Language Matters: An editorial critique using Orwell's "Politics and the English Language"

Language Matters <Tab/> <Tab/>In his essay, "Politics and the English Language," George Orwell contends that the English language is decaying but that this decay should not be considered inevitable. He lists several "tricks by means of which the work of prose construction is habitually dodged" [682] and argues that much more than a matter of linguistic aesthetics alone, these tricks are symptomatic of--and help lead to additional--problems …

…gt;Kmiec's writing provides an excellent example of the sloppy writing the leads to sloppy thinking as well as the sloppy thinking that leads to sloppy writing that Orwell touches on in his essay. Had Kmiec used Orwell's essay as a reference, he could have found simpler verbs, avoided sounding pretentious as well as used words with concrete definitions so as not to confuse and mislead his reader into swaying their opinion in his direction.