U.S. President Joe Biden has recently found himself in a controversy over his cognitive abilities due to his advanced age. Now, he’s under scrutiny for his ambiguous use of a certain word.
The New York Times (NYT) reported on July 6 that the White House had to go through damage control due to a word Biden used in a recent interview with ABC.
The word in question is “goodest,” which Biden seemed to use to mean “the best” while responding that he had achieved the best results.
The word is grammatically incorrect. It appears that Biden used the word as the superlative form of “good,” but the correct superlative form of “good” is “best.”
Critics say the term “goodest” sounds awkward, even considering that such grammatical rules are often not strictly adhered to in everyday life.
The online edition of the Collins Dictionary describes “goodest” as being used to mean “not the best, but okay,” rather than “the best.”
Even if the people allow for Biden’s use of a grammatically incorrect word, the argument is that he couldn’t properly convey his intended meaning with that word.
While this could be overlooked as a minor mistake in a normal situation, given the ongoing debate over Biden’s cognitive abilities, it may stir up another controversy.
The White House has also taken follow-up measures.
When ABC released the interview transcript, the White House claimed that Biden did not use the word “goodest” and raised the issue with the broadcasting station.
Subsequently, the word in the transcript was changed from “goodest” to “good as.”
Along with this, Biden’s election campaign requested NYT journalists who mentioned the word “goodest” in their articles to revise them.
