Drawing attention to something while claiming to be passing over it.[From Late Latin paralipsis, from Greek paraleipsis (an omission), from paraleipein (to leave on one side), from para- (side) + leipein (to leave).]
Today's word in Visual Thesaurus: http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=paralipsis
Paralipsis is especially handy in politics to point out an opponent's faults. It typically involves these phrases:
"not to mention"
"to say nothing of"
"I won't speak of"
"leaving aside"
An example from Moby Dick:
"We will not speak of all Queequeg's peculiarities here; how he eschewed coffee and hot rolls, and applied his undivided attention to beefsteaks, done rare."
"Political correctness has breathed new life into the paralepsis, the rhetorical device whereby we make a statement by first announcing that we are not going to make it. When pundits write 'No one is suggesting...' the American eye reads 'I'm suggesting.'"
Florence King; If 'Words Mean Things,' Then All Is Lost; Times-Dispatch (Richmond, Virginia); Feb 19, 1995.
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