A ‘Terrible, Horrible, No Good’ Trend

The wave began in the spring of 2007, as then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales prepared to face an inquisition over the U.S. attorney firings scandal. The licking of liberal chops was so heavy that Salon.com predicted in advance a "terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day" for Gonzo. (And so it was.) Since then, according to Nexis, that same "terrible, horrible" string of words has appeared in news stories nearly 50 times.

They're all allusions to Judith Viorst's classic 1972 children's book about a hard-luck boy named Alexander, a kid based on the author's young son. In the past year, convicted senator Ted Stevens, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and doomed cabinet nominee Tom Daschle have all received the "horrible, no good, very bad" treatment.

The weird part? Go back just a few more years, to 2005, and "no good, very bad" references all but disappear. Nexis turns up just a handful, most related to the original book itself. Asked if she has any theories about what gives, Viorst, now 78, first asked for the inquiring reporter's age, then noted that kids raised on the book have hit adulthood. "You're all running the world now!" she said. Well, maybe not the world, but evidently a newsroom or two.