flam

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The country will not endure another pretentious-sounding banker-friendly flim flam, which is precisely what Geithner has in mind.

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Definitions (11)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. noun Informal A lie or hoax; a deception.
  2. noun Informal Nonsense; drivel.
  3. noun Music A drumbeat consisting of two almost simultaneous strokes of which the first is a very rapid grace note.

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (6)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (2)

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Examples (50)

  • Without the ability to organize by activity, Twitter and Facebook feeds remain a cacophony of messages (they encourage people to send what I call flam -- Friends 'Lovingly Annoying Messages). —  Civilities
  • First up, check out this piece of unlikely flim-flam: semi-competent international bumblers England beat Croatia 4-1, Sven was right all along about Theo Walcott, Frank Lampard is a force at the highest level, Wayne Rooney scored a goal and all that stuff the press wrote about footballers being arrogant, lazy, millionaires who you wouldn't trust with your daughter was a big joke. —  Sport news, comment and results | guardian.co.uk
  • The American Indian Relief Council are scammers, swindlers, and flim-flam men. —  Rad Geek People's Daily
  • If it goes down that way, I think the chances of Federal flim-flam and hyperinflation go up considerably. —  Armed and Dangerous
  • Y'all, next time someone comes at you with a lot of flim-flam about taxes, and how Obama is gonna raise yours, remind them that it's highly unlikely you (or the person who is throwing the flim-flam) actually make up the very small percentage of folks who will feel that tax hike. —  ejshea.com - Erin Shea
 

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This word has been looked up 42 times.

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Etymologies (5)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. Short for flimflam.
  2. Probably of imitative origin.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (3)

  1. Of artificial origin, perhaps from the dial. and former English pronunciation of flame (cf. sham, similarly from shame); flam would then be equivalent to ‘glitter,’ which, with or without a disparaging adjective, is often used in the sense of a false show, illusion, delusion; ef. English dial. flam-new, i. e., fire-new, brand-new: see flam, flame. See flimflam.
  2. from flam, n.
  3. Prob. a variant of fleam.
 

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/flæm/
by American Heritage

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