smoke-filled room
3
7.2
- noun
- /smoʊk fɪld ruːm/
- Literature
:
sala llena de humo
- Vitti is seated at a big table in the crowded, smoke-filled room.
- hours in a smoke-filled room
Examples
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State party rules, which had evolved for decades since the days of closed-door, smoke-filled rooms, have evolved into a system which, with varying degrees of success, has sought to include the electorate in the process.
Blog text (11) -
Maybe the party shouldn't go back to the old smoke-filled rooms, but some system needs to be in place to keep those people off the ballot.
Blog text (31) -
They cannot just go off into the smoke-filled room and make their deals.
Academic text (2001) -
The old system of old pros in smoke-filled rooms had a better feel for what kind of candidate could appeal nationally.
Blog text (7) -
Classic smoke-filled room with street light cutting through half-closed Venetian blinds.
Fiction book (1997) -
The so-called super committee just seemingly went through the motions of trying to reach a solution while secretly doing the same old political pandering behind closed doors in smoke-filled rooms.
Blog text (25) -
As for presidential selection, the McGovern-Fraser Commission began a revolution that has given greater weight to primaries and caucuses, thus advancing the destruction of the party structures that once housed the infamous "smoke-filled rooms."
Academic text (1992) -
Many important decisions in politics are made in a smoke-filled room, away from public scrutiny.
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The reporters speculated about the agreements reached in the smoke-filled room after the closed-door meeting.
-
Critics argue that the best policies are often determined in smoke-filled rooms, rather than in open discussions.
Synonyms
3
2.6
A room in a hotel or club where people can smoke
Antonyms
How Smoky
Surface Forms
Morphology
smoke-filled + room
For a literal reading the phrase is fully compositional: a learner who knows 'smoke', 'filled' and 'room' will readily infer 'a room filled with smoke.' However, its common figurative use to mean a secretive backroom where unofficial or political decisions are made is a metonymic/figurative extension not directly predictable from the constituents and therefore likely requires prior exposure, so the overall transparency is intermediate.
Etymology
The phrase smoke-filled room comes from the picture of a small room literally full of smoke, where powerful people met away from the public. That's why it now means 'a place where secret or unofficial decisions are made'.