Safire's New Political Dictionary by William Safire, Random House, New York, 1993)
---
SMUGGLE OWAD INTO TODAY'S CONVERSATION:
"Where there is no smoking gun, one should be careful about making accusations of wrongdoing."
