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Phony

Saritdiisraele

Senior Member
Israel, hebrew
In this context does "Phony" means fraud or being fake?

"This is bullshit, he said. The guy’s a phony. Hehas no experience, he has no record; he’s not nearly ready
to be commander in chief."

Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin.
It's an informal variation of "phoney". Other words I can think of that would fit the context would be "shady, unsavoury, fishy"

This guy's shady, unsavoury, fishy, suspicious. There's something off about him. We can't trust him etc. He is far from being ready for being commander in chief.
Neither, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/phoney I doubt someone likely to become commander in chief would be a fraudster or a fake. More likely that he is insincere, pretentious or, as was said, a bullshitter. In fact, the speaker's idea of a phoney is given in the final sentence if you add at the end, "... but he thinks/says that he is."
By the way it's about Obama, Bill Clinton didn't understand how he won Iowa while they invested so much time and money there, I need to check about this "Shady, unsavoury, fishy ..."
Last edited by a moderator:
Paul I really can't know if it means insincere or pretentious ...
Here is another lines from the page maybe it will help ...

"Bill asked. Were they really all Iowans? The Obama campaign must have cheated, he
said, must have bussed in supporters from Illinois."

Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin.
Saritdiisraele said:
I need to check about this "Shady, unsavoury, fishy ..."

Well, I think these are synonyms but are a lot stronger than just "phony". I think you will have no trouble understanding the meaning after you read Cambridge's definition:

Cambridge Dictionary said:
phoney
not sincere or not real
All salespeople seem to have the same phoney smile.
He gave the police a phoney address.
I don't trust him - I think he's a phoney.
Dream the meaning stays the same for me a person who is fake, I know it usually written about "A fake thing" but that's what I understand from the examples ...
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