"Empowering Advanced Learners of English in Business and Academia - TOEFL / ESL / EFL"

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wag the dog

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Definition


To intentionally divert focus from one issue to another, sometimes less important issue.

Context : Business, Politics
Category: Idiom
Semantic: divert

Usage of “wag the dog”

  1. Stop trying to wag the dog! We need to focus on this first.

  2. Some said the President ordered air strikes were a wag the dog effort to get media attention out of his personal life.

Examples of idiom “wag the dog” from Twitter
  • Default avatar for Twitter user 'Liberty_Activis'
    Liberty_Activis:

    When will Obama do a wag the dog moment? Aug, Sept, Oct? Voice your opinion.

  • Default avatar for Twitter user 'loriswarner'
    loriswarner:

    Taking some pace off a couple of projects. The tail is wagging the dog.