Trillions of words have been spoken about politics, but the language used by politicians is remarkably limited. Of course, politics generates new phrases all the time, from “libertarian paternalism” to “hug a hoodie” (actually the same thing, more or less). And politicians are constantly searching for new ways to define their opponents. Margaret Thatcher was called everything from Attila the Hen (Clement Freud) to a bargain basement Boadicea (Denis Healey). Norman Tebbit was damned as a “semi-house-trained polecat” by Michael Foot, while David Cameron has been branded a “shallow salesman” by Gordon Brown. One might think there had been a falling off somewhat in the quality of epithet-mongering since the Seventies, but its undeniable that a lot of energy is still going into insult production. So how can I lament the limitations of political language?

Because you hear political language in its truest form not on the podium, or across the dispatch box, but in the studio. It's not the carefully honed phrases of party conference speechifying or question-time jousting that define contemporary political language, it's the answers politicians give in interviews that govern how we judge them. Conversation has replaced oratory as the art politicians must master.

And few current politicians manage to make their conversation compelling. I'm as guilty as anyone. That's because most of us essentially answer questions, all questions, indeed any questions, in the same way. Just as I argued last week that there are really only four op-ed columns, so there are only three political answers. In no particular order they are:

1. My statistics are bigger than your statistics. Whenever challenged on the facts, simply come up with your own list of numbers and try to browbeat the listener into submission. For example: “Well, you may think its wrong of Lord Voldemort to use his third term to target the muggle-born Sarah, but since we established Death-Eater rule this country has won more Quidditch matches at international level than any other major EU nation, so I think that shows our Snitch Strategy is working.”

2. I may smell, but the other guy's a skunk. Whenever challenged on your record, point out that your predecessors were worse and they would, if they ever returned, wreak havoc on our green and pleasant land. For example: “Yes, under Lord Saruman we haven't been able to put as many uruk-hai on the beat as we would have wanted, and we're working on that, but issues around orc welfare were completely neglected under the old Gandalf regime, and if he and the Fellowship of the Ring get their way we can expect massive cuts in orc provision and a return to the bad old days of two-tier public services with a sheep and goats, elves and orcs approach to policy.”

3. I refuse to recognise your premise and will say what I want anyway. Whenever presented with facts (or an argument) that are inconvenient and there are no bogus stats to hand and you can't recall just why the other guys are worse, then just bulldoze. For example: “So, Lucifer, you said your rebel angels would create a new Jerusalem but instead you've built a pit of flames and suffering - why?” “What we're seeing across creation is a massive upheaval of the kind I think no one predicted, but it's important to bear in mind we've got policies for the long term, with nuclear furnaces replacing the old sulphur-fired ones, training for imps, demons and dark angels as well as a new hellfire to work strategy for the long-term unrepentant. So we're focused on the issue that souls in torment really worry about.”

The buck stops

If I've missed any stock answers, please let me know, but I can't be held responsible for any errors, having handed responsibility for the quality control of this column over to the QCA, the Quarrels and Controversy Authority, where the buck stops (including any mistakes about the number of books in the Library of Congress).

By George

My item about George Eliot last week, in which I asked if she was still read by anyone under 65 or outside academia, brought a series of stinging rebukes. Giles Coren let me know that he was familiar not just with every page of Middlemarch but also Daniel Deronda. Scores of other Times readers wrote in to attest to the quality of Felix Holt and Romola. I am delighted to be corrected. And I can confirm that not only are Times readers hyperliterate they are also, those who know their George Eliot anyway, exceptionally polite.

But there are, as Sherlock Holmes might have put it, two dogs that didn't bark. I wondered if George Eliot was in danger of becoming, like Samuel Richardson and George Meredith, a novelist that only academics read. In all the championing of Eliot, no one paused to contest my assessment of Richardson or Meredith. Is there anyone who still reads them for pleasure? Or Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Warwick Deeping or any work of Thackeray's apart from Vanity Fair? Bestsellers all, now quite unread. Unless you tell me differently...

Michael Gove is Conservative MP for Surrey Heath

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