Absolutely clear: a rant.

The British Prime Minister, Theresa May (and please don't call her Prime Minister May, because it's wrong and annoying), has a habit of saying let me be absolutely clear...and then going on to say that the thing is everything will be fine once she can just get everyone to agree with her.

Which, of course, isn't clear at all. Let's face it, it's not even politic.

Clear has become a word, like undoubtedly, which signals opacity and doubt. This is clearly the case is, perversely, about something less clear than this is the case.

He's undoubtedly a villain has a faint feeling of uncertainty that he's a villain doesn't possess.

Both clear and undoubted move us gently from the realm of fact to the realm of perception. It's really rather clever.

Anyway, there was a recent example of the use of the word clearly in a piece about Alexa-type devices in the Daily Telegraph. You know the sort of thing I mean: those machines that listen to your activities so they can tell burglars when you've gone out. The piece said:

It's clearly convenient to be able to turn on your bedroom lights from your Amazon Echo speaker in your kitchen...

And I was pleased to discover in this a statement so bonkers that even the word clearly isn't crafty enough to obscure it.

Word To Use Today: clear. This word comes from the Old French cler. The Latin clārus means clear, bright, brilliant or illustrious.