You'll Get a Kick Out of This .

ROLCAM · Posted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 8:50 pm Post subject: You'll Get a Kick Out of This .

You'll Get a Kick Out of This .

When I was a kid, the Mantini kids and I would play a tag-like game called "kick the can." One kid would kick a tin can as far as possible along a dirt driveway. Then the kid who was "it" would have to retrieve the can before trying to tag the others.

So kicking the can as far as you could gave the other kids more time to flee. When Pete Mantini was it, he fumed when someone booted the can a huge distance.

The name of this simple children's game is alive and kicking as a political buzzword of the mid-2000s. "Kick the can" is now the metaphor of choice to describe a delaying tactic or attempt to put off a decision.

The first citation I could find for the term came in the November 11, 2002, issue of the National Review: "In each of these areas -- as in North Korea, as in Iraq -- Clinton's accomplishment was, at best, to kick the can down the road."

A few months later, Jamie Rubin, a former assistant U.S. secretary, of CNN said, "Well, diplomatically, what the prime minister did today is what we call kick the can down the road."

But here's the kicker: The game I played with the Mantini kids might NOT be the source of this political phrase.

In the children's game, kicking the can down the road is a good thing, giving you and your chums more time to escape. But, as used in most political contexts, "kick the can down the road" connotes a bad thing -- postponing a decision or avoiding an issue, a tactic that might cause more problems, well, down the road.

My hunch is that this political term derives from a more incidental pastime my friends and I indulged in as kids: repeatedly kicking the same can or stone down a dirt road as we walked, sometimes taking turns. It was a harmless way of alleviating the boredom of a long, dusty trek.

To me, this mundane diversion seems more consistent with the sense of prolongation and procrastination inherent in the political metaphor.

The only use of "kick the can" I could find that seems consistent with the crafty ploy of the game is this comment from Andrew Moravcsik, director of the European Union Program at Harvard University. It appeared in the Dec. 22, 2003, issue of Newsweek International: "Europe kicked the can down the road? Good. That's the smart play."

I just wish Pete Mantini had seen it that way.

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Roland Camilleri

Moderator

Sydney , Australia.