OpinionJournal - Taste: Compliments Out of Context

re: Kyle Smith, "...Since virtually every publishing house, theater producer and movie studio rips quotations out of context, one wonders whether even the EU can generate enough bureaucrats to handle the potential caseload. What standards will apply? If I am generally ecstatic about a film but detect one or two small problems, will a 20-word blurb be required to set aside five words for my quibbles? Will four words suffice? A new specialist in parsing such distinctions will arise: the blurbocrat. /Selective communication, though, is not only the brick and mortar of arts-and-leisure--it's built into our lives. You have been as guilty as the studio that made "Next" on many occasions: when discussing bad dates ("she said she had a really interesting time with you at the Hustler Club") or life's greatest miracle ("She's going to grow up to be as beautiful as her mother"). Politicians do it too, of course. The perpetual amusement of spot-the-loophole would wither if pols started saying things like, "I have never broken the laws of my country, but I smoked more pot than Crosby, Stills and Nash combined when I was at Oxford."..."...