Friday, August 2, 2019

Surging and Ebbing, Playing Your Cards Right

Surging and Ebbing
In politics, and other areas, to surge is to accelerate forward rapidly, while to ebb is to decelerate backward rapidly.

You can surge to make relative progress without making absolute progress, and vice versa.

Example: "The Washington Redskins surged back from behind but lost the game to the New York Jets by 2 points." The surge did not result in victory, but resulted in narrowing the 20 point gap by which the Redskins had been behind at halftime.

Example 2: "Sen. Nelson says he sees the campaign of Kendrick Meek surging following strong performances in recent debates."


Playing Your Cards Right
To play your cards right is to skillfully exploit an opportunity.

Example: (Subject: Payments by BP (formerly known as British Petroleum) to Gulf coast residents for economic losses.)
For those who played their cards right, BP's money brought a summer of quiet windfall. Ted Melancon, a shrimper from Cut Off, La., worked for BP for 130 days.

➤ Read more idioms and phrases, English grammar and vocabulary at Basic English Grammar And Vocabulary .

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