When people employ “that dog won’t hunt” as a rhetorical mic-drop, are you persuaded?

Once again the ferreting community is overlooked

• I've never heard this before and don't even know what it means

Option for "never heard of it" missing

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I don’t know why I’ve heard this phrase often enough in my life that it’s a weird object of personal fascination.

Anyway, apologies for the lack of a “I’ve never heard this” option

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American things

Pretty sure the first time I ever heard this was Bill Clinton in the '92 campaign--maybe during one of the debates.

I don't, ah, have a dog in this fight

https://clip.cafe/jfk-1991/one-pristine-bullet/

Not Clinton.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ool-F16yct0

I get those two confused all the time.

yes I am

It’s for American politicians and movie characters to sound like folksy American men of the people except actual American folk and people never say this

It’s what Dick Cheney said before he - nevermind

i feel like this guy says it every episode
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5b/Fred_Thompson.jpg/800px-Fred_Thompson.jpg

i like it tbh, makes me think of him 👇🏼
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/looneytunes/images/a/a5/Willoughby_heckling_hare.jpg/

Write in for “Go home Lindsey Graham, you’re drunk”

not as persuasive as "SMITHERS! Release the dogs!"

only heard this in texas chainsaw massacre 2 and the primus song that samples it, but in those cases, the dog will hunt. so i don't know. but my sog definitely won't hunt, so I'm voting that

i love that dog won't hunt. cannot stand the smell test: simultaneously vulgar and supercilious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6HaE2-CjXc

I think I only saw this (or at least only noticed it) for the first time yesterday.

every single person I've ever heard use this in a real life situation was a hardcore Republican douchebag, so a definitive "no" from me

^ same! Weird

Maybe they say it on Fox

I've always experienced it as a southern thing, I don't think I ever heard it before I moved to Atlanta.

oddly enough, i would say 75% of the people I heard use the phrase were Republicans from Wisconsin and despite living in the Milwaukee suburbs, they were definitely into the faux rural vibe - gigantic pick up trucks that never hauled a single thing in the bed, constant conversations about hunting trips, "business casual" topped off with a camo baseball cap, etc.

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the people who say "that dog won't hunt" tend to be all hat and no cattle

Love Southern expressions like this one, even if the people you hear using them in non-hyperlocal contexts are often highly questionable. In grad school I had a professor with an exquisite Faulkner-like way about him who referred to when things were going well as “sittin’ in clover”

Agree with above that it’s a much better turn of phrase then “the smell test” even though I use my nose daily and never have and never will hunt with or without a dog

I don't think he ever actually says it but Ned Beatty in Shooter is the face that comes to mind reading this.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/sSGtw3dR8HI/maxresdefault.jpg

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