Religious Citation

Politicians use proverbs in an attempt to arouse the public with vivid，emotionally suggestive words.In certain situations，however，political discourse seeks to pacify the public in order to make an unpleasant reality more palatable.This is accomplished by using proverbs，idioms or biblical utterances to attack opponents.For example，in order to rebuff Beazley's 5 percent unemployment target，and to emphasise his political counterpart's incompetence in the handling of the unemployment problem during his term in office，Howard uses the following biblical utterance to ridicule him：

Mr Beazley says he's going to reach a 5 percent unemployment rate.Mr Beazley had 13 years to do that.And now three weeks from the election he says：“Hallelujah brothers，I've found a way of solving it”（emphasis added）.

Here Howard uses one utterance to propose a condition for his opponent，“Mr Beazley says he's going to reach a 5 per cent unemployment rate”，then uses another utterance to test it，“Mr Beazley had 13 years to do that”，and then draws a conclusion implied in his final utterance，“And now three weeks from the election he says：‘Hallelujah brothers，I've found a way of solving it.'That is，it is impossible for Beazley to achieve his unemployment goal.Howard ridicules his opponent by employing a biblical utterance to emphasise how unrealistic Beazley's claims are.However，such a technique is only effective when the audience comprehends the unlikeliness of what is being suggested ever actually occurring.