It just doesn’t hold muster

This one was heard on the podcast Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, and uttered by Jamelle Bouie, columnist for the New York Times. They were talking about the Supreme Court and its current rulings that are highly political in nature, and on ethic issues swirling around the Court at this time. This is a congruent conflation of “does not hold water” and ” does not pass muster”, both referring to something that does not seem to be reasonable or true. I have posted other excellent malaphors involving “muster”, including “it cleared muster”, “it does not withstand muster”, and the classic “it doesn’t pass the mustard”. See, e.g, https://malaphors.com/2018/07/17/he-cleared-muster/.

For those interested, you can hear this malaphor at the 20:05 mark:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-last-word-with-lawrence-odonnell/id1316084734?i=1000619470556

A tip of the hat to Frank King for hearing this one and sending it in! Remember to “hold the muster” on your next argument.